social field

is (as distinguished from the cultural field) the groups, relationships, and social-structural organizational principles of the society in which rituals are performed.

Following the field-theory of Kurt Lewin (1949), Turner (1967:262-268) distinguished the social from the cultural field in which rituals take place... 'The social field (or action-field) refers to the groups, relationships, and social-structural organizational principles of the society in which the rituals are performed. (Turner 1968a:87-88).

is a competitive system of social relations, composed of individual 'agents' who are vying for the same stake... namely, the attainment of the degree of dominance that allows them to confer, or withdraw, legitimacy from other 'agents' within the social field.

Bourdieu's social field is a competitive system of social relations, composed of individual 'agents' who are vying for the same stake. What is at stake is the attainment of the degree of dominance that allows them to confer, or withdraw, legitimacy from other 'agents' within the social field. He speaks of 'an ensemble of relationships between «agents' antagonistically oriented to the same prizes or values' or alternatively 'fields of organized striving' (Bourdieu 1990).

is, among the Ndembu, dominated by the contradiction between matrilineal descent and virilocality. Ritual thus functions therein as a redressive mechanism in a social drama whenever crisis occurs.

In the case of the Ndembu, this refers to the ritual's function as a redressive mechanism in a social drama, and to such numerical characteristics as the number of villages represented during the ritual, the pattern of intervillage relationships, and the goals and aims of the people attending the rituals. In Ndembu society, the social field is dominated by the contradiction between matrilineal descent and virilocality. The rituals of affliction here serve as redressive mechanisms whenever a crisis occurs. The social field bears no relevance to life-crisis rituals, because the latter 'take no account of the actual balance between persons and groups but dogmatically stress the key values and concepts of Ndembu society, in virtual independence of the concrete historical situation' (Turner 1968a:87-88).

is that wherin every position induces a set of motivations that are subjectively experienced as what should be done.

Action is explained in terms of position and trajectory. According to Bourdieu (1990) every position in a social field is seen to induce a set of motivations that are subjectively experienced as a 'chain of objective requirements . . . what' should be done. Meanwhile, the actor's trajectory, their direction of movement through, and status within, the social field, determines the 'social fate' that propels them towards the places to which their socially constituted dispositions predestine them.

social field, n.Definitions

social field