What Is Habitus?

Abstract

The history of anthropology has made a tradition of studying the body. Among those early scholars who gifted us with fundamental ideas was Marcel Mauss. In the 1920s, Mauss’s students at the University of Paris acted as sounding board for his thoughts on body techniques. He formalized his lecture notes for a 1934 presidential address to the Société de Psychologie. His abbreviated statements about habitus inspired Pierre Bourdieu’s compelling treatment of the concept. Bourdieu went on to develop hexis, or embodied habitus. That practices and beliefs, structures and dispositions, leave imprints on bodies is an ingress for bioarchaeology. Here, citing modern and ancient examples and with an awareness of the potential pitfalls, I sketch out the beginnings of a bioarchaeology of body habits.