Thinking with habitus in the study of learner identities

This chapter examines the way that critical theoretical educational research has operationalized habitus – in conjunction with capitals and field – to examine how learner identities are formed in formal education settings. It provides a brief overview of how Bourdieu conceived of habitus and how he used it to explore and critique social structures. Researchers contend that habitus is at once the “anchor, the compass, and the course of ethnographic journey” while functioning as a ‘conceptual linchpin’ that can translate concepts with highly economic connotations into non-economic paradigms. An integral aspect of Bourdieu’s approach to habitus is the cognitive construction – or cognitive structures – highlighting the co-construction which occurs between field and habitus. Habitus is composed of a set of dispositions inculcated in the familial environment; these dispositions become embodied in the corporeal, through immersion in repetitive social practices and relations.