Showing papers in "The Sociological Review in 1981"

Evidence and proof in documentary research: 1: some specific problems of documentary research

Abstract: ‘D ocumentary research‘ is not a clearcut and well-recognized category, like survey research or panticipant observation, in sociological method. It can hardly be regarded as constituting a method, since to say that one will use documents is to say nothing about how one will use them. It is possible, however, that the mere fact of using documents as a data source does pose distinctive problems; the extent to which this is so is one of the themes of this paper. Discussions d the use of documents in the standard methodological literature are sparse and patchy. In 18 general textbooks on research methods’ only 7 devote a significant amount of space to anything to do wirh the use d documents, and these often either conflate it with other points (e.g. under the general heading d ‘unobtrusive measures’ or ‘availilable data’) or concentrate on only one type of use. Where there are discussions, they tend to be about what types of document exist and what problems they bear on rather than about how to use them;’ the tacit assumption is made that later chapters, with titles such as ‘Analysis of Data’ or ‘Tests of Hypotheses’, deal with that, although their contents usually imply survey-type quantitative data that would only be likely to approximated by content analysis from the main types of documentary research. In the sociological literature there are also very f&w more specialized monographic discussions of problems of documentary research; indeed I have been unable to identify any since the

Press Performance as Political Ritual

Abstract: Studies of ritual in modern Britain have mostly been concerned with occasions ofpublic spectacle and ceremony. 2 In taking over the concept from social anthropologists, sociologists have mostly dealt with those contemporary rites which appeared to be directly comparable to the rites observed in primitive societies. These rites have been mainly of two types, the regular ceremonial of church and state, the coronation, investiture of the Prince of Wales and other formal establishment occasions; and the surviving rites of the life-cycle, christenings, marriages and funerals. There have also been looser applications of the concept, drawing attention to the patterned, repetitive nature of many aspects of behaviour from eating practices to the leisure activities of youth, which have built as much on common usage as on anthropology. As Nadel remarked, 'Any type of behaviour may be said to turn into a \"ritual\" when it is stylised or formalised and made repetitive in that form.') Not that there has been any rush to take over the concept. One reason for the lack of interest has been that a concept so widely applicable has appeared to have little analytic value. Another, the empirical one, that both the traditional types of ritual appear to be little more than historical survivals. In a sceptical if not a secular age, less and less importance is attached to either public or private ceremonial. This is not to deny that some such occasions are immensely popular. Less significance is attached to their political or personal meanings. Her Majesty's recent Jubilee for example was widely regarded as no· more than an excuse for a jamboree and, in the other category, a large proportion of marriages now end in divorce rather than death. A third reason for lack of interest in ritual as a concept has been a theoretical one. Use of the concept has implied a unitary view of society. The main paradigm for the analysis ofcontemporary ritual has been set out by consensus theorists of society working within the terms of normative functionalism. In a valuable paper which marks a break with this tradition, Lukes has shown how most contemporary analyses have been set within the Durkheimian paradigm of ritual as the

Privilege and the professions

Abstract: Social inequality has been overwhelmingly studied from the perspective of those who are deprived and disadvantaged. The emphasis, accordingly, has been on lack of wealth, status and power. However, social inequality equally implies privilege and this has received little serious attention. Indeed, in the literature of sociology there are relatively few extended references to it.' With few exceptions those that exist tend to treat it unproblematically and often pejoratively. Thus the possessors of privilege are frequently cast as the villains of the piece and, even where the underdog has privileges in the sense of legal rights, these are commonly exposed as illusory or detrimental to his interests.\"^ In order to contribute to the understanding of privilege in general, and thereby social inequality, this paper will consider the privileges of the professions. This is because professions are examples of privilege not only in the sense of being privileged occupations, but also in the sense that the elites of professions are an integral part of the dominant elites of society/ To explore the privileges of the professions, two tasks are necessary. The first is to try to define professional privilege. A definition itself, however, does not explain why some professions and some professionals are more privileged than others. The second task, therefore, is to examine specific professions to account for these differences. The obvious professions to examine are those which in English history are recognised as the most privileged, namely the three great iearned' professions of Law, Divinity and Physic. It is equally necessary to examine other professions which appear to have achieved parity of privilege with these long-established ones. In our judgement these would include university teachers, because they are creators of knowledge' and 'gatekeepers' to all high-status occupations and accountants because of their essential control function within the context of corporate capitalism.\" This rationale necessarily excludes relative professional 'failures', e.g. engineers.'

