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This paper gives an overview of developments in the area of role theory which took place in West Germany between 1958 and 1980. We differentiate three periods. The first is characterized by a discussion of Dahrendorfs Homo Sociologicus, of which we highlight only the essentials. This discussion took place in the early `60s. For the second period, in the late '60s - early 70s, the role theory discussion went into a different phase as a result of the so-called `positivism debate' in German sociology. The various points of view explored in this discussion seem to have converged since the mid '70s; the contours of an integrated role theory are becoming apparent. The paper closes with an overview of both positive and negative sides of the developments outlined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that the clinical perspective on mental handicap which under- pins most research and professional practice in the field does not help us to explain or understand how mentally handicapped people are valued and treated in their day-to-day dealings with others. Using material gathered in interviews with the parents of mentally handicapped children, the paper plots the unfolding of the idea of subnormality and traces the gradual transition in the child's status as he drifts from normal baby to handicapped infant. It shows how subnormality emerges as a social state, which can be defined in terms of the qualities and capacities which are ascribed to or withheld from mentally handicapped people. In this sense, it is suggested that the social roles allocated to mentally handicapped people are created and shaped from the social meanings imputed to the diagnosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper critically examines available theoretical models which have been derived front statistically established patterns of association between contextual and organizational variables. These models offer an interpretation of organizational structure as a product of organizational structure as a product of primarily economic constraints which contextual variable are impose. It is argued that available models in fact attempt to explain organization at one remove by ignoring the essentially political process, whereby power-holders within organizations decide upon courses of strategic action. This `strategic choice' typically includes not only the establishment of structural forms but also the manipulation of environmental features and the choice of relevant performance standards. A theoretical re-orientation this kind away from functional imperatives and towards' a recognition of political action is developed and illustrated in the man body of the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the community situation of shipyard workers on Tyneside, certain aspects of their orientations to work and general social perspectives, and the relationship of these to each other and to the structure of social relations at work. In terms of their community situation shipyard workers would seem to come close to Lockwood's traditional proletarian type of worker. There is evidence to suggest, however, that these workers' social perspectives are not at all clearly traditional proletarian. The explanation for this is found, at least m part, m the much greater complexity of social relations at work than are accounted for in the model of traditional proletarianism. The paper suggests that existing typologies of the orientations and social perspectives of workers need to be refined by more detailed studies of the structural and relational aspects of both work and community situations. The paper concludes with a brief examination of changes in both industry and community and the likely effect of these on the social perspectives of shipbuilding workers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The increasing scale of transnational migration is sociologically one of the most interesting features of contemporary life, not least because of the analytical challenges posed by the complexity of this phenomenon. The aim of this paper is to explore the contradictions inherent in policy approaches to migration in the EU -- the logic of the market is weighed against welfare protectionism; welfare and labour market regulation against demands for cheap labour; national resource concerns against transnational rights. The outcome is presented in terms of an increasingly complex system of civic stratification, which raises a further set of contradictions; discriminatory exclusion alongside assertions of equal treatment. The implications of these cross-cutting pressures for a sociological understanding of migration are considered throughout, and doubt is cast on the validity of any single overarching perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A revised version of the conventional approach of classifying families in social class analysis recently surfaced in Sociology. Two-partner families are classified according to the class position of the main bread-winner, usually male. This approach discounts the importance of the other partner's work experience within the family. The special case of the cross-class couple is used to illuminate significant problems in the conventional approach. Swedish data from 1980 brings into question several of the assumptions of the conventional approach. Do women actually have a weaker attachment to the world of work? Are most families actually class homogeneous as the unitary family classification system would lead one to believe? Using evidence from a qualitative study of cross-class couples, this paper argues that diametrically opposed class experiences have significant effects on dynamics in the family unit. Issues in the division of labour in the home and access to cultural capital are clearly affected in class heterogeneous families. Women's work makes a significant difference in everyday life in the family and should necessarily affect the classification of families in class analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several approaches within the sociology of deviance stress the role of agents of control in the definition of behaviour as socially significant forms of rule-breaking. Yet studies of the operation of social control are rare. The paper takes up the attempt by Ditton, in Controlology, to develop a theory of crime in terms of the actions of controllers. It is suggested that Ditton's account gives insufficient attention to the constraints on controllers and in particular to the ability of subordinate groups to counter the exercise of control. Using case study material from several factories, relating to the control strategies of management and to one instance of an attempt to impose managerial definitions of discipline, a different account is developed. This stresses that the form taken by industrial discipline will depend on more general patterns of control over the labour process, with discipline being the product of distinct managerial interests and of workers' counters strategies. It is suggested that this provides the basis for a realist, as distinct from an idealist or interactionist, interpretation of discipline and control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper documents the reasons for the reluctance of fieldworkers to formalize and codify their methods of data creation. While these reasons are not directly challenged, it is asserted that the conventional emphasis on the experimental foundation of fieldwork practice may usefully be replaced by a consideration of its communicational and interactional foundations. Some implications for the teaching and learning of fieldwork are outlined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is pointed out that the new `sociology of literature' makes virtually no reference to poetry and is unable to cope with it. I argue that the reason for this is that in some sense poetry is incompatible with the idea of sociology. The language of poetry is almost definable as that which cannot be used in ordinary discourse or in the affirmation of social organizations. Examples are given to support this view. The implication is then drawn that `academic sociology' by overlooking this feature of poetic language stays unaware of the limitations of its own language; on the other hand Marxism, although clearly more sympathetic to poetic uses of language, is over-cager to then explain that use in Marxist terms. But even Marxist criticism pays little attention to poetry, thus supporting the general view of this paper. The parallels with the view expressed in terms of the views of social phenomenology. and its view of language, are also drawn out. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The theme of this paper is that the content, form, location and social role of utopia vary with the material conditions in which people live. These variations have been obscured by definitions of utopia in terms of its function in catalysing social change, which has also produced the illusion that the contemporary Western world lacks utopias. By defining utopia with reference to its meaning to author and audience as an expression of their desires and aspirations, it is possible to trace a series of shifts in the English utopia, to relate these to one another and to the social context, and to sh?w that the `absence' of contemporary utopias is simply another transformation of this kind. From being a spatially-locatat wish-fantasy, utopia moved through the function of social criticism to being a temporally-located catalyst of social change. These changes depended on perceptions of society-in-time as increasingly malleable and open to human control, culminating in the nineteenth century belief in progress. Utopia now appears to have reverted to the role of wish-fantasy as a result of a prevalent fatalism and a shift away from an evolutionary perspective, a change which, paradoxically, allows it to be more utopian by tying it less closely to reality. Utopia as a catalyst of social change depends on an optimism which is now absent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper pleads for hermeneutic processes to be taken into account in the discussion of role conflict. In order to avoid reification of mechanistic assumptions underlying cross-pressure models of social action, it is suggested that theory as well as research should take into consideration that norms and behaviour are mediated by interpretative processes. These constitute a level of 'social understanding' which can be operationalized in role-conflict terms as three different types of conflict. Reciprocity of perspectives and evaluation, as the main dimensions of interpretation processes, are shown to be the main features of conflicts in role interaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]