Cultural Sociology

In this new blog post Senior Lecturer Steven Threadgold (@stevethready75) from the University Newcastle discusses his new book on Bourdieu, entitled ‘Bourdieu and Affect: Towards a Theory of Affective Affinities’.

Steven responds to several questions posed by the conveners of the TASA Cultural Sociology thematic group in this video lecture:

 
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLP5AT9RnWI&t

The questions we directed at Steven included:

1. What were your motivations for writing the book?
2. Where do you stand on the debate about Bourdieu's supposed determinism and how does Bourdieu and Affect help to shift the term of such debates? 
3. Can you outline how an affective reading of a key Bourdieusean concepts (for e.g., "habitus" or "distinction") transforms that concept and its usefulness for cultural sociological/sociology of culture analysis?
4. The backcover of your book refers to fields as socio-cultural worlds with atmospheres. This is a very novel synthesis of Bourdieu with recent spatial-affective theory. Could you please provide an empirical instance of a field's atmosphere from research you have conducted?
5. Overall, how would you describe the book to a friend or someone you met at the pub who wasn’t a sociologist?

The book is now available for purchase from Bristol University Press, so please be sure to order yourself and your library a copy now!  https://bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/bourdieu-and-affect

Thanks again to Steve for responding to our request! 

We also look forwards to featuring other authors who are eager to share and discuss their recent publications (please feel free to get in contact should you wish to provide a blog post).