Pierre Bourdieu's Concept of Capital
Pierre Bourdieu uses the concept of capital for explaining the cause of differences between the academic achievement and performance levels in the education system. Among the things explored is the different types of capital, including cultural capital such as social assets. These capitals also comprise of symbolic goods and materials considered rare and worth seeking. The class position of an individual is determined by the structure and volume of capital that an individual has. Personal ties are also responsible for creating opportunities and building institutional resources. Capital is measured in two dimensions, namely the quantity and structure. The acquisition of the cultural capital requires an individual to be able to internalize after receiving it. An individual's lifestyle and life choices are usually shaped by the amount of capital available to them as well as the social classes, however, the education system tends to transmit and reward the dominant class culture.
Introduction
Bourdieu argues that resources tend to produce a habitus that generates a particular set of behavior when it comes to the contexts of fields. The symbolic power of these resources, links habitus, field, and capital together and uses those concepts to develop accounts of social change, social reproduction, and stratification. Capital is the resource which is classified into three categories, namely economic or the income and ownership, social entailing connections, and culture which is all about credentials, informal education, and cultural objects. Particular agents may possess less or more of the total amount of capital which may be structured in different proportions. An agent may be in possession of the overall amount of capital while another may have a greater proportion of economic and cultural capital. An analysis of Bourdieu's concept in relation to white collar and blue collar workers seeks to explore the relationship between class, occupation, and the concept of capital as well as how an individual lifestyle and life choices are shaped by capital and class.
The Structure and Volume of Capital
The structure and volume of capital are responsible for determining an individual's class position or position in the social space with the primary class division in the scheme being between the low and high total capital. However, within each of those classes, more differences exist between individuals with greater proportions of cultural or the economic capital (Riley 2017). The capital concept provides a map of the various social divisions in a contemporary society. Social capital is centered around the social relationships and networks and it implies the potential assistance and resources that could be drawn when needed. Bourdieu defines social capital to be consisting of two components which are the resources and the social relationship (Bourdieu 1986, p.249-250). One of the things emphasized is that individuals do not exist independently of each other, but they tend to explore the relationships existing between them and this is what defines social capital. Social capital has also been found to relate to whether the closure of weak ties leads to more social capital.
The Influence of Social Capital
Weak ties have been known to be crucial in the creation of social capital whereby weak ties with kin contribute to the building of opportunities and institutional resources. It is essential to understand that social capital may not solve all the social problems (Neveu 2018). In David Bentham's case study, which focuses on the context of college choice, social capital is portrayed to provide resources. Bentham narrates how his father ensured that he enrolled into the same institutions that he and his brothers had graduated from in a bid to ensure that he was equipped with the right skills to take over the family business. De Casanova (2015 p.37), notes that unlike social economic status, social capital is obtainable outside the family, thus indicating that there is room to overcome the limitations of family background. In this case, it is clear to see that individuals owning businesses want their children to be trained and educated in line with their businesses so that they can take over after them as managers (Chapman et al., 2015). It is evident that with time it is possible to form the social capital due to the room that is available for adjusting the behavior of the parents and that of the students to make sure that the process of college choice is desirable.
Lifestyle and Life Choices
The lifestyle and life choices are usually shaped by the amount of capital available to individuals as well as the social classes. Different types of capital are responsible for determining the type of life that an individual lives due to the opportunities that they are presented with. As a resource, capital is classified into different categories such as economic, cultural or even social which deals with connections (Winzler 2014, p. 1-2). Bentham's case study is a good example of how capital can influence an individual's life choices as evidenced in the fact that he is influenced to join university and study courses relating to the management of business run by the family. His father had the social capital in terms of connections, which made sure that he got admitted to the institution that he had desired him to school at (Susen and Turner 2011, 16). The other colleagues in the master class were all studying to take over their family business, thus being the reason for taking a business administration course. It is important to note that the surveys also indicate that adults visiting the cinema are mostly the ones possessing a bachelor's degree or a higher one and mostly working thus indicating that lifestyle is determined by an individual's capital.
