Underclass

The seminal thinkers of the profession are now largely historical figures, few 'heroes' have emerged to replace them," Michael P. Brooks recently wrote (Brooks, 1988). Brooks is unduly alarmist. Significant figures like Daniel Burnham and Rexford Tugwell have their counterparts today. But these contemporary planners are different. They do not espouse exaggerated visions nor call brashly for revolutionary changes. American life also is different. Big cities are no longer novel nor is the economy emerging from a major depression. The country now is dealing with seemingly intransigent issues like the underclass and runaway metropolitan growth and adjusting to major industrial restructuring.

Die Ware, die die Lohnarbeiterin zu Markte trägt, ist keine Ware wie jede andere. Wie schon Marx betonte, ist die Arbeitskraft die einzige Ware im Warenuniversum, die sich von ihrer Eigentümerin der Lohnarbeiterin, nicht ablösen lässt. Wer die eigene Arbeitskraft veräußert, veräußert Lebenszeit. Der Arbeitskraftverkäufer tritt für die Arbeitszeit an die Käuferin das Recht ab, darüber zu verfügen, was er zu tun und zu lassen hat. Das verleiht dem Interessengegensatz zwischen den Käuferinnen und Verkäufern der Ware Arbeitskraft eine von anderen Warentransaktionen unbekannte Zusatzdimension. Die Interessen gehen nicht nur bei der Lohnhöhe auseinander, sondern auch bei der Frage, wie groß der Anteil der Arbeitszeit an der Lebenszeit der Beschäftigten sein soll.
Das Interesse der Arbeitskraftbesitzerinnen in den Lohnkämpfen unterscheidet sich nicht weiter von den Interessen anderer Typen von Warenbesitzern. Ob Immobilie, Aktie oder Schokolade, der Verkäufer strebt nach einem möglichst hohen und die Käuferin nach einem möglichsten niedrigen Preis. Die Frage, wie viel Zeit die Einzelnen mit fremdbestimmter Tätigkeit zubringen müssen, betrifft unmittelbar die Lebensgestaltung, und das verleiht Kämpfen für die Reduktion der Arbeitszeit eine über das bloße Geldinteresse hinausweisende bedürfnispolitische Dimension. 
Seit der Chartisten-Bewegung der 1830er-Jahre spielten Arbeitszeitkämpfe in der Geschichte der Arbeiterbewegung immer wieder eine Schlüsselrolle. Im ausgehenden 19. und frühen 20. Jahrhundert etwa hatte keine andere Forderung über alle Branchen und Ländergrenzen hinweg eine derartige Ausstrahlungskraft wie die nach dem Achtstundentag. Das hielt zumindest die Arbeiterbewegung sozialdemokratischer und kommunistischer Provenienz freilich nie davon ab, in das Hohelied der Arbeit und des Produzierens einzustimmen und den Werkzeuge schwingenden Homo faber als Inbegriff des Menschen zu feiern. Für eine Bewegung, deren historische Mission in der Durchsetzung der Lohnarbeiterinteressen bestand, war es funktional, sich sowohl die mit dem Kapital entstandene Religion des Produktivismus zu eigen zu machen als auch das aus dem Aufklärungsdenken stammende Menschenbild des tool making animal (Benjamin Franklin) zu übernehmen. Die Abhängigkeit des Kapitals von der Ware Arbeitskraft war nun einmal das einzige Pfund, mit dem die Arbeiterbewegung wuchern konnte. Was lag da näher, als den Kampf um Anerkennung des Arbeiters als gleichberechtigten Warensubjekt mit der Überhöhung der eigenen Ware zu legitimieren?
Die Arbeiterbewegung ist schon lange Geschichte, und in Sachen Arbeitszeitreduktion herrschte jahrzehntelang Schweigen. Angesicht der chronischen Übernutzung der Ressource Mensch und der sukzessiven Verwandlung der Arbeitsgesellschaft in eine Art Burn-out-Gesellschaft drängt die Arbeitszeitfrage indes wieder auf die Tagesordnung. Nach einer Studie der Hans-Böckler-Stiftung wünschen sich hierzulande immerhin 81 Prozent der Beschäftigten eine Viertage-Woche. Damit sich noch einmal ein emanzipatives Lager formieren kann, wäre es freilich dringend geboten, das individuelle Bedürfnis nach mehr Lebenszeit mit einer umfassenderen emanzipativen Perspektive zu verbinden. Das hieße allerdings den Rahmen bloßer Interessenpolitik hinter sich lassen und zum Thema machen, warum sich drängende gesamtgesellschaftliche Probleme nur lösen lassen, wenn die Gesellschaft aufhört, um die Sonne der Arbeit zu kreisen.
Die Lebenszeitfrage und die ökologische Frage sind miteinander verschwistert. Wer wie die Anhänger eines Green New Deal die Klimakatastrophe zu verhindern verspricht und gleichzeitig das Ziel exponentiellen Wirtschaftswachstums fortschreibt, versucht sich an einer Quadratur des Kreises. Entweder die Weltgesellschaft befreit sich vom Zwang, immer höhere Warenberge aufzutürmen, oder sie zerstört angesichts des erreichten Produktivitätsniveaus über kurz oder lang die Naturgrundlagen des menschlichen Lebens. Die Gesellschaft kann aber nicht aus dem Produktivismus aussteigen, ohne die Lebenszeit, die Menschen mit der Herstellung und dem Vertrieb toter Dinge zubringen, radikal zu reduzieren.
Aber nicht nur, weil sie der Sache nach zusammengehören, gilt es die Lebenszeitfrage als Schnittstellenforderung zu formulieren. Darüber hinaus eröffnet dies im Zeitalter des Interessenkampfes unbekannt gebliebene Möglichkeiten der Solidarisierungs und Mobilisierung. Im vorliegenden Text wird das insbesondere an der Frage der in Lohnarbeit verwandelten Care-Tätigkeiten thematisiert. Noch nie hat sich ein Werkstück das Anliegen der um Arbeitszeitverkürzung kämpfenden Industriebelegschaft zu eigen gemacht. Im Care-Sektor sind aber die Arbeitsbedingungen der einen die Lebensbedingungen der anderen – und das eröffnet ganz andere Solidarisierungspotenziale. Diese Wende von bloßer Interessenpolitik zur Bedürfnispolitik ist freilich an eine Neubestimmung des gesellschaftlichen Reichtums gebunden. Was wollen wir: Warenreichtum und Selbstzerstörung oder Bedürfnis- und Beziehungsreichtum? Das ist aus einer emanzipativen Perspektive die Grundfrage, die es zu stellen gilt.

