Street talk and Bourdieusian criminology: Bringing narrative to field theory
| Author | Jennifer Fleetwood,Sveinung Sandberg |
| Date | 01 September 2017 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1748895816672909 |
| Published date | 01 September 2017 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1748895816672909
Criminology & Criminal Justice
2017, Vol. 17(4) 365 –381
© The Author(s) 2016
Reprints and permissions:
sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav
DOI: 10.1177/1748895816672909
journals.sagepub.com/home/crj
Street talk and Bourdieusian
criminology: Bringing
narrative to field theory
Sveinung Sandberg
University of Oslo, Norway
Jennifer Fleetwood
University of Leicester, UK
Abstract
The work of Bourdieu has increasingly gained interest in criminology. His theoretical framework is
rich and arguably the most sophisticated approach to social inequality and difference in sociology.
It has however, been criticized for bias towards the structural aspects of social life, and for
leaving little space for the constitutive, and creative role of language. We argue for the inclusion
of narrative for understanding street fields. Based on qualitative interviews with 40 incarcerated
drug dealers in Norway, we describe the narrative repertoire of the street field, including stories
of crime business, violence, drugs and the ‘hard life’. The narrative repertoire is constituted by
street capital, but also upholds and produces this form of capital. Street talk is embedded in
objective social and economic structures and displayed in the actors’ habitus. Narratives bind the
street field together: producing social practices and social structure.
Keywords
Bourdieu, narrative criminology, narrative habitus, stories, street capital, street culture
Introduction
Anders was a mid-level amphetamine dealer with a long history of drug use and crime.
He was in prison and committed to drug treatment at the time of the interview. Although
Corresponding author:
Sveinung Sandberg, Department of Criminology and Sociology of Law, University of Oslo, St Olavs plass 5,
Domus Nova, 0130 Oslo, Norway.
Email: sveinung.sandberg@jus.uio.no
672909CRJ0010.1177/1748895816672909Criminology & Criminal JusticeSandberg and Fleetwood
research-article2016
Article
366 Criminology & Criminal Justice 17(4)
he was motivated to end his criminal lifestyle when he got out, he explained that it was
not easy: ‘I have so many years of ingrained routines. How to talk, how to think, how to
be’, he said. In Pierre Bourdieu’s terms, Anders’ long experiences in the street profoundly
shape his habitus. Anders also makes clear that this embodied knowledge includes talk.
Henrik, a mid-level cannabis dealer with a similar life story, also stated: ‘[w]hat the fuck
am I going to talk about? The last years have been all about crime, drugs.’ Henrik con-
tinued, ‘[y]ou lose control over what to say, what you can talk to people about’. Social
networks, formal and informal competencies all play for reintegration from a criminal
lifestyle, but talk is pivotal too. Narratives connect past, present and future selves, as well
as between the self and one’s group. Anders and Henrik possessed a wide repertoire of
stories and vocabularies – their street talk – borne of, and belonging to, the street field.
Although these had been invaluable in the street, they formed an invisible barrier to
mainstream society.
Sociologists of crime, deviance and control have long employed Bourdieu’s con-
ceptual toolkit, which considers how ‘wider cultural and social structures such as pov-
erty, unemployment and class interact at the individual and group level to shape
unconscious behaviours and dispositions’ (Moyle and Coomber, 2017: 3). A contem-
porary literature has emerged developing Bourdieu’s concepts (habitus, capital and
field) in studies of juvenile delinquency, crime, drug use and gangs (e.g. Fleetwood,
2014; Fraser, 2015; Harding, 2014; Ilan, 2015; Parkin, 2013; Sandberg and Pedersen,
2009). Scholars inspired by Bourdieu have tended to downplay the significance of talk.
As interviews with drug dealers like Henrik and Anders demonstrate, narrative and
language are not ephemera, or ‘icing on the cake’ of social practice, but have important
functions: they establish the boundaries of the field, and are closely bound up with
habitus and capitals.
In this study we use interviews with mid- and high-level drug dealers in Norway to
identify the narrative repertoire of the street field. We outline the various ways in which
talk is produced by, and produces the street, and suggest that stories about crime busi-
ness, violence, drugs and the ‘hard life’ are core components in what can be described as
the street field. Throughout we argue that these stories are embedded in objective social
and economic structures and actors’ habitus, and that discursive practices – most impor-
tantly stories – are the glue that binds the field together: narratives re-produce social
practices and therefore social structure. Including a narrative dimension to Bourdieu’s
conceptual framework not only reflects the importance of stories and talk in the street,
but can overcome the problem of over-determinism arguably present in Bourdieu’s
theory.
Bourdieu, Social Structure, Social Practice – and Narrative
Bourdieu’s theory of social practice is well known. In brief, habitus, field and capitals,
are ‘thinking tools’ for studying the ways that social fields and individual social practices
are mutually constituting (Bourdieu, 1990). Individual actions are generated by the habi-
tus: the internalization of the social field entrenched through experience and socializa-
tion. Furthermore, an individual’s position within fields shapes and is shaped by their
access to social, cultural and economic capitals (Bourdieu, 1990).
To continue reading
Request your trial