On moral regulation: some preliminary remarks*

Abstract: I bis lectures on 'Gvic Morals', Durkbeim argues against Spencer There is an inward activity that is neither economic nor commercial and this is moral activity. Those forces that turn from the outward to the inward are not simply used to produce as much as possible and to add to creature comlort, but to organize and raise the moral level of society, to uphold this moral structure and to see that it goes on developing. It is not merely a matter of increasing the exchanges of goods and services, but

No-Woman's-Land: British Sociology of Education 1960–1979:

Abstract: recent years there have appeared a number of feminist critiques of sociology or aspects of sociological w0rk.l While sociologists have been taken to task for their treatment d deviance, the family and stratification, the sociology of education has remained surprisingly free from attack, and largely impervious to those attacks it has sustained.2 This is surprising given that the sociology of education has been particularly reflexive in the last decade. This paper considers British sociology of education from a feminist perspective, an approach rather different from those in conventional accouuts of the field.s This is a selective way of ordering information, but so are traditional approaches. At the very least, a feminist perspective challenges assumptions and stereotypes about women; at most, it provides a new creative edge with which to revitalize the sociology of education. I begin with a discussion of feminist criticism of sociology, before turning to the question of what we find when we examine British sociology of education, especially over the past two decades, from such a vantage point. I then discuss some specific areas where a feminist perspective is providing new direations as well as questioning the old, and conclude by suggesting some reasons why such a perspective has so far made few inroads on mainstream sociology of education. I

Objective possibility and adequate causation in weber's methodological writings

Abstract: he concept “objective possibility” (objective Moglichkeit) plays an important technical role in Weber’s methodological studies’, Parsons tells us in a note to his translation of Part I of Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft. His explication of the concept is that ‘a thing is “objectively possible” if it “makes sense” to conceive it as an empirically existing entity. It is a question of conforming with the formal logical conditions. The question whether a phenomenon which is in this sense “objectively possible” will actually be found with any significant degree of probability or approximation, is a logically distinct question.” Thus ‘objective possibility’ seems for Parsons to mean little more than ‘logical possibility’. Roth and Wittich, in their later edition of Economy and Society, left Parsons’ note intact.’ Part of this note is correct. The concept, and the related concept of adequate cause, are important for Weber’s merhodological argument. The subtitle for the crucial second half of ‘The Logic of the Cultural Sciences’ is ‘Objective Possibility and Adequate Causation in Historical Explanati~n’,~ and these terms are central to the discussion of cause in ‘Objectivity in Social Science and Social Policy’ and in ‘Roscher and Rnie~’ .~ So important are these uses of the concepts that Weber’s primary Russian disciple and friend, Kistiakowskii, regarded these uses as the core of his merhodology and especially of his distinction between ,he social sciences, which use the concept, and the natural sciences, which instead use the concept of law.5 But no one would come to this conclusion if the standard explication of the concept is correct. In this article we will give a new account of the concept, which will be based for the most part on clues and citations which Weber himself provides in the texts. This account will shed some light on a numeber of

Between sociology and journalism

Abstract: ‘You feel you can argue with literature, temper its vicarious experience with your own. Journalism intimidates because its currency appears to be irrefutable fact and the great myth about himself and his profession to which the journalist succumbs is that he is engaged mainly in the communication of objective fact. But if we view journalism as a chemical compound and break it down we would find the ingredient ‘fact’ existed in only small quantities and even then lumbered by human impurities’.

