Bourdieu and After: A Guide to Relational Phenomenology

Bourdieu and After aims to provide exactly this overview. Working closely with Bourdieu’s own writings, but also covering a wide range of research and literature inspired by him, it aims to guide the reader through the key principles, the major and minor concepts and the concrete findings of Bourdieusian sociology as clearly and comprehensively as possible. It explains the difficult and often overlooked philosophical foundations, walks through the logic of famous terms like ‘field’, ‘habitus’ and ‘capital’ and demonstrates how they have been or can be used to provide powerful accounts of colonialism, the emergence of nation states and the rise of global social relations. It covers topics that Bourdieu was famous for analysing, like class and educational inequality, yet also traverses subjects on which he said little but that others influenced by him have tackled in depth, such as ethnicity, sexuality and family.

Along the way Atkinson seeks to undermine some of the common criticisms levelled at Bourdieu while identifying remaining gaps and limitations. Rather than simply recognising the problems, however, Atkinson proposes possible solutions too – solutions that are facilitated, he argues, by characterising Bourdieusian sociology as what he calls ‘relational phenomenology’.