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This article seeks to explore sociological reflections of the September 11, 2001 attacks. It notes that international news has been an important mechanisms of the extension of the horizons of men and women, so that they have now reached their this-worldly limit. In so far as international news can report human suffering wherever it may be perpetrated then, in principle, the action of men and women can be oriented towards human being as such rather than any particular social and cultural group. However, before the paper proceeds any further it is important to make it plain that these reflections should be read as provisional contributions to a sociology of international news on September 11, 2001. Many of these reflections are made without supporting evidence and therefore it is hoped either that this paper will be treated as a framework to be filled in by other researchers or as a point of departure for further and independent analyses.

This paper argues that 'Irishness' has not been sufficiently problematised in relation to gender and ethnicity in discussions of Irish national identity, nor has the term 'Irish women' been ethnically problematised. Sociological and feminist analyses of the access by women to citizenship of the Republic of Ireland have been similarly unproblematised. This paper interrogates some discourses of Irish national identity, including the 1937 Constitution, in which difference is constructed in religious, not ethnic terms, and in which women are constructed as 'naturally' domestic. Ireland's bourgeois nationalism privileged property owning and denigrated nomadism, thus excluding Irish Travellers from definitions of 'Irishness'. The paper then seeks to problematise T. H. Marshall's definition of citizenship as 'membership in a community 'from a gender and ethnicity viewpoint and argues that sociological and feminist studies of the gendered nature of citizenship in Ireland do not address access to citizenship by Traveller and other racialized women which this paper examines in brief. It does so in the context of the intersection between racism and nationalism, and argues that the racism implied in the narrow definition of 'Irishness' is a central factor in the limited access by minority Irish women to aspects of citizenship. It also argues that racism not only interfaces with other forms of exclusion such as class and gender, but also broadens our understanding of the very nature of Irish national identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using a constructionist model of nation-ness, this paper argues that given the changes in the balance of class forces in the contemporary Irish Republic, Ireland has been re-imagined as a normal, modern, metropolitan nation-state. These discursive constructions require their backward and 'traditional' other; the GAA is regularly invoked as a signifier of such traditionalism. In the representational struggle between tradition and modernity, cultural nationalism is seriously misread and scapegoated. In order to facilitate a re-reading, the paper advocates a theoretical intervention involving a critical postmodernism which can deconstruct, and ultimately move beyond, the disabling binary oppositionalism which permeates these contestations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper extends to the year 2002 that section of an earlier paper (Breathnach 2002b) which considered whether the pattern of occupational change occurring in Ireland during the period 1991-1996 indicated the operation of processes of social polarisation. The occupational categories contained in the Census of Population were recast in order to create a set of broad groups which facilitated analysis from a social polarisation perspective. This analysis demonstrated strong growth, on the one hand, in the numbers of employers & managers and professional & technical workers and, on the other, in certain unskilled occupational groups (personal services and retail sales) - the latter following the allocation to these groups of the bulk of the greatly-expanded number of workers who failed to state their occupation in the 2002 census. Meanwhile, key middle-income groups, including blue-collar industrial, clerical and public service workers experienced contraction in their overall share of employment. These findings provide considerable support for the social polarisation hypothesis, albeit in the context of overall professionalisation of the occupational structure. Female workers have been to the fore in driving these processes of change, in that there has been above-average growth of female employment in those occupational categories at both ends of the occupational spectrum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports on an exploratory study conducted with non-resident fathers, to elucidate the key issues affecting the development and maintenance of a fathering role after a relationship has ended. In particular, the paper focuses on the contingent nature of fatherhood for young marginalised men in Dublin. The extent to which fathers identify with a fathering role is explored and comparisons are drawn between the experiences of estranged, committed and activist fathers. Key factors that militate against fathers maintaining an active role in their children's lives are identified. The paper concludes that while the experiences of fatherhood vary across different categories of fathers, the majority of them aspire toward and value their fathering role. However, their capacity to adopt a positive fathering role is affected by a range of institutional, economic and social barriers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sociological analysis of Irish sexuality has been notable for its absence. This paper examines the contribution which Foucault's theory, of sexuality as a discourse of truth and apparatus of power makes toward elucidating key issues in the history and contemporary field of Irish sexuality. Although Foucault provides