Owner‐occupation: its significance for wealth transfer and class formation

Abstract: There are two main currents of housing analysis which have grown considerably in the last decade. These are those of the institutional approach, based on Weberian analysis, and that of the political economy of housing approach, based on Marxist analysis. The institutional approach has emphasised the allocation of housing via both institutions and actors to particular individuals and groups within the city. The main focus of the research has thus been upon rules of allocation and procedures used by the key organisations within the housing market such as building societies and local housing authorities. In addition to the study of these organisations attention has also been turned onto the role of key actors in the allocation process such as real estate agents, housing officers and building society managers. The formulation in 1967 of the concept of housing classes by Rex and Moore has been important within this approach. Rex and Moore identified a number of housing classes wliich were distinguished by their position with respect to the dominant competition for scarce and desired forms of housing, which was identified as the suburban detached houseResearch conducted within the institutional approach has contributed a considerable amount of information upon how the housing market works as an allocative mechanism and assists in the creation of spatial inequalities. It has also been important for the reawakening of interest in the effect of the structure of local political and planning processes upon the opportunities and life-chances of urban residents,The political economy approach is concerned miore with the production of urban space than with the allocation of resources.' However, differences amongst the writers exist as to the themes that are em-

Not disengaged: grandparents in literature and reality, an empirical study in role satisfaction

Abstract: The mass media's stereotyped portrayal of the grandparent seems recently to have undergone a change. It is no longer a picture of a little white-haired old lady sitting in her rocking chair by the fire. More often the grandmother is a home-centred, grey-haired housewife, somewhat out of touch with the younger generation but still certain that her methods are sound. The grandfather is also now appearing on the scene, usually as a bumbling old man, a figure of fun. The stereotype is moving towards reality but it is stiU sadly out-of-date when it portrays grandparents as old people. A more accurate reflection of reality would include a grandmother who is a busy, blue-rinsed working wife who runs the Townswomens Guild and goes to keep-fit classes and a grandfather who is an active DIY en±usiast, still working but less interested in work than in the local football team, holidays in Spain and a good bit of water for fishing. Largely because of the lower age at marriage and smaller and more closely-spaced families, grandparenthood is occurring earlier in the life cycle for more grandparents. Age at marriage is of course class-related and in working-class families, where it has for long been earlier than in middle-class families, grandparenthood has concomitantly occurred earlier in chronological terms (although working-class middle-aged women after numerous pregnancies and difficult child-rearing often appeared older than their years). Typically men now bek:omc grandfathers between the ages of 51 and 53 and women become grandmothers between 49 and 51. Grandparenthood is thus a role characterizing middle ra±er than old age and middle age is a time when roles are both lost and gained. Middle-class men in their fifties are still actively chasing their last promotion or reacting to their failure to

CHRONICLES OF THE GALLOWS: The Social History of Crime Reporting

Abstract: In a recent article, James Curran 3 has identified the middle of the nineteenth century as the period in which the press was established as an instrument of social control with lasting consequences for the development ofmodern British Society. This effect was finally achieved by the repeal of a measure, the newspaper stamp tax, which had originally been intended to restrict the spread of radical ideas. The repeal of the 'taxes on knowledge' marked the triumph ofthose control strategists who like Bulwer Lytton had argued for half a century that 'the printer and his types may . . . provide better for the peace and honour of a free state than the goaler and the hangman'. 4 The intention of this present article is threefold: (i) to illustrate the varying degrees to which printed crime news was conceived and functioned as a means of social control; as well as a source of public information and entertainment, before the repeal of the newspaper stamp; (ii) to examine the social organisation of reporting underlying the presentation of crime during that period; and (iii) to identify the importance attached to ideological control through the printed word in general, and crime reporting in particular, in the establishment of a control culture suited to an emerging industrial capitalist economy.

