{"id":719,"date":"2025-03-28T14:44:26","date_gmt":"2025-03-28T13:44:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/practicalsense.net\/?page_id=719"},"modified":"2025-12-01T15:34:57","modified_gmt":"2025-12-01T14:34:57","slug":"9-2-html-the-relevance-of-la-misere-du-monde-30-years-later","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/practicalsense.net\/index.php\/issue-no-1\/9-2-html-the-relevance-of-la-misere-du-monde-30-years-later\/","title":{"rendered":"The Relevance of La Mis\u00e8re du monde 30 Years Later"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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University of Pisa, April 17, 2024<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

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Officina Bourdieu\u2019s Seminar Group<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

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On April 17, to mark the 30th anniversary of the publication of La Mis\u00e8re du monde<\/em>, the Italian Bourdieu Research Group organized a dedicated seminar at the University of Pisa. The event, held at the Department of Political Sciences, aimed to explore the relevance and significance of this seminal collective work edited by Pierre Bourdieu, from multiple perspectives. Three distinguished scholars were invited to participate.<\/span>
Rita Bichi from the Universit\u00e0 di Milano \u2013 Cattolica discussed Bourdieu\u2019s methodology, drawing a comparison between the<\/span> article \u201cL\u2019illusion biographique\u201d and the final chapter of La Mis\u00e8re du monde<\/em>, titled \u201cComprendre\u201d. According to Bichi, in his earlier work, Bourdieu rejected the r\u00e9cits de vie<\/em> approach, emphasizing the challenges of reconstructing the evolving dynamics of the field solely through personal life stories. However, Bichi also pointed out that in the later methodological essay, Bourdieu advocates for a more flexible approach, suggesting a reevaluation of interviews as a means to comprehend individuals’ social and personal worlds. The essence of this approach, she argued, lies in extracting key elements from interviewees’ words, rooted in their social context, which helps in better understanding their contingent agency. Thus, the informant’s discursive status gains<\/span>
legitimacy through the interview process, fostering researchers\u2019 reflexivity and mitigating symbolic violence, all while respecting the interviewee.<\/span>
Bichi\u2019s presentation was followed by Mirella Giannini\u2019s from the Universit\u00e0 di Napoli \u2014 Federico II. Giannini embraced the idea of bridging the gap between micro and macro dimensions through Bourdieu’s methodology. She further argued that this approach also necessitates overcoming the divide between research activities and political engagement. While Bourdieu maintained a critical distance from political activism as a sociological duty, he adjusted his position in response to the emerging neoliberal order of the early 1990s. Giannini highlighted how the authors of La Mis\u00e8re du monde<\/em> examined, first, the manifestations of precariousness among interviewees, whose struggles differ based on their habitus and local positions. Second, they revealed the uncertain and often miserable lives of individuals who cope with inequalities<\/span> through self-blame and a denial of aspirations, often unaware of the structural roots of their precarity within neoliberalism.<\/span>
Finally, Antonello Petrillo from the Universit\u00e0 di Napoli \u2014 Suor Orsola Benincasa, who edited the Italian translation of Bourdieu\u2019s volume, offered insights into the book’s contents and its editorial legacy, reflecting on the conditions of contemporary research. He stated that confronting and challenging misery, now standardized under neoliberalism, is essential for social researchers, particularly within the increasingly weakened public university and social spheres. Additionally, by moving away from axiological neutrality<\/span> toward a more interactive relationship with interviewees, the sociological practice put forth by Bourdieu rejects fixed, \u201cepistemocratic\u201d solutions. Petrillo argued that sociology, as the art of questioning the social world in collaboration with interviewees, aligns with a bottom-up practice that transforms personal troubles into public issues. This principle embodies<\/span> Bourdieu\u2019s intellectual legacy: research as the practice of breaking with fate, connecting the individual to broader history, and offering new prospects based on a deep understanding of lived<\/span> realities.<\/span>
Following these discussions, The Lab\u2019s Quarterly<\/em> will host a symposium to present these reflections and further contributions, building upon the valuable insights of Pierre Bourdieu, and encouraging new theoretical and methodological debates and research directions.<\/span><\/p>\n

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University of Pisa, April 17, 2024 Officina Bourdieu\u2019s Seminar Group On April 17, to mark the 30th anniversary of the publication of La Mis\u00e8re du monde, the Italian Bourdieu Research […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":545,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-719","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/practicalsense.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/719","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/practicalsense.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/practicalsense.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/practicalsense.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/practicalsense.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=719"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/practicalsense.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/719\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2501,"href":"https:\/\/practicalsense.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/719\/revisions\/2501"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/practicalsense.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/practicalsense.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=719"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}