The conference in tribute to Monique Pinçon-Charlot et Michel Pinçon aims to examine the relevancy of concepts in use to comprehend the members of the dominant classes, such as - in French - "hauts fonctionnaires", "capitaines d’industries", "responsables politiques", "top managers", "think tank", "intellectuels influents". The focus of attention of the conference lies in the question, how these concepts can help to understand, in which sens the members of the dominant classes are relatively unbound of the stakes, the rules of game and the frontiers of certain fields, which all are otherwise granted.

The conference is coorganized by the RT "sociologie des élites" of the AFS and the LaSSP of the l’IEP of Toulouse.

See the full text of the call for papers in French.

Submission deadline: October 31 2010.

Contact and further information: Sylvain Laurens, sylvainlaurens (at) free.fr

The conference aims to examine the current relevancy of Pierre Bourdieu's book Distinction in contemporary sociological research on topics as diverse as food practices, political attitudes, housing conditions, forms of residential and geographic mobility, attitudes in the areas of mores and the family, educational styles, cultural practices, etc. The cultural questions, which have undoubtedly retained more than other topics the attention of present-day readers of Distinction, will obviously be particularly focused on, but this thematic orientation is far from exclusive.

Start here to submit a paper to this conference.