Social Differentiation examines the economic, political, and normatively defined relations that underlie the construction of social categories. Social differentiation, embedded in inequalities of power, status, wealth, and prestige, affects life chances of individuals as well as the allocation of resources and opportunities. Starting with a theoretical framework that challenges many traditional analyses, the contributors focus on four specific strands of social differentiation: gender, age, race/ethnicity, and locality. They explore the historically specific social practices, policies, and ideologies that produce distinct forms of inequality, in turn revealing and explaining such issues as the formation and maintenance of a gendered order; the privileging of prime-age workers; the penalties incurred by visible minorities in the labour market; the highly disadvantaged position of Aboriginals; and the economic decline of agriculture, resource, and fishing dependent regions. By paying special attention to political processes, norms, and representations, and by indicating how social policies shape economic functioning and relate to normative definitions, this book will interest policy-oriented researchers and decision-makers.

The author discusses important questions of social differentiation and relates them to the problems of democracy. Following his belief in the essential unity of the social sciences, he has drawn upon materials from the fields of psychology, economics, political science, and anthropology, as well as sociology. Originally published in 1926. A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.

This book contends that conventional class concepts are not able to adequately capture social inequality and socio-cultural differentiation in Africa. Earlier empirical findings concerning ethnicity, neo-traditional authorities, patron-client relations, lifestyles, gender, social networks, informal social security, and even the older debate on class in Africa, have provided evidence that class concepts do not apply; yet these findings have mostly been ignored. For an analysis of the social structures and persisting extreme inequality in African societies – and in other societies of the world – we need to go beyond class, consider the empirical realities and provincialise our conventional theories. This book develops a new framework for the analysis of social structure based on empirical findings and more nuanced approaches, including livelihood analysis and intersectionality, and will be useful for students and scholars in African studies and development studies, sociology, social anthropology, political science and geography.

The essays included in this volume honor a truly gifted teacher and sociologist, John C. Pock. After a brief stint at the University of Illinois, Pock moved in 1955 to Reed College, a highly regarded but very small liberal arts institution (roughly 1,000 students) located in Portland, Oregon. Pock has spent the rest of his career (to date) there. During his forty-year tenure at Reed College, the sociology department usually had only two faculty members. Even so, during this period as many as 104 students graduated with majors in sociology and 69 established professional careers as sociologists. (A listing, which is assuredly incomplete, of Reed students during Pock's tenure who went on to professional careers in sociology is presented in an appendix to this volume.) Many of these sociologists have been extremely successful and influential within the discipline. Reed sociologists have taught or are teaching at the University of California at Berkeley, the University of Chicago, Columbia, Cornell, Duke, Michigan, Northwestern, Stanford, UCLA, Wisconsin, and other leading U.S. academic departments. Others have been employed as researchers in such prominent institutions within and outside the United States as RAND, the National Academy of Sciences, the National Opinion Research Center, the East-West Center, the U.S. Census Bureau and Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Sloan Foundation, and the Australian National University.

Social Differentiation in Cameroon English investigates the correlation between some extra-linguistic variables (gender, age, level of education, ethnicity, regionality, occupation, and mood) and phonological variables in a New English setting that is sociolinguistically and culturally different from most Western contexts. The investigation reveals that the type of correlation patterns between linguistic and sociolinguistic variables reported in the Western world are lacking in Cameroon because of contextual factors and the fact that English Language Teaching (ELT) goals in Cameroon continue to be based on Inner Circle English norms. It is therefore predicted that if mainstream Cameroon English is promoted and standardized and Cameroonian speakers of English are evaluated in terms of their knowledge of Cameroon Standard English, some of the correlation patterns reported in the Western world can equally be observable in Cameroon.

This 1979 volume was the first to apply the principles of social linguistics within a British urban community, specifically Norwich.

The essays included in this volume honor a truly gifted teacher and sociologist, John C. Pock. After a brief stint at the University of Illinois, Pock moved in 1955 to Reed College, a highly regarded but very small liberal arts institution (roughly 1,000 students) located in Portland, Oregon. Pock has spent the rest of his career (to date) there. During his forty-year tenure at Reed College, the sociology department usually had only two faculty members. Even so, during this period as many as 104 students graduated with majors in sociology and 69 established professional careers as sociologists. (A listing, which is assuredly incomplete, of Reed students during Pock's tenure who went on to professional careers in sociology is presented in an appendix to this volume.) Many of these sociologists have been extremely successful and influential within the discipline. Reed sociologists have taught or are teaching at the University of California at Berkeley, the University of Chicago, Columbia, Cornell, Duke, Michigan, Northwestern, Stanford, UCLA, Wisconsin, and other leading U.S. academic departments. Others have been employed as researchers in such prominent institutions within and outside the United States as RAND, the National Academy of Sciences, the National Opinion Research Center, the East-West Center, the U.S. Census Bureau and Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Sloan Foundation, and the Australian National University.

This book offers an exciting new perspective on differentiation and inequality, looking at how our most personal choices (of sexual partners, friends, consumption items and lifestyle) are influenced by hierarchy and social difference.