good insights into the constitution of a hermeneutics of the self within different ethical regimes, his analysis of sexuality is inadequate when it comes to explaining how sexuality operates in everyday life and the individual struggle to attain power and position in social life. In this respect, the paper turns to the work of Bourdieu and examines the field of Irish sexuality, in relation to his concepts of habitus, practice and capital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In what way can social action be simultaneously inquired into and ethically evaluated by social theory? This paper explores the responsibility sociology has with regard to the political and ethical implications of its knowledge production and does so through a case study examination of the sociological concept of role. It compares and evaluates the different orientations that ground the concept of role and Arendt's concept of action, which is then expanded to address the critique of the social sciences by theorists like Arendt and Foucault. The paper engages a particular tradition of reflexive sociology in the context of the danger of banal evil (Eichmann) and in the context of modern structures of domination that makes that danger more prevalent. Arguing that a theoretical non-empirical reflexivity is called for, and drawing on the phenomenological reflexivity of Berger and the constitutive reflexivity of Blum and McHugh, the paper seeks to demonstrate the need for a reflexive awareness of the actor's responsibility for action and the theorist's responsibility for formulating action that can make conceptual space for reasoned evaluation oriented by and to principle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is now a lack of quantitative capacity among practitioners and teachers in sociology in Ireland. Yet interest in the value of quantitative methods among governments, funding organisations and society in general are on the increase. Social science research councils and funders in other countries, notably the UK, have realised there is a problem and are now attempting to remedy this through increased funding for the recruitment of quantitatively trained academics for example, Q-Step. The paper examines a number of developments notably Big Data, increases in transdisciplinary research and developments in mixed methods research which, it is argued, underline the need for more and better quantitative methods teaching in sociology. The paper calls for sociology departments to rethink their curricula and actively promote the teaching of a range of methods at the undergraduate level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2004 Wright et al. issued a challenge to sociologists, to examine 'the effect of the structure of the academy on teaching and learning outcomes' (2004: 155). In this paper I take up this challenge, beginning with a short overview of the changing Irish higher education context, highlighting three macro level changes that currently impact on teaching sociology in Ireland. I argue that such a structural lens is essential to our understanding of the meso (institutional and disciplinary) levels of teaching sociology. I argue a nascent 'teaching and learning movement' in Irish sociology may be emerging. A number of factors that have facilitated this are identified. However even a quick glance at Irish higher education also reveals contradictions and conflicts which threaten this movement before it is even established, including worsening staff-student ratios, increased casualisation of teaching and the neo-liberal turn. The paper concludes with a call for more sociologically informed work both on teaching and learning in Irish higher education, and on teaching sociology. This would enable more informed involvement in critical debates around teaching excellence at the national and institutional levels. It would also make public pedagogies currently in use for teaching sociology in Ireland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides an overview of the history of sociology in Austria from its first appearance in the late nineteenth century until the present time. I argue that the Austrian case disproves the conventional view of professionalization leading to disciplinary improvement; Austrian sociology enjoyed a greater status prior to its institutionalization as a university-based discipline. The Austrian case, if anything, suggests the opposite, that the growth of the discipline in terms of institutional status and resources has arguably been accompanied by decline in terms of prestige, recognition, innovation and excellence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Beginning with early fact-finding investigations this paper outlines the emergence of a distinctive sociology of Wales and relates it to changes occurring in the Welsh university system. It traces the tensions between emphases on language and culture, and on class and economy, and shows how the focus of sociological work has shifted over time, reflecting changes in Welsh society and political structures. Early preoccupation with community studies and the fate of the Welsh language gave way to questions of economic decline and structural inequality. Themes of uneven development, social and economic restructuring and internal colonialism were explored. The nature of Welsh identity was problematised. Devolution of political powers to Wales has opened up new questions about national belonging and civil society. It has brought Welsh sociologists closer to government and helped strengthen the research base in Wales, at some risk to the critical independence of social science. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Documentary investigation has particular strengths to offer the study of the historical emergence of sociological research. Here two documents relating to a Muintir na Tire initiative of the late 1950s to secure US scholarship funding for Irish students of sociology are introduced and reproduced. The reasons why the scheme did not get off the ground, even though financial support appeared to be on offer, are discussed. Here a combination of Muintir na Tire's limited support within the Catholic Church and a modest, but significant, expansion of Irish social science educational capacity brought about by the use of Archbishop McQuaid's power within University College Dublin are emphasised. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws a parallel between the classical works of John Dewey and Pierre Bourdieu with regard to their critical analyses of power which, in both cases, are grounded in the examination of practical activities. The comparison includes a third approach developed by the author, the sociology of engagements, which crossed the paths of the previous two and specifies the points of comparison. This latter approach deals with capacities, power and oppression through analysing kinds of practical engagement with the world that ensure such capacities, owing to mutually supporting dispositions of human beings and their environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a moral-political witness to contemporary human suffering, the activist campaigning on various healthcare issues makes a vital contribution to the social expansion of a human rights consciousness. Particular incidents of citizen neglect are highlighted for their exemplary significance to a more general critique of economic and administrative processes of re-structuration, including international initiatives to marketise health. This actor attempts to invert a state politics of rationalised indifference by shifting the focus from the issue of procedure to that of patient harm. With a collective consciousness of suffering at the epicentre of their campaign, protest coalitions construct policies aimed at restricting public funding for essential services, for instance, as representative of an 'embodied injustice' against the sick and the vulnerable, and as an act of moral disrespect against the population at large. As this paper argues, discontent leads to a rediscovery of the practical significance of universal norms of social justice or equality, and of the need to actively partake in the project of democracy. The specific direction and orientation of this actor's struggle for recognition within Irish society is centrally shaped by established traditions of reasoning and responding to social conflict. When combined with new macroeconomic priorities, such traditions not only restrict the realisation of autonomy and difference, but continue to reinforce a culture of profound non-accountability. The theoretical conception of justice and recognition applied to this study of social conflict on health will follow that tradition of thought established in particular by Axel Honneth (2003, 2007) in critical response to Nancy Fraser (2003). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although clearly sociological in origin, the concept of social capital has become popular in a number of academic disciplines, and prominent in discourses about tackling social inequality. It has managed to cross over into popular consciousness and the vocabulary of political leaders and it has been invoked as a sort of cure-all for an assortment of societal problems. Putnam (1998) has linked social capital to 'better schools, safer streets, faster economic growth, more effective government, and even healthier and longer lives'. Given its rapid journey into political, policy and popular discourse, this paper seeks to critically explore the concept, and its application in research and social policy terms. It calls for a critical and thoughtful approach to the application of the concept, particularly in the context of addressing the problems faced by communities experiencing deprivation or disadvantage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most of the research on masculinity in Ireland stresses the influences of family, work and education in the construction of gender (Ferguson, 1998; Ferguson and Synott, 1995; Ferguson and Reynolds, 2001; McKeown et al., 1998, Owens, 2000). Although the impact of the entertainment media is regularly alluded to, there is a dearth of empirical work in this area. While it is generally agreed that mediated images play a highly influential role in young people's lives, both the nature and the scope of this influence remain unclear in the absence of concrete ethnographies of reception. This paper discusses the findings of a quantitative and qualitative investigation into Irish male teenagers' consumption and reception of a broad range of media texts and discusses these findings in relation to the relevant literature. It points to the shortcomings of both `hypodermic needle' theories, which claim direct media influence, and of some active audience theories, which posit consumers as impervious to ideological influence. Contrary to popular discourses which frame the media as an autonomous, regressive force that lags behind a more progressive reality, the findings presented here suggest that mediated fictions are part of wider `gender scripts' (Nixon, 1996) that both inform and are informed by the social structures within which (male) viewers are immersed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents an essay on the author's reply to Rod Aya's writing on reign of error or the case against cognitive cultural relativism. There are two basic issues in this essay. The first is the sloppy use of the term postmodernism to designate a more or less organized collection of unsavory academics, who subscribe to various forms of nihilism and epistemological hypochondria for some, as yet-to-be-determined but clearly nefarious, ends. The more serious issue in this paper, though, is a slippery slope argument, equating any contextual partialness in understanding knowledge in the human sciences with the abandonment of any claim to science as such, logically leading to only individual maps of the world that are only ever able to be provisionally coordinated with one another.

Race, ethnicity and racism are currently of major significance to Western societies. Recent social and cultural changes, associated with the crisis in modernity, involving global economic restructuring, mass migrations and increasing cultural exchange have highlighted a wide range of processes of social exclusion and marginalisation. These changes have challenged older conceptual frameworks of racism and anti-racism based on a black-white dualism. This paper focuses upon the question of the racialisation of the Irish within the Republic of Ireland and the argument for a specific rather than generalised American-based analysis of racism. This is an under-developed area of Irish sociology that requires a sociohistorical perspective. However, the Irish — both in Ireland and as emigrants — have played a central role in the formation of race and racism in early and late modernity. The monocultural Irish state is often elided with the travelling 'multicoloured', Irish people — one of the world's most transnational populations. There is a particular concern here with the experiences of the Irish diaspora in Britain, which may be of value as a conceptual resource, at a time when there is much confusion around the issue of race and politics in the Republic of Ireland. Sociology has a specific role to play in making public space for explanations that produce more inclusive accounts of Ireland and Irishness, as a territorially based national identity is in the process of being re-configured in the South. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The gay disco has an important function within the gay cornmunity. It is a place where lesbians and gay men can meet and socialise with other rnembers of the gay community, in a fairly closed environment that offers seclusion and sheher from the outside (mainly heterosexual) world. This paper examines the way in which potential patrons of a gay disco, that is, those who were not known as regular patrons to the doorman and bouncers, were screened in an attempt to determine sexual identity. to ensure that as few heterosexuals as possible were allowed entrance into the club. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that Celtic Football Club has played a central organising role in establishing a common identity for Catholics of Irish descent in Scotland. Concentrating on evidence taken from discourse in the public media, it draws attention to reactions to this identity by other population groups. Such responses, which are frequently ferocious in the degree of rejection they express, highlight the effects of Celtic's role. It provides a public arena within which Irishness can be expressed; at the same time, it draws fire from hostile elements in the social setting. Tensions within the Irish community about their common identity may in part be responses to these reactions. 1 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper attempts to analyse and understand loyalist reactions to the 'peace process' in Northern Ireland since the summer of 1994. It highlights the strategically insecure position of the Unionist community and the variety of attempts which have been produced from within this community to respond to a changing political context - albeit on the basis of a political philosophy not free front internal contradictions. These attempts are based on re-statements of Unionist fundamentals; while there are indications of new forms of self-questioning within the Unionist community, particularly in its working class, these are vulnerable to etoliation by the dominant Unionist discourse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the entry of the Irish language into the political debate on the peace process in Northern Ireland. The background to the Irish language revival in terms of the representations provided by West Belfast Gaeilgeoirí (Irish speakers and learners) themselves and the competing discourses associated with the Irish language are discussed. Finally, the issue of rights for Irish speakers and parity of esteem are dealt with as part of the peace process debate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the field of historical sociology Ireland has served as a case study testing ground for Hechter's internal colonialism and for Hutchinson's cultural nationalism. This paper reviews the ways in which these theories were tested on the Irish case. The coherence of internal colonialism is called into question by fundamental discrepancies between the original and the revisited versions of the model. In the testing of cultural nationalism the procedures followed suffer from a circularity that sees Irish historical evidence sifted to highlight what the theory postulates before the extent to which the theory fits the evidence is comparatively assessed. The manner in which these theories were tested lends support to Goldthorpe's criticisms of the methodology of 'grand historical sociology'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 46th Annual Conference of the Sociological Association of Ireland (SAI), hosted in Galway in May by NUI Galway's School of Political Science and Sociology, has demonstrated once again the strength and promise of the discipline across the island. This year was particularly special in the range of plenary events, with papers from three recently appointed professors, Professor Linda Connolly of Maynooth University, Professor Maggie O'Neill of University College Cork, and Professor Ross MacMillan of the University of Limerick. [Extracted from the article]

The article focuses on the 2017 Sociological Association of Ireland conference. The conference focuses on role of sociology and the sociological issues concerning the world, and Queen's University's decision to drop sociology. The topics discussed at this years conference includes immigration, immigrants and ground sectarianism and various research papers are presented by the speakers.

