ABSTRACT
This chapter is the third ‘background’ discussion to the three main themes of the book: classrooms, language and ethnography. Here, we offer an account of Pierre Bourdieu's perspective on language and education, since much of the later work in this book is presented in the light of his philosophical position and method. We are leading towards an account of a Bourdieusian ethnography of the language classroom. Language and Education are two separate fields, which need to be seen as being both distinct and integrated. The chapter consequently aims to show the degree to which the particular dimensions of one field also has implications for the other in terms of Bourdieu's general theory of practice. Since our concern is ethnographic, issues of context will never be far away from the discussion. The chapter considers Bourdieu's main theoretical positions, his ‘key concepts’ (see Grenfell, 2008 for further detail) and how these arose from and have implications for the study of language and education. It will contrast his approach to that of other writers in the broad area of ‘language and education’ and compare a Bourdieusian methodology with other approaches. The major aspects of adopting such a method will be discussed, together with the advantages they may have – in intent at least – over other methodological approaches. Education is itself a multidisciplinary subject. It will consequently be necessary to refer to issues from other cognate fields, such as history, psychology and sociology. Similarly, language needs to be understood as being central to such academic fields as philosophy and the study of language itself – linguistics (including sociolinguistics and social psycholinguistics). These disciplines will also be referred in the course of the discussion in this and later chapters of the book. Due to limitations of space, this chapter represents a summative rather than a chronological account of Bourdieu, language and education (see Grenfell, 1999 and Grenfell, 2010 for a fuller account). However, it is important, at the outset, to note that Bourdieu himself always insisted on a ‘socio-genetic’ interpretation of his work; in other words, that it should be read in terms of the socio-cultural, as well as academic context, from which it emerged. The first section of the chapter therefore places Bourdieu's work within his own personal and academic trajectory.
