When science meets self-analysis

Pierre Bourdieu's heritage for a sociology of self-defense

Abstract

This article interprets the scenario of the scientific field in contemporary Brazil in the light of Pierre Bourdieu's sociological theory. In this effort, he looks at how Bourdieu produces a theory of classes, suggesting that his sociology reorganizes the Marxian scheme in the matter of interests. It reconstructs the way in which Bourdieu makes habitus an operative concept, and points out the extent to which habitus is restricted by social class. In the sequence, the analysis regarding the articulation established between the class and the habitus operates, showing how much this connection acts in the composition of the agents' world perception categories. The article chooses Bourdieu's concept of collective self-analysis or collective socio-analysis, placing the Brazilian scientific field under analytical scrutiny. The elaborated interpretation indicates that the political rearticulations of the last years, especially of the middle classes, resulted in a weakening of the Brazilian scientific field. Along with this, the administrative reforms and budget cuts of the State put researchers in a conflict situation due to the scarcity of resources. Finally, the text recalls some outputs produced by Pierre Bourdieu in the French context, when science is under the attack of neoliberalism. This is to encourage, in the horizon of debates between Brazilian researchers and scientists, the possibility of sketching a sociology of self-defense of the autonomy of the scientific field.