Making social work more Bourdieusian: why the social professions should critically engage with the work of Pierre Bourdieu

Abstract

In recent years, some attempts have been made to ascertain if the work of the late Pierre Bourdieu has relevance for the work of social workers and others located in the social professions. It is important to support this exploration, but to expand it by also seeking to incorporate the overtly ‘political’ Bourdieu and to highlight some of the issues which preoccupied him. It is argued that his work, when viewed in a more rounded way, may contain a number of key ‘messages’ for social work in the early twenty-first century.

Keywords:

• Habitus
• Field
• Capital
• Doxa
• Intellectuals
• Sociology
• Politics
• Neo-Liberalism