The Habitus of Dancing

Abstract

This article uses Bourdieu’s cultural framework to analyze the social determinants and internal logic of a swing dance field in New York City. Using habitus, field, hexis, and cultural capital, the author offers an ethnographic analysis of how former members of punk subcultures transposed their durable, familial-based dispositions into the swing dance field. Likewise, this article explores the homologies between the fields of punk and swing and examines the influence of the agents’ class backgrounds. To conclude, the author considers possible extensions of Bourdieu for future studies of American leisure and consumption.

Sensoriality, Social Interaction, and “Doing sensing” in Physical–Cultural Ethnographies

“…Indeed, our ethnomethodologically-inspired perspective contributes to a vibrant strand in ethnography, which focuses on the detailed examination of embodied practices as socio-culturally framed and developed. Ethnographic studies have, for example, also drawn on a Bourdieusian framework, to explore the development of habitus as forged through practice, in both physical cultures (e.g., Doane 2006) and occupational cultures (e.g., O'Connor 2005), to give but two instances. The employment of an ethnomethodological perspective allows us to sharpen the focus on the "doing" of sensing and sensuousity, and on the sensory self as "produced" in specific interactional contexts.…”