Bourdieu: Key Concepts

The French social philosopher Pierre Bourdieu (1930-2002) is now recognised as one of the major thinkers of the twentieth century. In a career of over fifty years, Bourdieu studied a wide range of topics: education, culture, art, politics, economics, literature, law, and philosophy. Throughout his studies, Bourdieu developed a highly specialised series of concepts that he referred to as his "thinking tools", which were used to uncover the workings of contemporary society. Pierre Bourdieu: Key Concepts takes a selection of his most important concepts and examines them in detail. Focusing on an individual concept, each chapter is written to be of immediate use to the student with little or no previous knowledge of Bourdieu. At the same time, the chapters develop various dimensions around each concept to make the coverage of interest to the more experienced reader.