THEY EMPLOY CLEANERS TO DO THAT - HABITUS IN THE PRIMARY CLASSROOM

Pierre Bourdieu suggests that his concept of habitus should be seen as a method; a le,ay of thinking about the social world which invites an understanding of everyday practices as constitutive of social differe nces. The appeal of habitus lies in its ability to uncover social ineq ualities in a way that keeps agency and structure simultaneously in fo cus. However, there are also problems in operationalising habitus, chi efly because of the indeterminacy of the concept. In order to overcome these difficulties I have outlined four key components of habitus and attempted to delineate the aspects of habitus as method that seem mos t relevant to primary classrooms. Finally drawing on ethnographic data gathered over 15 months of participant observation in two primary cla ssrooms, the article seeks to explore through the lens of habitus how differences of gender, 'race' and class are produced by children in pr imary classrooms. Although I make no claims for my own empirical work it does suggest that habitus as method has the potential to reveal the taken-for-granted inequalities embedded in everyday practices.