Abstract

Why do the dominated and exploited come to accept a social order that disadvantages them? Pierre Bourdieu suggests that the relative stability of societies results not from coercion but from consent by the dominated, which is the result of symbolic power. The present chapter provides an introduction to the functioning of symbolic power by analysing the transformation of Michael Corleone as depicted in Francis Ford Coppola’s film The Godfather. It explores how objective social structures become embodied within the subject through everyday rituals. Once embodied, these structures operate as principles of cognition and contribute to the misrecognition of the social order as legitimate and natural. Michael’s individual transformation, understood from a Bourdieusian perspective, at the same time secures the reproduction of the Mafia order.