The Relational Habitus: Intersubjective Processes in Learning Settings

Abstract

The relational habitus, an adaptation of Bourdieu’s concept of habitus, is an ecological ensemble of relations including self, tools, tasks, and others that is intersubjectively constructed and sustained over time in formal and informal learning communities. The development of the relational habitus explains variances in the social organization of meaning making in local arenas of learning, referred to as dynamic fields. As a theoretical tool, the relational habitus encompasses two interrelated aspects of intersubjectivity: (a) an orientation to others in cultural contexts and (b) mutual perspective taking accomplished through communication. These two aspects of intersubjectivity explain how the meaning-making processes that promote learning and development involve both agential action and the situational structuring of these actions.