The Role of Education System
In Bourdieu's theory of cultural capital and social reproduction, it is argued that the education system tends to transmit and reward the dominant class culture. Schools require the students to possess this ability, but they do not provide them with it and instead, it is the social class that is responsible for allowing the acquisition of the cultural capital and academic rewards. Cultural capital is the cultural and linguistic competence and knowledge of the culture that belongs to the upper class and less frequent in lower classes (Dumais 2002, 45). The education system also reinforces the differences in cultural capital given that there is a preference for styles leaving members of working class without much hope of being able to achieve social mobility. It leads to disparities in the income earned by individuals whereby, individuals from the high class tend to study courses that allow them to become managers as in the case of Bentham thus, earning high household income of about £179,980 while the traditional working class are earning £57,510 (Susen and Turner 2011, p.16-17). The economic capital data gives a clear indication that one's occupation is a determinant in terms of the amount of capital that one can save given that, managers have more household income which enables them to purchase more property and save more.
The Role of Family in Social Class Reproduction
Family plays a crucial role in crafting an individual personal style while inside and out of work which leads to the reproduction of social class. Bourdieu focuses on the reproduction by exploring the role of social groups, family, and school in maintaining the division between social classes and the structure of the society (Bourdieu n.d). Families promote the formation and the transmission of white-collar norms and this can be explained by the concept of cultural capital, which promotes class-based and specialized knowledge (De Casanova 2015, p. 37). In the Bentham case study provided, parents passed on certain cultural capital to their children with sons and their fathers developing blocks of a contemporary white-collar image.
Differences in Tastes and Preferences
The notion of coherent habitus which gets determined by class is something that indicates the differences in particular domains of tastes. Warde (2006, p 13-14) notes that the difference in tastes varies widely across domains of taste with some of them being shaped by occupational groupings as evident in the opera and cinema demographics. According to this data, the public participation of adult viewing opera had 96.8 percent holding managerial positions in corporations. Moreover, 94.2 percent of the same attendees held master's degrees. Adults attending cinema and holding a bachelor's degree made up to 64.4 percent, while 49.8 percent of these individuals were working class (De Casanova 2015, p.37). The data shows that individuals holding white-collar jobs have preferences based on the type of job that they perform and it's the reason why managers are inclined to participating in arts as compared to other activities.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it is clear that Bourdieu's concepts play a crucial role in explaining the differences among the academic achievement and levels of performance in the education system. The analysis of social capital helps to explain the relationship between the different types of capital and how they relate to social classes in society. Resources are also responsible for producing a particular set of behavior as evident in the diverse preferences among managers and the working class individuals. Moreover, the social classes and the amount of capital an individual has are some of the determinants of one's lifestyle and the life choices they make.
References
Bourdieu, P. (1986). “The Forms of Capital.” Pp. 241-258 in Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education, edited by J. G. Richardson. New York: Greenwood Press.
Bourdieu, P. (n.d.). The Forms of Capital by Pierre Bourdieu 1986. [online] Marxists.org. Available at: https://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/fr/bourdieu-forms-capital.htm [Accessed 26 May 2018].
Chapman, S., Holborn, M., Moore, S. and Aiken, D., 2015. AQA A Level Sociology Student Book 2 (AQA A Level Sociology). Collins Learning.
De Casanova, E.M., 2015. Buttoned up: Clothing, conformity, and white-collar masculinity. Cornell University Press.
Dumais, S.A., 2002. Cultural capital, gender, and school success: The role of habitus. Sociology of education, pp.44-68.
Neveu, E. (2018). Bourdieu’s Capital(s). Oxford Handbooks Online.
Riley, D. (2018). Bourdieu’s Class Theory. [online] Catalyst-journal.com. Available at: https://catalyst-journal.com/vol1/no2/bourdieu-class-theory-riley [Accessed 26 May 2018].
Susen, S. and Turner, B.S. eds., 2011. The Legacy of Pierre Bourdieu: Critical Essays. Anthem Press.
Warde, A. (2006). Cultural capital and the place of sport. Cultural Trends, 15(2-3), pp.107-122.
Winzler, T. (2014). Pierre Bourdieu’s Field Theory and its use for understanding the illicit trafficking of cultural objects.