Schooling, capitalism and the mental/manual division of labour*

Abstract: Marxist writing on the school in capitalist society has tended towards emphasizing the role that this institution plays in maintaining and reproducing the status quo, with little attention being focused on contradictions, resistance and change within the process of reproduction of social relations. The school has been seen as a capitalist school because of its identification as a microcosm of the organization and social relations appertaining in the wider capitalist society. Althusser,' for example, presents an image of the school as simply and unproblematically transmitting the necessary technical skills of the labour force, combined with the disdpline and respect for existing relations of production which enables capitalism to reproduce itself. He emphasizes the school as passively socializing people into their various positions in the class structure, with the school connecting neatly with the wider capitalist society and tidily reproducing capitalist social relations.Althusser writes that the school ejects people at various points of the educational hierarchy and claims that \"̂ each mass ejected en route is practically provided with the ideology which suits the role it has to play in class society/-' Bowles and Gintis* emphasize the replication in schools of the scKial relations which exist in the sphere of production: relations of domination and subordination, the grading and assessment procedures, the lack of control of pupils over their work processes and so on. These types of analyses seek to understand the relation between the

Analysing press content: some technical & methodological issues

Abstract: 'Mass communications are uniquely a feature of modern society; their development has accompanied an increase in the scale and complexity of societal activities and arrangements, rapid social change, technological innovation, rising personal income and standard oflife, the decline of some traditional forms of control and authority. The link is evidently something more than coincidence of timing'. I

Peasants, patriarchy, and the feudal mode of production in england: a marxist appraisal: 1 property and patriarchal relations within the peasantry

Abstract: he concept of patriarchy (used here to refer to male dominion over women rather than in the stricter anthropological sense of a father’s control over his family) has normally been associated with feminist writers rather than with Marxist analysis. Feminists have been wont to point out that traditional Marxist perspectives have been unable satisfactorily to explain the fact that in almost all known human societies power is disproportionately vested in the male sex, and in many respects is exercised directly over women (though whether all individual men share in the prerogatives of patriarchy has been a matter of dispute). Consequently, the prevalence of patriarchal institutions is not attributable to any particular mode of production. Many Marxists, on the other hand, repudiate entirely the concept of patriarchy on the grounds that it is irredeemably ahistorical. This wariness, too, has not been without some justification, for the concept has been widely deployed by feminists in just such a manner. Historical variations in patriarchal institutions have regularly been interpreted epiphenomenally-as mere changes in the form of some essentially unchanging reality. Explanation, in that event, has inevitably implied recourse to some kind of physiological or psychological reductionism. More recently, several writers in the socialist-feminist tradition have argued that the way out of the dilemma is to explore the development of patriarchy in relation to the several modes of production and reproduction in which it has evolved. That is also the working assumption of the present two-part article, which forms part of a wider study

Women, shiftwork and the sexual division of labour*

Abstract: The research on which this article is based was carried out during 1980, soon after the Equal Opportunities Commission's recommendations to repeal protective legislation were published. Thus it took place in a climate of debate over the merits and demerits of protective legislation and its effects on discrimination against women in employment. Although firm positions have been taken on this issue by both the T.U.C. and the C.B.I., with the E.O.C. becoming partisan on the side of the latter, minimal attention has been paid to the people who are best qualified to evaluate the significance of shiftwork for women, the women shiftworkers themselves. Our research has sought to remedy this omission. The need to review the protective laws arose from two separate but connected sources. On the one hand, Britain's entry into the E.E.C. meant that British law concerning women at work had to be brought into line with E.E.C. regulations, and on the other hand the implementation of the Equal Pay Act amended by the Sex Discrimination Bill in 1975 was seen by some as a means of eliminating the special protection afforded to women at work by these laws. Employers argued that 'restrictive' laws which applied to only one sex were discriminatory and a review of these laws was written into the 1975 Equal Pay Act. The C.B.I, supports the repeal of protective legislation arguing that equality of opportunity for women at work is prevented by outdated restrictions which are now a historical anachronism. However, this rhetoric of equality for women masks the very real interests that employers have in being free to employ women on shifts. Before the

