Foundations of a theory of symbolic violence (Translated from French by N. Shmatko)

Abstract

We are publishing chapters from the first part of Pierre Bourdieu’s book in order that our readers could be among the first to become acquainted with one of the most important works in the controversy on education inequality. For Pierre Bourdieu, an outstanding French sociologist of the 20th century, the problem of education inequality was among the most crucial. He considered this inequality not as a separate phenomenon, but rather as a manifestation of the general mechanism of social reproduction. The way this mechanism is realized in the education system is treated in his book Reproduction. Foundations of a theory of education, written with J.-C. Passeron in 1970. This work was practically unknown to Russian researchers. Currently, a Russian translation of this book is being readied for publication by the Prosveshchenie publishers together with the National Foundation for Workforce Training and the Moscow School for Social and Economic Sciences in the series «Education. World Bestsellers.