Brian Showler, Barrie O. Pettman and Malcolm J. Maguire
This article seeks to examine the role and effectiveness of retraining in British Government Skillcentres (formerly Government Training Centres) using case study material from a…
Abstract
This article seeks to examine the role and effectiveness of retraining in British Government Skillcentres (formerly Government Training Centres) using case study material from a project based on the North Humberside local labour market. In the first section the background to the project and the methodology utilised are outlined. Secondly, we examine the characteristics of the Skillcentre trainees and their evaluations of the courses followed. Thirdly, we discuss the job search process and post‐training employment experience of these trainees. The fourth section concentrates on the demand side consideration of the responses and views of employers vis‐à‐vis Skillcentre trainees. Finally, we conclude that while such retraining programmes have met with some limited success there are certain important aspects which warrant further discussion.
John Horne and Dominic Malcolm
Sociology of sport in the United Kingdom is as old as the subdiscipline itself but was uniquely shaped by the prominence of football hooliganism as a major social issue in the…
Abstract
Sociology of sport in the United Kingdom is as old as the subdiscipline itself but was uniquely shaped by the prominence of football hooliganism as a major social issue in the 1970s and 1980s. While it remains a somewhat niche activity, the field has been stimulated by the growing cultural centrality of sport in UK society. This quantitative and qualitative development has been recognized in recent governmental evaluations of research expertise. Current research reflects this expanded range of social stratification and social issues in sport both domestically and on a global level, while the legacy of hooligan research is evident in the continuing concentration on studies of association football. Historically, this empirical research has largely been underpinned by figurational, Marxist/neo-Marxist, or feminist sociological theories, but there is now a greater emphasis on theoretical synthesis and exploration. As a consequence of the expansion of the field, allied to its empirical and theoretical diversity, there is a burgeoning literature produced by UK sociologists of sport that spans entry-level textbooks, research monographs, and the editorship of a significant number of specialist journals. The chapter concludes by noting the future prospects of the sociology of sport in the United Kingdom in relation to teaching, research, and relations with other sport-related subdisciplines and the sociological mainstream.
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Katie Liston and Dominic Malcolm
To examine the ways in which sports-related brain injury (concussion and subconcussion) is both similar to and different from other injuries and to set out a sociological…
Abstract
Purpose
To examine the ways in which sports-related brain injury (concussion and subconcussion) is both similar to and different from other injuries and to set out a sociological understanding of the injury, its manifestation and management.
Approach
There is a broad contextualization of the ‘issue’ of concussion and the processes that have brought this to the fore, an examination of the ways in which concussion has been figuratively clouded from plain view, and an outline of the main contributions of the social sciences to understanding this injury – the culture of risk and the mediating effect of social relationships. The chapter concludes by questioning whether the emergence of concerns over chronic traumatic encephalopathy has stimulated a fundamental change in attitudes towards sport injuries, and if this has had a significant impact on the social visibility of concussion.
Findings
The two available sociological studies of the lived experiences of concussion are situated within a broader analysis of the politicization of sports medicine and the emergence of a particular social discourse around sports-related brain injury.
Implications
The difficulties emanating from the dominance of a biomedical approach to concussion are discussed along with the need for further research, incorporating a more holistic view of concussion, as a bio-psycho-social phenomenon.
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This first chapter is the introduction to the book. The purpose of this book is to address and better understand why China tightly embraces modern sport in contemporary times…
Abstract
This first chapter is the introduction to the book. The purpose of this book is to address and better understand why China tightly embraces modern sport in contemporary times. Some view this as an indicator of glocalisation and a result of Western industrial civilization putting pressure on China to showcase their strengths as a nation. Some important considerations to explore are China's mediated ability to play and compete with the west. Sport is also seen as a channel of observing global political and economic challenges, especially those in the current context of the COVID-19 pandemic and the intense tensions between communities, which certainly inspires further academic development. Given China's recently remarkable achievements in sport, it is high time to show the world more inside stories of sport development across the nation. The contributors of this collection bring foundational Chinese context to each chapter as they examine changing sport cultures at different scales.