Incorporation and conflict: a case study of subcontracting in the coal industry

Abstract: T he recent 'rediscovery' of the labour process inspired by the work of Harry Braverman has led to a renewed interest in the nature of capitalist work organization.' If Braverman stressed the imperative of capital to de-skill labour, writers such as Friedman have emphasized the need to view the labour prcKess as shaped by the constant struggle between labour and capital.Indeed, such conflict is seen as integral to the capitahst labour process, making the successful extraction of surplus value problematic. The strategies of control adopted by capital are strongly influenced by the degree of opposition (or acquiescence) of labour. Worker resistance is often said to be particularly developed in occupationally homogeneous communities which are dominated by a single industry. These conditions, it is argued, engender strong solidaristic ties amongst workers who identify and pursue common interests which conflict with those of their employers.\" However, even in industries such as coalmining, which are marked by a relatively high incidence of overt conflict, capital has, historically, been able to successfully accommodate labour. The processes whereby this, albeit uneasy, incorporation has occurred remain, nevertheless, largely unexplored.* The purpose of the present paper is to illustrate, by reference to a case study in one coalfield during the inter-war period, the manner in which workers with a strong tradition of solidarity were divided and compromised by a particular form of work organization. A detailed analysis of subcontracting arrangements at one colliery reveals how work relationships were effectively fragmented and the development of solidaristic ties beyond small workgroups severely limited. The miners in question, as their first-hand accounts make clear, did not generally share common experiences at work and were consequently prone to

Class, power, and the press: problems of conceptualisation and evidence

Abstract: 'the central truth about newspapers (is) that they are what they are because human nature is what it is ... Their content cannot go beyond the range of their readers. It is therefore the readers, in the end, who are the figures of power'. I 'whatever else the immense output of the mass media is intended to achieve, it is also intended to help prevent the development of class-eonsciousness in the working class ... the fact remains that \"the class which has the means ofmaterial production at its disposal\" does have \"control at the same time of the means ofmental production\"; and it does seek to use them for the weakening ofopposition to the established order.' I

Redundancy and female employment

Abstract: t has become commonpiace to argue that women employees are more vulnerable to redundancy than their male counterparts.^ Their greater 'disposability' is often attributed^ at least partly, to their own attitudes which foster a passive response to redundancy. This paper reports two studies of redundancy situations in which women workers were involved^ Whilst they support some of the assumptions underlying the greater-disposability thesis, they point to the need for more sophisticated conceptions of reactions to redundancy than can be captured by a simple acquiescence/opposition dichotomy.' In certain situations women can respond to redundancy differently from men and even in a unique way, for example by using their redundancy payments to bring forward their plans to have a baby. Nevertheless, the implication of the paper is that we cannot assume women v/ill respond qualitatively difterently from men, even though they may well be more susceptible to redundancy than men and have distinctive orientations to work. Brown has argued that there has been a general neglect of female employees in industrial studies, and moreover that what consideration has been given to them has been largely unsatisfactory. Writers often treat employees as 'unisex\" or alternatively only consider women in so far as they are a 'special category of employees who give rise to certain problems'.^ The implication of Brown's treatment of women is that we should locate them within a more general sociology in which the differences between workers are accorded significance and indeed are its central concern, since it is exploring variability in orientations to work, alienation, job satisfaction and collective action. This appears to be the kind of approach adopted by such writers as Barron and