From the Dublin Diocesan Archives a May 1958 letter from Maynooth Sociology Professor Jeremiah Newman to the Director of the Dublin Institute of Catholic Sociology appraises the contribution that a group of students about to be ordained for the Dublin archdiocese might best make to the Institute's work. A Cold War context of politico-ideological struggle links this peculiarly Irish epistle with an international literature concerning letters of recommendation and reports to police agencies about practitioners of sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including the innovative departures in the sociology in France, the debate on social criticism and critique, and the emerging and anticipated society in the twenty-first century.

Following work by James Coleman and Pierre Bourdieu in the 1980s, social scientists from different disciplinary backgrounds have engaged in a debate about the meaning and application of social capital. Questions arise about the coherence, novelty and analytical purchase of the term: there is a risk of overstretching the concept to include too much. Moreover, empirical measures and proxy variables are only very approximately matched to the underlying concept(s). Some applications of the concept lump together different strands of social behaviour and attitude and treats these as universally equivalent or ‘outside’ specific cultures, institutional settings, historical contexts and power structures. It is suggested that these problems cannot be entirely resolved and have parallel examples in all areas of empirical research in the social sciences. However, suggestions are made for greater trans-disciplinary research, dialogue and connection to policy and community practice in an Irish context. We can sum up our position as follows. Social capital has several adolescent characteristics: it is neither tidy nor mature: it can be abused, analytically and politically: its future is unpredictable: but it offers much promise. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The basic challenge of Israeli sociology always has been, and continues to be to present days, the designation of its object of study; i.e. 'Israeli society'. The history of Israeli sociology and its conception of 'Israeli society' may be discerned into the five following modules: 1. Proto-sociology. In the pre-state era, sociological thought thrived within the context of the socialist Zionism. The two prominent 'proto-sociologists' were Arthur Ruppin and Martin Buber, who professed German communal perspectives. 2. Modernization sociology. The formative phase of sociology as a discipline was from 1950 to 1977. It was led by Shmuel Noah Eisenstadt, who effected a transition from the German anti-modernist paradigm to an American modernization theory. 3. Critical sociology. The critical phase took place in the 1970s and 1980s. Critical sociology was manifested in elitism, pluralism, Marxism, feminism and colonization approaches. Simultaneously there emerged a robust branch of 'quantitative sociology'. 4. Post-modem sociology. The turn towards post-modernity started in the 1990s. The three noticeable post-modem perspectives are: post-structuralism, post-colonialism and post-Marxism. 5. Palestinian Arab sociology in Israel. Palestinian Arab sociology is emerging and coming to its own since the 1990s. It reflects integration as well as alienation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Looking at the history of sociology in modem Ireland we can observe a constant oscillation between continuity and rupture. However, we are somewhat reluctant to interpret this as a kind of Irish Sonderweg or Irish exceptionalism. What remains noticeable though is a relatively late willingness to connect to the outside world - culturally and intellectually. This is partly explained by several decades of Catholic institutional dominance. The challenges since late secularisation of the field occurred in the 1970s have included epistemological dominance of the rather narrow posivitist type. Within this context university-based sociologists and sociologies have often been perceived as self-marginalised figures and paradigms. As we approach the new millennium the situation of sociology as a discipline is less precarious compared to earlier times. However, new institutional challenges, such as the metrics increasingly used to evaluate scholarship, have called more traditional notions of the discipline into question. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An interview with professor Neil Fligstein of the University of California, Berkeley is presented. Fligstein discusses the concept of social structure and the theory of conventional opposition on macro-social and micro-social orders. He views the discovery of the idea of strategic action field as organizational sociology in the politics and economics of U.S. government. He also outlines the benefits of large corporations in the economic development of the country.