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This register of current research in social economics has been compiled by the International Institute of Social Economics. The register does not claim to be comprehensive but is…
Abstract
This register of current research in social economics has been compiled by the International Institute of Social Economics. The register does not claim to be comprehensive but is merely an aid for research workers and institutions interested in social economics. The register will be updated and made more comprehensive in the future but this is largely dependent on the inflow of information from researchers in social economics. In order to facilitate this process a standardised form is to be found on the last page of this register. Completed forms, with attached sheets as necessary, should be returned to the compiler: Dr Barrie O. Pettman, Director, International Institute of Social Economics, Enholmes Hall, Patrington, Hull, N. Humberside, England, HU12 OPR. Any other comments on the register will also be welcome.
Contemporary standards-based reforms to teaching and teacher education are characterised by appeals to technical orientations to teacher professionalism. In addition, the…
Abstract
Purpose
Contemporary standards-based reforms to teaching and teacher education are characterised by appeals to technical orientations to teacher professionalism. In addition, the standardisation agenda has targeted literacy education as a focus for interventions. This has highlighted an incongruence between standardised approaches to literacy and pedagogies and practices in subject English that have developed over time, and which represent disciplinary ways of knowing.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper uses the occasion of the author’s transition from classroom English teacher to teacher educator to inquire into the pedagogies and practices around teaching with texts that form part of her professional identity. The purpose of this study is to introduce cultural memory as an approach to interpreting narratives about educational experience and the development of English pedagogies over time.
Findings
The paper argues that standards-based reforms tell “official stories” (Malcolm and Zukas, 2009) about teacher professionalism that displace knowledge of past practices and the ethical and intellectual investments they represent. This is characterised by a marked “presentism” (Green and Cormack, 2015) in contemporary education policy. By contrast, critical autobiographical inquiry practised as cultural memory produces situated accounts of the role of professional memory in the on-going “project” (Green 2002/2014) of English teaching.
Originality/value
The paper presents new work in the area of teacher professional identity drawing on the interdisciplinary methods of cultural memory studies.
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The aim of this chapter is to examine and problematize the taken-for-granted conceptual understanding of risk practices in sport cultures. By inspecting the mainstay, and one…
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of this chapter is to examine and problematize the taken-for-granted conceptual understanding of risk practices in sport cultures. By inspecting the mainstay, and one might argue relatively stagnant, constructions of risk in the sociological study of sport, a case for attending to a wider range of risk-based ideologies and cultural practices is presented. The chapter ventures away from viewing risk as predominantly physical in sport settings and constructing athletes as oppressed agents who naively acquiesce to practices of self-injury and self-alienation in sport cultures. Emphasis is given to a broad spectrum of risks undertaken in the practice of sport, and the reflexive, personal nature by which risk may be understood by sports and physical culture participants.
Approach
In the first part of the chapter, the relatively simplistic or unidimensional construction of risk in sociological research in sport is reviewed. In the second part, the complexity of the concept of risk is then discussed alongside case examples that push the analytical boundaries of how risk is a multidimensional construct of athletes’ minds, bodies, selves, beliefs, values, and identities in a host of relational contexts.
Findings
Risk is best understood as a set of practices and belief that exists on a continuum in sport and physical cultures. Risk-taking in sport, however, can be personally injurious and detrimental along a number of lines but is also often calculated, personally/group satisfying and existentially rewarding at times. If the concept of risk is to be applied and interrogated in sport and physical cultures, it should be done so, therefore, in radically contextual manners.
Implications
This chapter illustrates the need for new and exploratory theoretical understandings of what risk means to athletes and other participants in sport and physical culture. New substantive topics are proposed, as are methodological suggestions for representations of the unfolding risk in the process of “doing” sport.
In the last four years, since Volume I of this Bibliography first appeared, there has been an explosion of literature in all the main functional areas of business. This wealth of…
Abstract
In the last four years, since Volume I of this Bibliography first appeared, there has been an explosion of literature in all the main functional areas of business. This wealth of material poses problems for the researcher in management studies — and, of course, for the librarian: uncovering what has been written in any one area is not an easy task. This volume aims to help the librarian and the researcher overcome some of the immediate problems of identification of material. It is an annotated bibliography of management, drawing on the wide variety of literature produced by MCB University Press. Over the last four years, MCB University Press has produced an extensive range of books and serial publications covering most of the established and many of the developing areas of management. This volume, in conjunction with Volume I, provides a guide to all the material published so far.