Advertising as a patronage system

Abstract: Introduction THE importance of the press as a marketing agency is generally overlooked. In every year since 1934, when reliable advertising statistics were first collected, the press (broadly defined to include all press publications) has accounted for over two-thirds of total media advertising expenditure. 2 Even after more than two decades of commercial broadcasting, advertisers continue to spend well over twice as much on the press as on commercial TV and radio. J The press thus remains, in terms of promotional expenditure, the dominant marketing medium in Britain. The promotional role ofthe press distorts its economic structure. The publication ofa large volume ofadvertisements substantially adds to its costs. At the same time, the sale of space to advertisers subsidises the price at which most publications are sold. For this reason, the overwhelming majority of press publications, outside the juvenile market, sell to consumers at net prices that do not cover costs. 4 This gives to advertisers a far-reaching, iflargely unsought, influence over the press. How advertisers spend their money generally determines which publications, selling at competitive prices, make a profit. The profits generated by advertising also affect the resources available to competing titles and to competing sectors of the press for editorial and promotional investment. Competition for advertising patronage inevitably also influences the editorial strategies ofthe press-sometimes crudely in terms ofwhat is published, but more often discreetly in terms of the target definition of audiences sought by press publications. This strategic influence of advertising has far-reaching implications that need to be more fully explored. In particular, we need to ask in what way demands made upon the press as a marketing system have influenced its functioning as a system of political communication. This question will be approached, in this article, by examining how changes in the requirements and policies of advertisers have influenced the political structure and character of national newspapers since the First World War. While the conclusions that emerge from this enquiry are necessarily only directly applicable to the national newspaper press, it is hoped that they will throw light on the processes by which advertising patronage influences the broad spectrum of publications constituted by the press.

Only Connect? Issues in Charting Social Networks

Abstract: Metaphors can stimulate attempts to appreheixl diversity, to make interpretations afresh. The social network can be such a metaphor.' It is neither new nor can the literature on social networks be said to be recent, or newly emerging or confined chiefly to anthropology.' All metaphors however require vigilance in use: the vitality of the 'as if' quality must be retained.' The idea of the social network, first enthusiastically advocated as of analytical potential by J. A. Barnes over a quarter of a century ago, is now pervasive in the social sciences and I do not wish to go over in any detail conceptual issues already succinctly discussed In the considerable literature. There has been, it seems, more critical attention to the idea than to substantive en^irical work based on it.̂ Ddiates about adequate definition and appropriate characteristics have resulted in the elaboration of a range of network-related terminologies and continued. If specialized, interest in social network analysis.^

Journalists' occupational ideologies and press commercialisation

Abstract: Introduction: IN recent years conflicting occupational ideologies and strategies among British journalists have been brought into public attention on many occasions, most notably during the controversy surrounding the passage through Parliament of the Trade Union and Labour Relations Bills of 1974 and 1976. A sustained campaign by newspaper proprietors, the Guild of British Newspaper Editors and the Institute of Journalists tried to prevent the National Union ofJournalists regaining the right to pursue closed shops which these Bills were intended to restore to trade unions in general. This campaign typically portrayed the N.U.J. as dominated by subversive elements who were trying to impose left-wing censorship on a free press, helped by legislation which it was implied would compel the introduction of a closed shop in journalism. The controversy was also often described as an inter-union squabble between the 'moderate' Institute and the 'extremist' Union. As in most other uses of this conventional dichotomy it misrepresented a more complex state of affairs and ignored the long term changes in social conditions which I suggest were interdependent with the variations in occupational ideology and strategy among British journalists. Among the range of OpInIOnS held by British journalists four significant clusters ofviews can be identified which I suggest constitute distinctive occupational ideologies and which are related to differing strategies for the defence or advancement of the occupation. Individuals may hold combinations of these views, not always consistently, and the organisations that British journalists have created contain within them ranges of views with differing strengths. Journalists' support for these ideologies and their manifestation in policies and actions have also varied over time. The current situation is very much the outcome of a long history of conflicting ideas and actions. I wish to argue that the changes in occupational ideology and strategy are inter-related with the changing structure and character ofthe British press over the past hundred years and constitute journalists' active

The british press in the age of television

Abstract: THIS article seeks to provide an overview of some major trends in the British press during 'the age of television'. While the press industry remains in a broadly healthy financial state, television has played an important part in other major changes in the press. Social class polarisation within the press audience has increased, as have other related forms of polarisation such as the national/provincial and the popular/prestige divides. Television has indirectly played its part in major changes in the pattern of British press ownership. Broadly since 1945 there has been a change from a predominantly family pattern of ownership to a conglomerate pattern. This article concludes by noting that the empirical facts can be seen as illustrating both Marxist and functional accounts of mass media in market economies.