This article opens with H.G. Wells's assertion that utopia is the distinctive and proper method of sociology. It outlines four ways of thinking about utopia which imply different methods, distinguishing a hermeneutic method from the imaginary reconstitution of society. The author finds common ground with Wright in exploring and endorsing the role of utopia, utopias and utopianism in transforming capitalism into something better. But this article focuses on two areas of difference: Wright's reliance on extrapolation from prefigurative practices, and the state-economy-civil society model that underpins Wright's work. It argues that we should take imagination and the imaginary reconstitution of society more seriously as tools in the struggle for social transformation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The transnational turn in sociological studies of care and welfare is generating new research agendas focused on the circulation and hybridisation of social ideas, values, practices, resources, relations and provision across political borders. This article examines neglected aspects within care transnationalisation research by focusing on the involvement of the Irish Catholic female religious from a historical perspective. Successive histories of female religious care migrations reveal Catholic religious orders of women to be the epitome of a flexible, hyper-mobile labour force. The nature of religious life combined with the social, cultural, economic and organisational capacities of the Catholic Church rendered female religious orders pivotal to the formation of border-spanning care labour networks through which Catholic ideas and practices of carework circulated to forge and sustain links and connections between Ireland and many other places worldwide. The discussion emphasises the necessity of attending to 'counter-geographies' of global care migrations, the interlocking nature of religious and secular care migration and historical antecedents of contemporary care transnationalisation processes in future research programmes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article argues that the epidemic of depression is to be understood alongside the normative conditions of self-realisation associated with the emergence of the new spirit of capitalism. In the new spirit of capitalism, active realisation of the authentic self is an institutionalised demand, which is expected to be converted into praxis. This is interesting in relation to the phenomenon of depression, as it means that contemporary depression may be understood, not as a clinical and subjective condition, but as a mode of action. What is applauded in today's society is precisely what depressive individuals lack - namely the ability to realise themselves in accordance with contemporary normative values. Thus, within present-day society, depression and the institutionalised/capitalist demands for self-realisation have become each other's antitheses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In contemporary Irish Society there is considerable uneasiness about both the existence of and threats to the ‘patriarchal dividend’ (O'Connell, 1995a: 82). It is suggested that this wider social and cultural context, characterised by male dominance of key institutions, militates against the identification of gender related private troubles as public issues. Burawoy's (2005) focus on the public aspect of each of the four types of sociology he identifies (viz., policy, critical, public and professional sociology) is used as a framework to explore the recent contribution made by sociologists in Ireland to the identification of gender as such a public issue. The article concludes that, by not explicitly focusing on it their contribution as agenda setters has been more limited than it might otherwise have been. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article seeks to develop multi-layered reflections on men in England, Finland and Ireland. It connects autobiographical memories, the politics and the problematic of men, studies on men, and men's situation in three countries and societies, and their postcolonial contexts. In each case, personal, political and academic connections with the countries concerned are explored and interlinked. Though postcolonial studies have been developed mainly by those who are members of or in an ambiguous relation to social categories that have been marginalised by colonialism and imperialism, these perspectives are drawn on to interrogate and deconstruct the dominant. Postcolonialism figures in different ways in the three countries, providing multiple means to deconstruct men, the unified, coherent, individual and collective male subject. `Men', the mystified/mythologised One(s), are made material Other(s). Studying men needs to be less ethnocentric, less national(istic), and more fully located in transnational contexts. INSETS: England Memory I: Woolwich, Chariton, Greenwich.;Finland Memory I: post-war television beyond the Empire.;England Memory III / Ireland Memory II: Oxford….;England Memory V: Finding men problematic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adolescence is not a fixed stage in a life-cycle, so much as a terrain of encounters between growing persons and the adult world. International research on youth shows the importance of a relational approach. Masculinities are constructions within a gender order; but gender orders are neither simple nor static. Projects of masculinity formation reflect social diversity and inequality. Developing bodies are re-interpreted and challenged in new practices, institutions such as the high school are encountered and negotiated, the state and the corporate economy are approached. Hegemonic definitions of masculinity exert strong pressure, yet multiple paths through adolescence are found by different groups of youth. The importance of adolescence in the making of masculinities lies both in the ways existing masculinities are appropriated and inhabited, and in the negotiation, and sometimes rejection of old patterns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This comment on Nathan Glazer's essay sets it in the context of Glazer's distinguished academic career, discusses contemporary sociological thinking about American exceptionalism in race relations, and considers how the reproduction of certain beliefs and values, including diversity and inequality, can be explained sociologically. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The media's contribution to the creation of a healthy public sphere and civil society is the focus of public debate, especially in the light of concerns about the impact on them of the economic and political spheres. The media's ideal contribution to the development of a democratic society has traditionally been framed within the structures of the public service model of broadcasting, where education plays a crucial role. This article traces the evolution of education in Irish broadcasting, exploring the consequences for Irish democracy and civil life. It outlines how education's potential contribution has continually been shaped by the institutional demands of the political and economic systems, including the cultural nationalist ethos of early radio broadcasting, its role in the modernisation of Irish society, and the growth of commercialism and pluralist approaches. These trends had a formative influence on education's role in Irish broadcasting, and consequently on the civic and democratic lives of Irish citizen [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many social theorists and philosophers now say truth is cultural convention and no culture is privileged, so the cognitive ideas different cultures maintain - say, magic and physics - are equally true. That is the bottom line of cognitive cultural relativism alias postmodernism, which pervades the social sciences and humanities. Cognitive cultural relativism should be distinguished from moral cultural relativism, which says there is no universal morality, only cultural values and norms - the latter is a tragedy, the former is a farce: it is a contradiction in logic, an absurdity as theory, and humbug as method. It insults the cultures it defers to and legitimates dogmatism, which motivates fanaticism; it invites - indeed, practically demands - what it pretends to combat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Media representations of young people are an important part of society's ongoing discussion with itself about ‘the state of its youth’. This article sets out to explore how the Irish media address the issue of young people and sexuality. Adopting a broadly social constructionist perspective, it presents qualitative case studies of the verbal and visual content of selected feature items hi the press and concludes that, at least where sexuality is at issue, young people are envisaged and presented as ‘Other’, as something puzzling arid mysterious. The tabloid and broadsheet press employ similar sets of rhetorical devices to construct this representation and to ‘make a spectacle’ of the young, often with marked gender differences. There is a consistent ‘metaphor of discovery’: the ‘lifting of a lid’ on what young people are ‘getting up to’, unknown to their parents. There is a pervasive sense of alarm, dismay, of loss and even (ambivalently) of betrayal. It is suggested that in consistently treating young people as ‘Other’, as predominantly different and difficult, these media representations may themselves be helping to construct and sustain the ‘problem’ of intergenerational relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social science has in the past granted much credence to two forms of relativism: cognitive relativism and cultural relativism. These two forms constitute the major components of postmodernism. Why do we believe so easily the arguments put forward by both cognitive and cultural relativism? Suspect arguments are often hyperbolical versions of valid ideas. Cognitive relativism rests on the efforts made, from the work of the Vienna Circle to that of Popper, to identify general criteria by which to differentiate between science and non-science. It also rests on sound studies of the history of science by scholars such as Kuhn. Cognitive relativism is based on hyperbolical conclusions drawn from these two sources; we are not, however, obliged to accept these conclusions. Cultural relativism is legitimated most notably by theories elaborated by certain sociologists and anthropologists on the basis of sound ideas borrowed from Montaigne, Hume and Max Weber. Again, they have drawn hyperbolical conclusions from them that we are not compelled to accept. The influence of the theories that legitimate the two forms of relativism is also due to them having been launched on the ‘market of ideas’ at an historical conjuncture when they were perceived by various publics as ‘useful’ (in Pareto's sense of the word). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is a case study of the social and physical construction of an 'Irish' community in an English town. It asks how or why members of this community migrated and how they construct contemporary images of 'home'. The article draws on semi-structured interviews and conversations with members of the contemporary Irish community in Huddersfield, including Irish-born and second-generation Irish respondents. We find that their sense of Irish identity is complex, encompassing the totality of social experience, much of which is influenced by often competing interpretations of social and political relationships and understandings of history. What constitutes Irish identity in Huddersfield is determined not just by these factors, but also by the ways in which individuals are socialised as members of different families, neighbourhoods, workplace or other social interest groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduces articles about sociological perspectives of the Irish diaspora published in the June 2002 issue of "Irish Journal of Sociology."

