ABSTRACT
One of the many attractions of working with P. Bourdieu, and perhaps the most appealing, is his insistence that his theoretical tools are not intended for theoretical commentary but should be put to use in empirical research. For Bourdieu all so-called objective knowledge can be seen to be constantly provisional, subject to testing and reformulation. For Bourdieu, reflexivity is the principle that connects the epistemological security of the research project to the socio-analysis of the researcher as a cultural producer, and to the analyses of the conditions of possibility of education as a discipline. For Bourdieu, choices between agency and structure, submission and resistance, are inevitably spurious. Of all the social theorists of the twentieth century Bourdieu had the most overt commitment to equality and social justice. In ‘The Practical Importance of Bourdieu’s Analysis of Higher Education’ Derek Robbins argues that the strength of Bourdieu’s analyses of educational practices lies in his refusal to remove them from their social contexts.