On the validity of accounts about everyday life

Abstract: The overriding point of this paper is to discuss and compare the criteria of validity attached to (i) descriptions of everyday life by collectivity members, (2) organized descriptions of everyday life by ethnographers and (3) analysis of such descriptions by sociologists. An attempt will be made to point up the main similarities and differences between the criteria of validity considered appropriate to these three different qualitative accounts, and it will be argued that substantially different criteria are appropriate for micro-sociological accounts (e.g. i and 2) as opposed to macro-sociological analysis (e.g. 3). In particular it wiU be suggested that validity is inseparable from what is acceptable as competently and properly arrived at and that such acceptability rests upon ideological assumptions and traditional social practices, convendons; since the natural history of professional academic sociologists differs from that of their research subjects (i.e. collectivity members), we might expect different criteria of acceptability from them and thus different nodons of validity. I take it that those interested in validity, members, ethnographers and sociologists alike, are interested in how they can know that a document or verbal account of social reality may be taken as true, correct, adequate, sufficient, believable, that is 'valid\\, as opposed to incorrect, mistaken, erroneous, decepdve, biased, selectively edited to the point of misrcpresentadon, that is 'invalid'. Since this short paper

The teaching of industrial sociology in higher education: an exploratory analysis

Abstract: I n a period when sociology as a discipline in higher education is ac best experiencing a staidc demand, and at worst a decline in deimnd, from students who wish to study it as a single subject or in combination with other social sciences,* indusnial sodol<^ is notable for its continued growth, especially in the local auiiiority seaor, as a subsidiary subject alongside many more vocationallyoriented areas of study such as Business Studies or Management. Since this development may well have important implications for the political poteintial and intellectual development of both sociology and sociologists, it is essential that all involved with the discipline gain some understanding of what teaching industrial sociology involves, and of how it relates to state educational policies and debates, to the 'needs' of capital and the economy, and to the degree of autonomy which higher education retains or does not retain in relation to the State and the economy. It is indicative of present trends in educational policy that subjects such as Business Studies, Management, and accountancy are amongst the fastest growing areas of post-school education, and such developments cannot be viewed in isolation from other

Sociologists and industry—in search of a distinctive competence

Abstract: This paper will be in two main parts. First of all I shall discuss the development of industrial sociology in Britain over the past twemty or thirty years, and, in the light of a brief review, will suggest that, despite some ki^rUnt achievements, as a subject area within sociology it has failed to establish a clear identity and focus of attention. Secondly, I shall argue that such an analytical focus can be found in the 'employment relation' or 'employment contract'; that a number of the more important contributions to industrial sociology during ithe past two decades have, at least implicitly, had such a focus of attention; and that such a point of departure provides industrial sociology with a dearly distinct identity from other types of enquiry— within and without sociology.

Peasants, Patriarchy and the Feudal Mode of Production in England: 2 Feudal Lords and the Subordination of Peasant Women:

Abstract: hen in the course of researching the history of patriarchy in precapitalist England I first became acquainted with the specialist literature on the medieval peasantry, my initial impression was that the particular disabilities suffered by peasant women were almost wholly due to the direct agency of the ruling landlord class.* It would not be true to say that this impression reflected any kind of conventional wisdom among historians, for patriarchal relations have received far too little serious amention for anything resembling an informed consensus on this point to emerge; but the great majority of instances of coercion and discrimination directed specifically against peasant women appeared to result from some seigniorial imposition. One was continually encountering references to lords who encouraged male primogeniture, regulated female sexuality and marriage rhrough the instruments of leynoite and merchet, or forced their female dependants in.to unwanted marriages. Nor were the motives for such interference hard to discern. Historians had shown the encouragement of primogeniture to be I function of the operation of labour-services; enforced marriages reflected the lord’s anxieties about the supply of labour and his wish to 3ee a breeding-unit established on each of his holdings; marriages of female tenants had to be regulated because d the risk, inherent in all such unions, that the land in their possession would be taken out of the 10&3 personal jurisdiction; while unmarried bondwomen had to be dissuaded from acts of fornication lest, in becoming sexually deMllu.ed, their lords lost the