Dong Michael dong, please delete this line kay di jud ni asa dong, No ASa man ni tawon oy! [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pléitear stair an chraolacháin Ghaeilge thar na c&ueacute;ig bliana is seachtó ó thosaigh an stáisiún raidid 2RN, suas go dtí an lá atá innin ann agus teacht TG4. Cuirtear an argóint chun cinn go bhfuil coimhlint ann idir dhá idé—eolaíocht — bíonn daoine ag súil go mbeidh TG4 in ann freastal ar an mhionlach a labhrann Gaeilge agus teacht ar airgead ó fhógraíocht a bhíonn ag brath ar lucht féachana níos mó ná mar atá fáil i mease lucht labhartha na Gaeilge amháin. Ar an lámh eile de thig le TG4 ról tábhachtach a bheith aici mar réimse miotasach inar féidir le Gaeilgeoirí a bhféinuúlacht a dhlisteanú. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Speakers of Welsh, Irish and Scots Gaelic have expressed a demand for television services in their respective languages since the mid-sixties. This demand however, has manifested itself in very different forms in each linguistic community. In this article, frame alignment, the newest strand of social movement analysis developed by advocates of resource mobilization, is used to account for these differences. The tactical repertoires which the collective actors established to achieve their demands are compared and the frames which each campaign group drew on to contextualize their campaigns are examined. The analysis suggests is that a similarity in the framing process can help to account for the congruence in tactics between the Welsh and Irish campaign groups in the early stages of the Irish campaign. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researches the events surrounding the Outdoor Relief Strike in Belfast, Ireland in 1932. Reasons for unemployed Irish to rally; Results of the agitation and violence; Interviews with former protesters; Implications of the strike in today's society; Comments on sociology as a science in studying the oppressed.

Although the educational system in Northern Ireland has been subjected to extensive sociological research since the 1970s with extensive debate over the use of the educational system to secure equality of opportunity, a single reference summarizing the history of the Northern Irish educational system with direct reference to social stratification issues does not exist. This article has three main goals. First. conceptual differences between four analytically distinct types of phenomena are clarified: age or maturation effects; cohort or generational effects: historical trends; and period effects. The cohort generation is proposed as a structural variable of equal significance to other variables such as social class, gender, religion or ethnic group. Second, a detailed overview of the changes in the Northern Ireland education system over its first fifty years with particular reference to the implications of these changes for the analysis of social mobility is given. Third. data on changes in educational attainment in the male population of Northern Ireland over the same fifty year period are presented in order to clarify, the conceptual discussion and overview of the educational system. Sociologically-determined cohort generations developed for Northern Ireland are used to place this presentation in a valid historical context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Utilising fieldwork with Irish fans, and interviews with leading Irish journalists and football officials, this article examines five major themes surrounding USA '94 for the Irish: i) the cultural and ethnic symbiosis of Ireland with the USA; ii) aspects of the political economics behind the United States' allocation of the Finals; iii) the Irish supporters' culture of 'carnivalesque', and any internal changes involved; iv) the possible impacts of USA '94 on soccer culture in Ireland, particularly in playing style; v) the possible future inter-relations of soccer and Irish civil society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]