University of Greenwich

About: University of Greenwich is a education organization based out in London, United Kingdom. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Context (language use). The organization has 3749 authors who have published 9958 publications receiving 234340 citations.

The material and the symbolic in theorizing social stratification: issues of gender, ethnicity and class.

Abstract: Within most approaches to stratification gender and ethnicity are seen to pertain primarily to the symbolic or cultural realms, whilst class is regarded as pertaining to material inequality. This constructs gender and ethnic positioning as entailing honour, deference, worth, value and differential treatment (sometimes expressed through the notion of ‘status’), but the social relations around these are themselves not seen as constitutive of social stratification. In this paper I will rethink social stratification away from the polarity between the material and the symbolic, and argue that material inequality, as a set of outcomes relating to life conditions, life chances and solidary processes, is informed by claims and struggles over resources of different types, undertaken in terms of gender, ethnicity/race and class. This formulation allows us to include these categorial formations, alongside class, as important elements of social stratification i.e. as determining the allocation of socially valued resources and social places/locations.

Comparing smallholder farmers’ perception of climate change with meteorological data: A case study from southwestern Nigeria

Abstract: This paper examines smallholder farmers’ perceptions of climate change, climate variability and their impacts, and adaptation strategies adopted over the past three decades. We use ethnographic analysis, combined with Cumulative Departure Index (CDI), Rainfall Anomaly Index (RAI) analysis, and correlation analysis to compare farmers’ perceptions in Southwestern Nigeria with historical meteorological data, in order to assess the way farmers’ observations mirror the climatic trends. The results show that about 67% of farmers who participated had observed recent changes in climate. Perceptions of rural farmers on climate change and variability are consistent with the climatic trend analysis. RAI and CDI results illustrate that not less than 11 out of 30 years in each study site experienced lower-than-normal rainfall. Climatic trends show fluctuations in both early growing season (EGS) and late growing season (LGS) rainfall and the 5-year moving average suggests a reduction in rainfall over the 30 years. Climatic trends confirmed farmers’ perceptions that EGS and LGS precipitations are oscillating, that rainfall onset is becoming later, and EGS rainfall is reducing. Overall impacts of climate change on both crops and livestock appear to be highly negative, much more on maize (62.8%), yam (52.2%), poultry (67%) and cattle (63.2%). Years of farming experiences and level of income of farmers appear to have a significant relationship with farmers’ choice of adaptation strategies, with r≥0.60@ p