Symbolic revolutions. Mobilizing a neglected Bourdieusian concept for historical sociology

The article builds on a recent literature that has sought to underscore the relevance of Bourdieu’s field theory for historical-sociological analysis. It draws attention to symbolic revolutions, a concept that has been given short shrift in this literature and even in Bourdieu’s own expositions of his field-theoretical apparatus. The article argues that symbolic revolutions denote a universal mechanism of field-internal change which extends and complements a conceptual battery of mostly structural universals of fields. In a synoptic reading of Bourdieu’s field-theoretical work, the article fleshes out an ideal type of symbolic revolutions, with special regard to its dialectical features. It adds further analytical purchase to the concept by highlighting continuities and parallels with the work of Thomas Kuhn and Karl Mannheim. Finally, it argues that more recent studies by other authors on transformations in the psychiatric field, the field of social and human sciences, and the political field are in fact discussing instances of symbolic revolutions. It thus shows how the concept can help identify common properties among highly heterogeneous phenomena, opening up new avenues for historical-sociological investigations that can more systematically relate the general and the particular.

Universals

Immanent realism is the view that some fundamental properties are immanent universals, entities that can exist wholly in different places at the same time that yet only exist when instanced. This chapter develops the proper immanent realist account of the basic properties and relations that appear in our experience. It includes a new understanding of the relation between determinate and determinable universals. Another novelty involves determinable structural universals constituting one fundamental substantial form of ordinary concrete particulars. Various other complexities of modal structure are developed. Cases discussed include phenomenal color, other sensory properties, spatial and temporal relations, causal powers, and substantial forms. Some affinities but also differences with transcendental realism are considered.

STRUCTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY OF CLAUDE LEVI-STRAUSS AS A METHOD OF STUDYING THE ETHNIC RELIGION OF OSSETIANS.

Этническая религия осетин – сложный объект для изучения по ряду причин. Актуальность ее исследования возрастает с каждым днем. Не­смотря на то, что в последнее десятилетие она переживает некоторое возрождение, современное этнорелигиозное мировоззрение осетин суще­ственно отличается от дореволюционного, об аспектах которого мы имеем возможность судить, в частности, благодаря массиву нарратив­ных источников, фиксирующих народные легенды, предания, травелоги путешественников с описанием элементов традиционной культуры народа. Поэтому необходима конкретизация временного периода, в рам­ках которого мы исследуем этнорелигиозное мировоззрение. Не менее важным является учет социальной среды, поскольку социально-группо­выми различиями (прежде всего, территориально-населенческими) опре­делялась разница и религиозного мировоззрения. Мы изучаем религиозные представления, бытовавшие в среде горской части осетинского этноса в конце XIX – начале XX в., поскольку именно эти люди являлись носите­лями того, что можно считать квинтэссенцией традиционной осетин­ской религии. Этническая религия осетин, безусловно, самобытна, в силу чего мо­жет представлять сложность для исследователя, по логике нуждающе­гося в разработке уникального исследовательского инструментария под стать изучаемому объекту. В настоящей статье впервые представлена апробация структурной методологии Клода Леви-Стросса как наиболее оптимальной для изучения традиционных культур, в частности, рели­гиозной культуры осетинских горцев в указанный период. В этом заклю­чается новизна настоящего исследования. Нашей целью является демон­страция того, как метод структурной антропологии Леви-Стросса спо­собствует поискам научной истины в области реконструкции аспектов религиозного мировоззрения в традиционном осетинском обществе. Для этого в рамках статьи мы решили ряд исследовательских задач, к числу которых, помимо изложения сути методологии Леви-Стросса, относится поиск структурных универсалий в рамках традиционной религии осе­тин и их анализ по аналогии с подобными объектами в иных культурах. The ethnic religion of the Ossetians is a difficult subject and a number of reasons make its study complex. The relevance of its research is increasing every day. Despite the fact that in the last decade it has been experiencing some revival, the modern ethno-religious worldview of the Ossetians differs significantly from the pre-revolutionary one, the aspects of which we can judge, in particular, thanks to the array of narrative sources that record folk legends, traditions, travel logs of travelers with descriptions of elements of traditional culture of the people. Therefore, it is necessary to concretize the time period within which we study the ethno-religious worldview. It is no less important to take into account the social environment, since social and group differences (primarily, territorial and population ones) determined the difference in religious worldview. We study the religious ideas that existed among the mountainous part of the Ossetian ethnos in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, since it was these people who were carriers of what can be considered the quintessence of the traditional Ossetian religion. The ethnic religion of Ossetians is undoubtedly original, which makes it difficult for a researcher who logically needs to develop a unique research tool to match the object under study. In this article, for the first time, the approbation of the structural methodology of Claude Levi-Strauss is presented as the most optimal for the study of traditional cultures, in particular, the religious culture of the Ossetian highlanders during this period. This is the novelty of this study. Our goal is to demonstrate how the Levi-Strauss method of structural anthropology contributes to the search for scientific truth in the field of reconstruction of aspects of religious worldview in traditional Ossetian society. To this end, within the framework of the article, we solved a number of research problems, which, in addition to stating the essence of the Levi-Strauss methodology, include the search for structural universals within the traditional religion of the Ossetians and their analysis by analogy with similar objects in other cultures.

An Analysis of the Debate over Structural Universals

The paper outlines a conceptual framework to identify all ontological and logical aspects relevant for the debate over structural universals. The framework allows for a multi-facetted classifications of various accounts of the latter and facilitates their comparison in a systematic way. To show the framework in action I use it to classify all major theoretical positions in this debate.

Knowledge, Certainty, and Skepticism

Epistemic universalism, the view that epistemic intuitions are culturally universal, plays an important role in underwriting ordinary practice in contemporary epistemology. But is it true? Here the authors present several studies that examine epistemic universalism by looking at the relationships between cultural background, folk knowledge attribution, and salience effects, whereby mention of an unrealized possibility of error undermines our willingness to attribute knowledge. These studies suggest that there may be structural universals, universal epistemic parameters that influence epistemic intuitions, but that these parameters can vary in such a way that certain epistemic intuitions, in either their strength or propositional content, display patterns of genuine cross-cultural diversity.