Pierre Bourdieu: Sociology Is A Martial Art

Directed by Pierre Carles. Produced by Veronique Fregosi and Annie Gonzalez. C.P. Productions and VF Films, 2001.
VHS video. 146 minutes. Color.
Available from First Run / Icarus Films,
32 Court Street, 21st Floor,
Brooklyn NY 11201.
Website: http://www.frif.com.

Reviewed by Roy R. Behrens,
Department of Art,
University of Northern Iowa,
Cedar Falls, IA 50614-0362, U.S.A.

ballast@netins.net

This is a collage-like film biography of an outspoken French sociologist, university professor and Chair of Sociology at the College de France, who died in 2002 at age 71. Filmed over a period of three years, it was popular in France shortly before Bourdieu's early death. Unfortunately, it may not be quite as engaging for American audiences because nearly all the soundtrack is in French (with English subtitles), while the issues addressed are so hopelessly huge that, even if it were in English, it is unlikely to be penetrable by anyone except a Bordieu enthusiast. The film's title is derived from a colorful statement in which Bordieu (in this film and in earlier writings) refers to sociology as "a martial art, a means of self-defense." It also alludes to his vocal support of certain socio-economic causes, as distinct from a reclusive scholar who stays at arm's length from his research subject. The particular film is enriched by several odd events, as when this "celebrity scholar" is hailed on the street by a former student who talks on and on about his influence on her, and yet never lets him speak. In another segment, he converses with the German novelist Gunter Grass on a television program; and in a third, we can follow his facial expressions as he opens, reads and is completely baffled by a letter from the French screenwriter Jean Luc Godard. In a documentary that is lengthier than most feature films, one cannot help but start to sense his exasperation with his own life. For more than two cinematic hours, we follow him as he goes to political rallies, to research conferences, to interviews with journalists, on endless car and airplane trips, to meetings with students, and to sessions with his office staff. There is a revealing moment in which he stands alone, totally exhausted, then suddenly looks at the camera and sighs, "Poor Bordieu." He has become so sought after that he no longer has the time nor the energy to do what allowed him to gradually build "cultural capital" (one of his favorite terms), and to rise from his working class origins to academic prominence.

(Reprinted by permission from Ballast Quarterly Review, Vol. 18, No. 3, Spring 2003.)