Introduction

Bourdieu argued that in order to understand interactions between people, or to explain an event or social phenomenon, it was insuf- ficient to look at what was said, or what happened. It was necessary to examine the social space in which interactions, transactions and events occurred (Bourdieu 2005: 148). According to Bourdieu, an analysis of social space meant not only locating the object of investigation in its specific historical and local/national/international and relational context, but also interrogating the ways in which previous knowledge about the object under investigation had been generated, by whom, and whose interests were served by those knowledgegeneration practices (e.g. Bourdieu 1993a; 1994d; 2001c).

This chapter looks specifically at what Bourdieu meant by social space, or field, as he named it. After discussing how field can be understood and the work which the theorization of field was designed to accomplish, I consider specific “fields” using Bourdieu's own writings on these topics, as well as that of other social scientists who have adopted his methodological tool kit. I conclude by looking at some critiques made of the idea of field and its operationalization in research.

The idea of field

Bourdieu's first use of the concept of field was in an article entitled “Champ intellectuel et projet créateur” (1971c [1966]; see also Boschetti 2006: 140), which discussed a difference in view between two French scholars, Roland Barthes and Raymond Picard. Bourdieu suggested that despite their differences, both academics were engaged in a similar academic pursuit: such disagreements were the stuff of scholarly practice and both scholars were equally invested in the intrinsic value of dispute and debate (Lane 2000: 73).