This article explores both the contributions and the drawbacks of the work of French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu. Habitus and symbolic violence, terms central to Bourdieu's thought, are explicated, as well as his critical assessments of methodological and epistemological problems in current social scientific research. In particular the drawbacks of public opinion polls and survey research, and the problematics of the social scientist as social subject, are treated. Bourdieu's metaphorical preferences are highlighted to indicate the assumptions he makes regarding social scientific practices and the hidden pitfalls of adapting his work wholesale to the field of communications. Finally, the social paradigm underpinning Bourdieu's work is compared with that underpinning a cultural studies approach to the study of communications.
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