The politics of socialisation: recruitment and training for journalism

Abstract: THE paper demonstrates that the provision of formal training in journalism, as possibly in any other industry or occupation, is not solely determined by a specific range of ‘necessary’ skills. On the contrary, politico-cultural factors may be equally, if not more, important. The paper finds the ‘professionalisation’ hypothesis insufficient, however, as an explanation for the emergence of a national system of compulsory training. It notes that the character of training has been greatly influenced by the requirements of a specific sector of the industry, on which, significantly, the National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ) has been heavily dependent for financial support and legitimacy. Ambiguity in this sector's approach to graduate trainees created a vacuum which was one factor that encouraged the development of university and polytechnic based journalism and communications courses. More fundamentally, potential competition for authority in training has developed from the establishment of an Industrial Training Board for Printing and Publishing (PPITB) with statutory responsibility for training in journalism. These developments inspired survival/adaptation responses from the NCTJ, including the formulation of a broader structural and financial base, a more positive attitude towards graduate training, a wider range of functions and a reappraisal of alliances. These in turn have had consequences for training content. Analyses of training in terms of ‘socialisation’ or ‘professionalisation’ which fail to take into account such aspects of industrial structure and political rivalry may be misleading.

The Art of Migration: The Preservation of Kinship and Friendship by Londoners during a History of Movement:

Abstract: hat happens, after people migrate, to their former relationships with kin and friends? In many urban settings fresh relationships are made, which go some way towards replacing former ties. But there are other situations, which have so far been observed mostly in rural or peasant life, in which the former relationships are, after a period, taken up again, creating patterns of continuity in the course of a lifetime. This distinction between urban and rural migration is often, however, more apparent than real, and my purpose is to discuss an urban case in which patterns of continuity are surprisingly frequent. The trend of the literature on urban migrants would suggest that, after they begin moving, they lose most of their direct contact with their kindred and their neighbourhood of origin, with the exception perhaps of holiday periods. The continuance of indirect contact, by letter and telephone, and of fmancial support, has of course been documented, especially for middle-class families;^ and if changes occur it is through the loss of the direct relationships of visiting and active personal help. These lost routines have then to be replaced with new associations,and the capacity of the migrant to create these new relationships is therefore one factor v^hich has been emphasised. For

Industrial sociology—who wants to know?

Abstract: '1 always feel a bit guilty if someone comes in and I'm reading and if I'm reading the paper .. .* 'Wtat I tend to do actually, is look at something and at the bottom it says J. Snooks or something who's a lecturer in psychology at somewhere or other, I think, Oh Christ, but if it says J. Snooks who's got a psychology degree and for the last so years has been Works Manager at Boggs and Company, then I think, Oh yes, I'll read that So there is in my mind, if you lilw, a distinction between academics (laughter) and others!' 'You're not a soci

The Woman's Magazine Cover Photograph:

Abstract: THIS article explores the cover photographs of women's magazines. It looks at the female world they suggest-a world which extends beyond the changing fashions in faces, figures and clothes they show. These cover photographs also present definitions of the desirable-of femininity-as these are understood by, and commercially produced for, a female audience. As such, they offer visual cues about physical 'types', social roles and relationships for that audience to identify with or emulate. The purposes of these photographs are examined firstly at the level of editors' selection and audience perception processes. They then are explored specifically through a content analysis of three British women's weeklies, compared over time for the presence or absence of change. This leads to inquiry into ways in which such images relate to editor understandings of the wider society in selecting and mediating signals of social change. Women's magazine cover photographs, like all photographs, convey several layers ofmeaning. In this they are no different from other forms of media content, verbal, visual or printed. For in Adorno's words: