Habitus and reflexivity in tandem? Insights from postcolonial Sri Lanka

Introduction

This article contributes to the unresolved sociological debate on reflexivity and habitus and demonstrates that the concept of reflexivity is more viable than routinised, habitual behaviour in understanding contemporary social action. Reflexivity is the non-routine, creative individual action that responds to social influence upon people’s lives, transcending existing relations between structure, culture and agency (Brock, Carrigan, & Scambler, 2017). Reflexivity is held to be central for emerging global social morphogenesis, an incipient account of contemporary social order as a worldwide morphogenic society induced by technology, digital science and neo-capitalist forces, which is considered an alternative account to late-modernity (Carrigan, 2017). In this context, ‘[t]he role of habit – habitual, routinised or customary action’ becomes increasingly irrelevant as individuals are increasingly required to generate creative and novel responses (Archer, 2012, p. 47).

Many scholars who acknowledge the centrality of reflexivity to understanding social action (e.g. Elder-Vass, 2007; Sayer, 2010) argue that habitus, a concept developed to reflect the dynamics of society particularly depicting 20th-century France by Bourdieu, also remains useful and relevant. Scholars such as Elder-Vass and Sayer therefore propose a reconciliation of the two philosophical constructs of reflexivity and habitus with some ontological adjustment to the latter. In contrast, other scholars argue, habitus itself can account for both the pre-reflexive and generative capacity of agents, and reflexivity could be habituated, dismissing the pro-reflexive project altogether (e.g. Aarseth, Layton, & Nielsen 2016; Adkins, 2004; Krause & Kowalski, 2013; Lišková, 2010; Noble & Watkins, 2003; Silva, 2016; Sweetman, 2003; Wacquant, 2016). Such scholars who focus on a reflexive habitus consider that reflexivity only stems from social relations and symbolic exchanges, such as shared identities (Adkins, 2004).

Yet, a position that over-relies on the social undermines the vital dialectical role played by structure and agency. Critical realism and particularly the morphogenetic approach (MA) developed by Margaret Archer is a non-conflationary methodological approach that recognises the usefulness of considering both structure and agency in understanding social reality. The MA, which assumes that society and the individual are interconnected through human reflexivity, is also critical of the reflexive modernity project advanced by Beck (1992), Bauman (2004), Giddens (1991) and Lash (1994). The reflexive modernity project argues that individuals are assumed to be complete reflexive beings operating outside life-worlds. Although there is an ongoing (meta-)theoretical debate on the possibility of mapping reflexivity and habitus within a single theoretical framework, empirical studies looking at the issue, mainly those using a non-conflationary social theory, are scarce.

Moreover, while critical realism, particularly the MA, has earned philosophical currency within the Western world, the postcolonial world remains an uncharted territory for the deployment of Archer’s social theory. Furthermore, the fact that the development of Bourdieu’s social theory is informed by colonial and postcolonial contexts also prompts a re-examination of habitus within a contemporary postcolonial context (Puwar, 2009). As a response to these observations, this article examines the question: ‘Does habitus still play a central role in the determination of social action within a social context that is labelled as traditional?’

The remaining sections of the article are organised as follows. First, the debates that support the proposition that habitus entails reflexivity are discussed. The detraditionalisation thesis offered by reflexive modernity theory is then critically assessed to understand whether the habitus and reflexivity problem has been resolved or not. The article then introduces the MA, which is critical of the detraditionalisation thesis, and discusses its critical stance on habitus. The research design is outlined and the position that habitus and reflexivity occupy in the lives of agents is then examined, followed by a discussion of the findings and a brief conclusion.

Habitus in tandem with reflexivity?

Bourdieu’s social analysis centres on the core concepts of social space, social field and habitus. Habitus represents how social structures and cultural forms shape individuals’ orientation to the world by imparting ingrained dispositions that produce pre-adapted habitual social practices when they confront new situations (Elder-Vass, 2007). Bourdieu believed that habitus endures regardless of changes in social circumstances, for example, resulting from educational and occupational changes, and shapes the life circumstances of individuals. For Bourdieu (1977, p. 79), an individual is not the ‘producer and has no conscious mastery over [his/her] habitus’. A habitus is socially ascribed predominantly through the individual’s position within a field, for example class status (Weininger, 2005). Habitus pre-formats ‘all the expressive, verbal, and practical manifestations and utterances of an actor’ (Chudzikowski & Mayrhofer, 2011, p. 23) with an enduring attitude towards the world. Thus, habitus is considered to possess the explanatory potential of ‘how social relations are internalized and experienced as “natural”, and how social position is expressed through … accumulated cultural capital’ (Noble & Watkins, 2003, p. 520).

While habitus has made a significant contribution to the studies of the embodied practices of individuals (Noble & Watkins, 2003), Bourdieu’s social theory has been criticised for underplaying individuals’ conscious action (e.g. Archer, 2003, 2007, 2010a). However, a counterargument has been offered by some writers from a critical realist perspective, suggesting that habitus does allow for conscious deliberations (e.g. Elder-Vass, 2007; Sayer, 2010). These scholars note that actors gain contextually internalised knowledge (doxa), which enables individuals to reproduce existing structures through habitual behaviour. The hysteresis effect, the gap between changed field and habitus, introduced by Bourdieu, is considered as providing insights into subjective responses of individuals on objective social influence. The relationship between consciousness and habits is thus understood as ‘a dialectic of bringing behaviour to consciousness in order to alter it, and then habituating that behaviour: a dialectic of “remembering” and “forgetting” ’ (Noble & Watkins, 2003, p. 535).

Krause and Kowalski (2013), Sweetman (2003) and Weininger (2005) propose a reflexive habitus, arguing that Bourdieu’s thinking that habitus is ‘durable, but not eternal’ is not entirely deterministic and may be altered by new experiences (Bourdieu & Wacquant, 1992, p. 133). Such theoretical accounts suggest that individuals situationally act either consciously or unconsciously, producing both dispositional and reflexive responses. Therefore, Sayer (2010) argues, despite the volatile nature of the late-modern era, habitus endures throughout life-courses and is gendered and class-specific.

Yet, the concern that the generative schemes Bourdieu adopts fail to allow for complete reflexive powers for individuals remains a major criticism of Bourdieu. He only allowed ‘actors to apprehend their specific situation and its elements as meaningful, and to pursue – typically without reflection or calculation – a course of action which is “appropriate” to it’ (Weininger, 2005, p. 132). Hence, if Bourdieu was aware of the gap that exists between changed field and habitus (hysteresis effect) and suggested that in such instances dispositions become dysfunctional leading to failure, why does his theory not provide any explanation of how actors respond to this discrepancy? Friedman (2016, p. 130) notes that Bourdieu himself also felt this confusion: ‘the habitus – as an enduring matrix of sensibilities flowing from primary socialization – appears to contradict [Bourdieu’s] own experience of long-range social-mobility’. The inconsistency that emerges when habitus and habitat mismatch – habitus clivé – therefore ‘remains a concept only fleetingly explored in his empirical work’ (Friedman, 2016, p. 132). The arguments that the conceptualisation of habitus indirectly incorporates conscious thought and the recognition of ‘conflict in the habitus’ imply that Bourdieu has left the analysis incomplete (Aarseth et al., 2016, p. 149; Archer, 2010b; Sweetman, 2003).

This incomplete analysis explains why Archer is so dismissive of habitus, arguing that it is a deterministic, static and unconscious formation that neglects emergent powers of actors. A theory that appears to strongly contradict Bourdieu’s conceptualisation of habitus as an unconscious formation is the detraditionalisation thesis that assigns complete reflexive powers to the individual. The subsequent section, therefore, examines if the detraditionalisation thesis can resolve this problem of habitual and conscious activity.

Detraditionalisation thesis

The theory of reflexive modernisation advanced by the works of Beck, Bauman, Giddens and Lash advocates a detraditionalisation thesis, in which increasing personal reflexivity as a causal mechanism generates individualisation and detachment from traditions, transforming the social within late-modernity. Increasing uncertainty, rapid change, intensifying individualisation and proliferation of risk make habitual action obsolete, forcing individuals to increasingly rely on personal reflexivity, as agency becomes progressively powerful over structure (Beck, 1992; Lash, 1994). Rather than understanding social reality as guided by traditional action, individuals are freed from socially ascribed roles of identity and social positions, such as gender roles, towards more reflexively accomplished identities (Bauman, 2004; Beck, 1992; Giddens, 1991).

However, a major criticism of the detraditionalisation thesis relates to its lack of clarity in ‘how’ these individuals use their reflexive powers and for ‘what’ purpose they are used. Archer’s social theory upholds this criticism and denies complete freedom for a single element – structure or agency. Thus, the conceptualisation of an individual who is ‘being progressively “freed” or unleashed from structure’ is problematic (Adkins, 2004, p. 192). Yet, although supporting the idea of the demise of routine action, Archer (2003, 2007) departs from the detradionalisation thesis because reflexivity as an essential element to understand social action has not been fully analysed. Particularly, Archer (2007) sees Bourdieu’s theory of transcending objectivity and subjectivity through habitus as sharing commonalities with Giddens. This is because presenting a conflated view of structure and agency debars the opportunity for internal conversations. Nevertheless, reflexivity cannot always operate purely cognitively based on freedom and choice, but rather ‘it can be examined as the causally powerful relationship between deliberation and action in people’s social lives’ (Archer, 2007, p. 37). In representing a ‘radical break’ from tradition, the detraditionalisation thesis appears less sensitive to how traditions weave into the fabric of post-traditional society. Instead, Archer’s social theory situates conscious reflexive activity as having dialectical relations with the social world. Thus, reflexivity entails a more cautious and more thorough scrutiny than envisioned by detraditionalisation scholars. This is discussed in the next section.

The morphogenetic approach and agential reflexivity

Focusing on the central sociological problem of structure and agency, Margaret Archer (2003, 2007, 2012) offers her social theory, the MA, in place of the conflationary theorising, for example, of the work of Giddens et al., and Bourdieu, that grants epiphenomenal status to either individual or society. Archer’s emphasis that individuals consciously engage with the social through internal conversations, rather than engaging habitually, makes reflexivity indispensable in any sociological enquiry – thus, in the investigation of the relevance of habitus within contemporary society. The MA confers a stratified ontological status on both structure and agency and considers these different elements as different types of emergent entity consisting of specific kinds of emergent powers. Archer argues (2010a, p. 273) that ‘the influences of the social order upon agency should not be located fully within agents or entirely outside them’. Central to Archer’s social theory is that reflexivity is the way the relationship between individual subjectivities and structural and cultural objectivities is understood. Structure and agency are considered as analytically distinct phenomena and agential reflexivity is held as the medium through which their interplay can be observed. Structural and cultural powers are causally efficacious on individual action and, in turn, individuals reflexively monitor themselves against their social circumstances that reproduce or transform the social order (the double morphogenesis) (Archer, 2007). Thus, through a process of conscious reflexive deliberations, individuals engage in self-talk about themselves – their situations, behaviour, values and aspirations, in articulating life-strategies, confronting life-trajectories and satisfying ultimate life-concerns (Elder-Vass, 2007). Archer offers a novel perspective on how people’s everyday reflexivity can be incorporated into understanding social phenomena, enabling the empirical examination of the way individuals respond to social forces. Archer also emphasises that every society depends upon the practice of reflexivity by its members, which makes agential reflexivity indispensable to the study of social phenomena within Western sociology.

Archer (2003, 2007, 2012) identifies four modes of reflexivity – communicative (CR), autonomous (AR), meta (MR) and fractured (FR) reflexivity – each entailing a unique patterning of life-courses. These reflexive modalities are the predominant ways in which actors respond to the social impact. While fractured reflexivities are identified as having underdeveloped reflexivity, demonstrated by the lack of a clear patterning of life-courses, communicative, autonomous and meta-reflexivities each exhibit a distinctive patterning of life-journeys, demonstrating a tendency to effect social immobility, upward social mobility and lateral or volatile social mobility, respectively. Archer emphasises, however, that there is much variety involved in life-courses, even among practitioners of the same reflexive mode, from evasion, through compliance, to strategic manipulation of subversion. These modalities, therefore, are not deterministic and may change over time, and agents may also practise provisional reflexive modalities, based on individual experiences and circumstances (Wimalasena, 2017).

Archer’s assumption that individuals reflexively anticipate, adapt and respond to novel situations, rather than reacting habitually, is at odds with Bourdieu’s social theory that stresses the centrality of habitual action. Archer’s focus on the criticality of reflexivity in contemporary life, therefore, downplays both routine action and tacit forms of knowing, which are embraced by Bourdieu’s (1977, 1984, 1990) concept of habitus. Archer (2012, p. 47) holds that, whilst habitus ‘has had an extremely long run in social theory’, reflexivity occupies a new position within the contemporary landscape of sociology that considers non-routine and creative action by actors as a response to changing social circumstances. Further, Archer argues that habitus is no longer relevant within a contemporary society that witnesses the breaking down of traditional cultures and increasing morphogenetic conditions resulting from economic and cultural globalisation, displacing the contexts within which habitus has any relevance (Archer, 2012). The section that follows, therefore, explains the methods used to examine how reflexivity and habitus work in contemporary individuals’ everyday life.

The study

Communicative reflexivity and social immobility

Seventeen participants were identified as communicative-reflexives, including all those engaged in caste-specific occupations, except for one participant – meta-reflexive Sumanadasa (56, male, traditional drummer). This subgroup conforms to Archer’s finding that CRs are actively committed to effect contextual continuity; for example they persevere to maintain familial obligations:

Both my parents’ lineages performed kariya-korala (administrator at the Temple-of-the-Tooth) duty … The central focus of our family environment was about this duty to the Temple-of-the-Tooth … I used to go to the Temple-of-the-Tooth ever since I could walk, and I’ve been doing everything to satisfy my father’s expectations … (Bandara, 37, male, kariya-korala)

Similar to Bandara, all caste-specific occupation holders’ central life-focus centres on the concern that traditions are continued, which Archer (2007) recognises as social reproduction through contextual continuity – the key feature that sets CRs apart from other reflexives. Yet, effecting social immobility appears more challenging today than participants’ ancestors would have ever imagined. Such ancestors predominantly occupied stable socio-occupational conditions with few distractions. For example, becoming involved in the familial duty, which has lost social recognition and involves high opportunity costs, demands greater reflexive engagement for the participants:

Initially, I thought of doing a government job like my brother … My father didn’t force [me] but said ‘stay here with me … to continue this family tradition’. So that’s what I ultimately did. (Bandara, 37, male, kariya-korala)

Bandara cannot, as his ancestors would have done, operate pre-reflexively but is having to exert greater levels of reflexive action to sustain familial duties. The privileges of social and cultural capital afforded by Bandara’s higher-caste family no longer exist. The social order that prevailed for his ancestors was systematically eroded by the mechanisms of modernity. The caste system and associated rajakariya are no longer the priority in society. The influence of the feudal caste system, therefore, has faded, diminishing the status and recognition for his familial trade. Thus, to stay put, CRs appear to strategically create micro-worlds (Archer, 2007); for example, Bandara has developed a greater focus on the value of his occupation:

When I look at my life, I’ve a superior satisfaction in thinking that I could perform this duty to the Lord Buddha at least once in my lifetime … No words to describe this happiness. I’ve been very fortunate to inherit this duty … (Bandara, 37, male, kariya-korala)

The stable social spaces that bestowed upon the ancestors of the present CRs enduring class or caste-specific social relations, practices and material circumstances, are no longer available. Therefore, sustaining traditional practices including religious and cultural rituals is no more a routinised endeavour operating within a stable social outlet. The excerpt below further demonstrates these reflexive struggles of CRs to ensure traditions:

The problem in this system of rajakariya is, there isn’t enough money coming in to live a normal life … So, people give up on the rajakariya nowadays … If you compare someone of my age, and what they’ve achieved materially, building a nice house etc., I can’t do that … (Bandara, 37, male, kariya-korala)

Not only do the contemporary CRs face constant day-to-day struggles in sustaining traditions, but also the future of these duties appears uncertain. Attracting and conditioning the younger generation to continue these duties is no longer a routine act but increasingly involves reflexive strategies, of autonomous reflexivity – a case of practising a provisional reflexive modality (Wimalasena, 2017). The following extract from Millawana’s biography demonstrates how his concern about transferring the traditional duties to the future generation makes him employ a range of reflexive strategies. He has started a kalayathanaya (a small-scale arts institute) to train newcomers, particularly targeting his grandchildren and relatives, but he doubts the future of their duties:

It’s difficult to continue rajakariya now. We don’t get the same privileges like in the past … Unlike then, lamai (children) cannot be easily persuaded to follow this art now. We can’t say who will take on these duties in future although rajakariya must be continued. (Millawana, 58, male, traditional drummer)

The uncertainty the CRs’ experience regarding contextual continuity renders the need for reflexive engagement, making habitual action increasingly irrelevant. In a rapidly changing social context, the younger generation move away, looking for lucrative occupations and westernised ways of living, refusing to conform to involuntary customary obligations. The younger members seem to feel ashamed of, and reluctant to absorb the social identities inherent to their castes:

Now it is different, they carry the instrument [the drum] hidden in a bag, they take it out only when performing. Once it’s over, they quickly hide it to disguise what they do. Our generation is not like that, we wrap the instruments with a piruwata [clean white cotton cloth], respect and worship the instrument. Now, youngsters are ashamed of this work. (Kamaladasa, 58, male, traditional drummer)

This reluctance of the younger generation from traditional lineages to comply with inherited obligations provides a clear demonstration of the extent of the reflexive challenge that CRs like Kamaladasa face in sustaining contextual continuity. Commonly, the biographies of the CRs are characterised by a lifelong commitment to an occupation that enables staying put, which, in most cases in this study, befell the particular agent as a birth-ascribed obligation. Those CRs who are outwith traditional occupations, for example Yahampath (36, male, banking executive), Duncan (37, male, business partner) and Udesh (37, male, development assistant, postal department), also demonstrate the adoption of provisional reflexive modes, particularly autonomous reflexivity to stay put, by gaining the education and experience required to acquire middle-class occupations within their natal contexts. Archer (2007) suggests that these temporary high-reflexive acts are attempts by CRs to return to base if required to remain established within their natal contexts. Contemporary CRs experience increasing difficulty in sustaining traditional practices as they sense their dispositional capability is increasingly irrelevant, having to rely on reflexivity to avoid novel social/occupational situations. Even the most rural CRs seem to ‘encounter external obstacles defeating their habitual routines and exceeding their habitual repertoires’ (Archer, 2010a, p. 273).

Autonomous reflexivity and upward social mobility

Thirty-five participants were identified as autonomous-reflexives. Conforming to Archer’s findings, a central characteristic of ARs was upward social mobility accomplished through work and they demonstrate a high degree of reflexivity. The biography of Charu, an accomplished banking professional, shows how this centrality of work is conceived very early in life by ARs:

… all I knew was, I was in love with [a bank] since I was [in] schooling. I just wanted to join that bank. That was my pure objective in life. (Charu, 30, female, senior manager, private sector bank)

Through education and occupation, complemented by the social bonuses of inherited social and cultural capital available within her middle-class natal context, Charu has managed to challenge traditional gender ideologies and gain autonomy in life to some degree. Charu therefore was able to make her own decisions, for example marrying the man she loved as well as choosing a career. She is not ready to settle down and have children yet, and presently she is undertaking her MBA, nurturing ambitions for further occupational success. Charu’s life-journey is an example of an autonomous-reflexive’s strategy to navigate normative constraints. Yet, for rural Sri Lankan women, unlike for Charu, liberation seems more distant as the patriarchal social system is more strongly present in their daily life (Wimalasena, 2017).

Rural ARs tend to effect contextual discontinuity in moving to the industrialised capital city, Colombo, for education and work. This move to an urban centre subjects migrant ARs to experience incongruity between concerns, contexts and dispositions, where pre-reflexive behaviour becomes redundant. Jayasiri is a perfect example of a migrant AR who moved to the city for education and when interviewed held a middle-class professional occupation far away from his natal context. Within this new social setting, Jayasiri experiences contextual incongruity in terms of both his personal and occupational lives. With parents who are landless labourers, Jayasiri claims a rural underprivileged social standing. Yet, his reflexive resources have been instrumental in achieving a great deal of success, even though upward social mobility has activated a range of constraints. For example, his village identity and dispositions are inadequate to operate within this urban social context:

… the fact that I come from the village … I feel, is an obstacle, combined with the [English] language problem. For example, our [company’s] bank accounts are in a privileged banking sector, it’s a very different place, those people are a different class. I’m not used to wear a tie, dress so formally, wear polished shoes, ironed clothes etc. … I don’t have a posh [English] accent … [T]hey keep asking about my background, where I come from, my school … etc. What I’m trying to say here is that me being a godaya [a villager], for I’m not from the Royal College … for not having [been] educated overseas … etc. … work against me. Succeeding further isn’t going to be easy. (Jayasiri, 38, male, manager finance/administration)

Yet, Jayasiri is not prepared to abandon his dream of upward social mobility. He is conscious of the (reflexive) strategies he might employ to further his occupational prospects. He also seems to effect generational upward mobility, through his children, who already study in the English medium at private international schools, which is an example of what Archer (2007) considers ARs’ strategic sensitivity. Like Jayasiri, the other ARs also depend largely upon reflexivity in managing both personal and occupational trajectories to attain further progress. These rural ARs find entry to the labour market is extremely challenging, particularly because the gatekeepers of this labour market are the privileged middle-class actors. The following example from Yasantha’s biography, another migrant AR, further illustrates their reflexive attempts to mediate constraints stemming from incompatible dispositions:

[W]hen you live in this society, you need be like them … otherwise, they call you ‘godaya’ [villager] … I hadn’t used ‘hendi, geroppu’ [spoons and forks] until I came to Colombo. I didn’t know how to use them … Honestly, I hadn’t had a meal at [the] Hilton or any other big hotel ever. So, when I’m in such situations, I imitate the others … There’s a big gap between my background and the level I’ve managed to get into today. Sometimes, it’s a big challenge, I know I must learn new things every day. (Yasantha, 36, male, finance manager)

The above discussion suggests that the occupational and social contexts that the majority of the ARs occupy do not provide the stability required to develop a congruent habitus, so the ARs are having to produce innovative and creative reflexive responses constantly to face unpredictable social conditions. The biographies of ARs, therefore, suggest that habitual action no longer provides the required guidance to operate; instead, their reflexivity must fill this gap.

Meta-reflexivity and lateral social mobility

Twenty participants were identified as meta-reflexives. Following Archer’s observations, this subgroup is unique, with ultimate life-concerns focused on value commitments with highly developed reflexivity. The biography of meta-reflexive Padma, a 40-year-old single woman, living in a rural village and managing her life by lending money to villagers, presents a clear example of the increasing displacement of habitus. In consciously adhering to her own values, Padma has contradicted patriarchal social normativity within her rural setting. A woman being single is at odds with the social norm of a good woman, who is expected to marry and have children (Wimalasena, 2017). Further violating rural social norms, Padma chose to leave for the Middle East to work as a housemaid to gain independence in her life, and to overcome poverty, thus further tampering with her social identity as a good woman (Lynch, 2007). As a result, the man she was to marry has abandoned her. Yet, Padma does not regret the life she has accomplished, in which there is no husband to rule over her. Her biography is an example of MRs’ value-committed unique approach to life, which demands reflexive action rather than habitual behaviour:

I don’t want money, if I did, I wouldn’t have come back [from the Middle East]. I don’t like money. I’ve enough freedom to do as I like, I don’t misuse it … I’m not scared, I live on. If the path I tread on is right, why should I be scared? No-one can ask me why I don’t get married or tell me how to live. I’m very independent, not a burden to others … (Padma, 40, female, money-lender)

Accomplishing and sustaining a life committed to a self-imposed value ideology by MRs is clearly not a product of dispositions but of reflexivity (Archer, 2010b). In attaining their value-oriented modus vivendi, MRs reflexively anticipate and mediate a vast range of constraints throughout their life-courses, which also involve attempts at emancipation from oppressive conditions (Wimalasena, 2017). MRs’ actions, therefore, lead to social transformation that could even extend through generations. For example, rather than accepting his birth-ascribed low-caste status, unlike his fellow villagers, Sumanadasa has dedicated his life to resist oppression through a range of reflexive life-strategies that also include creating a counter-identity:

The officials block all the governmental aid given for farming because of our caste-difference. They blocked water to our fields. Realising this loss, we formed a farming association, and made two lakes. We still manage them … that lifted the living standards of our people. I was the farming association president for twenty years continuously … Also we formed a thrift society [savings association for funeral costs] I’m the Treasurer … I joined the cultural centre … to teach dancing … Was active in the school development association too. I demonstrated good leadership … Do a lot of social service in the village. Did all these because I feared my children would face the same problems I experienced. I’m a powerful member in the temple too, have done a lot of work, so I can speak with the monk or so-called big people [higher-caste] in the village face-to-face fearlessly. (Sumanadasa, 56, male, traditional drummer)

By establishing a social identity that is counter to his berava caste identity, which ‘falls in the lower ranks of the local caste hierarchy’ (Gamburd, 2000, p. 14), Sumanadasa appears to contradict Sweetman’s (2003, p. 528) claim that ‘identity is less susceptible to reflexive intervention’. Sumanadasa’s biography provides an example that supports Archer’s (2012) claim that MRs are outwardly oriented towards social transformation. Sumanadasa’s emancipatory endeavours continue. For example, he educates his four daughters at a school far from his village, in order to disguise their caste identity and avoid harassment. Sumanadasa has to some extent achieved a lifelong reflexive commitment to overcome discrimination. His eldest daughter is attending university. He is hopeful that she will gain proper employment without being restricted to low-grade caste occupations:

The negative influence from the village on our caste-difference continues. I’m determined to educate my children. My daughters also had to face that problem at the village school, which I didn’t let [become] too serious, I sent them away to study. I didn’t allow villagers even to speak to my children. (Sumanadasa, 56, male, traditional drummer)

Similarly, the biographies of all the MRs indicated that they increasingly reject, challenge and contradict traditional action. They are aware of the social price to be paid in violating traditions to safeguard value commitments (Archer, 2003). The kind of modus vivendi the MRs strive for is clearly not achievable through habitual behaviour. Thus, habitus is displaced for failing to provide adequate guidance in their lives.

Concluding discussion

Based on data gathered from Sri Lanka, this article makes a novel sociological contribution that displaces Bourdieu’s concept of habitus as obsolete to understanding 21st-century social dynamics. As a response to gradual changes experienced through inevitable social forces, such as colonisation, industrialisation and modernisation, many rural Sri Lankans found the need to move to the few available urban centres for higher education and work. However, a segment of the rural population still makes a conscious but difficult decision to remain and sustain traditional occupations. These findings suggest that rural migrants are having to juggle between the expectations of modernity and of tradition, which can only be realised through the repertoires of reflexivity and not through the reservoirs of hysteresis. Yet, this dominance of reflexivity should not be confused with the detraditionalisation theorists’ claim that individuals become complete reflexive beings, totally freed from structure in late-modernity. Instead, reflexive modalities provide useful guidance to aid understanding of the differentiated stances that individuals consciously adopt in responding to social influences.

The centrality of reflexivity in the lives of these Sri Lankans can be understood in two ways. First, reflexivity plays a dominant role in social reproduction (particularly for CRs). Conforming to Archer’s perspective on reflexivity and habitus (2010a, 2010b), the current study shows that even the maintenance of contextual continuity has become a reflexive task. Individuals who are bound by caste obligations struggle to sustain their customary social contexts that have been gradually exposed to modernity. The changing perceptions and the disinclination of younger generations to absorb caste-based identities threaten the intentions of social immobility. Those CRs who are not bound by caste obligations also find contextual continuity a highly reflexive task. The life-trajectories of both cohorts of CRs support Archer’s (2010a) contention that inherited social and cultural capital is less significant in accomplishing their intentions of social reproduction. These CRs demonstrate the practice of provisional reflexive modes that involve high levels of reflexive engagement. Furthermore, work is a life-strategy for many CRs to stay put, which is also an increasingly reflexive task where habitus cannot provide all the guidance required to operate. While the actions of communicative reflexivity generate social reproduction, this very act entails a high degree of reflexive commitment.

Second, the centrality of reflexivity can be understood through those who effected contextual discontinuity and upward or volatile social mobility, who include both ARs and MRs. The ARs claim life-journeys focused on upward social mobility, mainly accomplished through occupational success. They demonstrate high levels of reflexive engagement in gaining the qualifications and experience required to progress in their careers. The frequent contextual discontinuity subjects ARs to experience contextual incongruity within novel occupational and social settings. The migrant ARs find the cultural and social capital that they enjoyed within their natal contexts no longer provides the currency required to live and succeed. Instead, the migrant ARs rely on high levels of reflexivity, which include attempts to erase old identities and gain new ones. This finding contradicts the position of scholars, such as Lišková (2010) and Sweetman (2003), who suggest habitus is less receptive to identity work. While the misfit between contexts, concerns and dispositions generates numerous constraints, the migrant ARs’ upward mobility intentions and occupational aspirations do not seem to diminish. Instead, the migrant ARs draw heavily upon reflexive resources to confront constraining emergent powers that are activated by their own actions. The outcome of practising autonomous reflexivity is clearly social transformation, which is only possible through reflexivity.

MRs in this second subgroup are, for the most part, committed to a lifestyle that requires greater levels of reflexivity in preserving and sustaining self-inflicted value ideologies, which is obviously not an outcome of a reflexive habitus. The life-journeys of MRs are much more than ‘a dialectic of remembering and forgetting’ as suggested by Noble and Watkins (2003). Realising a desired modus vivendi is predominantly a matter of reflexivity and not a habitual act. The MRs in this study were also observed to practise a provisional reflexive mode of autonomous reflexivity; for example in attaining occupational positions they thought would provide outlets for sustaining value commitments. The inherent critical and subversive stance towards the world around them suggests that MRs generate extraordinary levels of reflexive action. Through constant social critique they generate creative and innovative reflexive strategies and solutions within both social and occupational spheres, leading to social transformation and reorientation (Archer, 2007).

This analysis of the three dominant reflexive modalities thus reveals that members of this society are increasingly expected to be reflexive rather than operating habitually. The field in which contemporary Sri Lankan agents operate is far more dynamic than the one that their ancestors once occupied, displacing the opportunities of habituation those dynasties experienced. Even those individuals who (in)voluntarily absorb the traditional way of life find it increasingly difficult to operate habitually. Therefore, habitus is becoming increasingly irrelevant in explaining social action even within the most rural social contexts. The explanations of the incongruity between dispositions and changed (and changing) contexts cannot be simply limited to a reflexive habitus. While many biographies provide evidence of conscious attempts to gain new identities, even sustaining birth-ascribed identities now appears to be reflexively challenging. Hence, Sweetman’s (2003, p. 533) argument that ‘Bourdieu’s concept of habitus … suggests that identities may be less amenable to reflexive intervention’ is untenable. Instead, this article demonstrates that even the aim of a precise replication of a particular social context, which is mostly the aim for all CRs, is an extremely reflexive activity. Thus, Bourdieu’s assumption that habitus and field act as depositories of past practices appears less important in the case of contemporary Sri Lankans.

By using perhaps the largest empirical study conducted so far on habitus and reflexivity, this article thus answers the question as to whether habitus still plays a central role in the determination of social action within a social context (Sri Lanka) labelled as traditional. Sri Lankan society is shifting rapidly, absorbing the globalised changes occurring in its wider environment and this ‘swift change renders habitual guidelines to action of decreasing relevance or positively misleading’ (Archer, 2010a, p. 284). Contextual discontinuity activates a range of constraints for migrant agents crossing over to new occupational and social contexts, generating incongruity between old habitus and new habitat. Dispositions are no longer able to guide these agents through new challenges, in the absence of stable contexts to produce a new habitus. Therefore, this article proposes that any discussion of postcolonial contexts such as Sri Lanka must incorporate agential reflexivity and avoid overemphasis on the social.

This study reassigns the missing voice to the subaltern and argues that they are active reflexive beings who do not operate in a pre-reflexive rule-like manner, nor do they live anymore in societies that are isolated from modernity. Even the exact reproduction of a previously existing social context increasingly demands high levels of reflexive engagement (Archer, 2012). Thus, based on a morphogenetic position, this study dismisses habitus for failing to be a reliable approach to understand 21st-century social dynamics.