У студији се анализирају три романа, Неспоразум у Москви Симон де Бовоар (написан 1966/67, први пут објављен тек 1992), Једно дописивање Јулке Хлапец Ђорђевић (1932) и Пожар Данијеле Крин (2021). Ови посве удаљени текстови имају неколико тачака које
их повезују и које омогућавају да се тумаче из јединствене перспективе. Тематска веза јесте (бескрајна и неиспричана) повест о мушко-женским односима и о (изостанку) љубави коју сва три романа/новеле причају. Формална веза јесте да су у центру приповедања мушкарац и жена, те да је нарација двоструко фокализована, кроз мушку и кроз женску перспективу. Међутим, као најзнаковитија веза оцртава се то што се кроз приче о индивидуалним старостима главних јунака говори о старости брака због чега се управо брак издваја као главни јунак сва три одабрана текста који покушавају да дају одговор на исто питање: да ли брак нужно стари.

Despite an increasing interest in minority entrepreneurship in recent years, the issue of ‘underclass entrepreneurship’ and its linkages to ‘enterprise culture’ remain underresearched. In this article, the authors examine ‘chavs’ as an indigenous British underclass. Using data gathered from an Internet search and newspaper cuttings, they examine how this silent ‘stereotyped’ and socially constructed minority is presented as dangerous and unemployable. In the process, they uncover hidden links between the underclass and enterprise culture, and analyse how entrepreneurship can help such minorities to achieve inclusivity via consideration of role theory and the power of narrative in initiating social transformation. This framework helps us to understand how it is possible to direct young, disadvantaged individuals towards an entrepreneurial career path via self-employment. The paper raises intriguing issues relating to youth employment and tells the story of how contemporary enterprise...

For the late Marcuse, it was important to recognize the “perspectival permanence of utopia” – and thus the “permanence of art”. This self-correction of his philosophy of art and aesthetics in the 1970s has been misunderstood: Even nuanced interpretations tend to overlook that Marcuse returned to a figure of thought that he had already formulated in 1937 in his cultural theory essay On the “affirmative character of culture”.
Für den späten Marcuse galt es, die „perspektivische Permanenz der Utopie“  einzusehen – und damit die „Permanenz der Kunst“. Diese Selbstkorrektur seiner Kunstphilosophie und Ästhetik in den 1970er Jahren ist missverstanden worden: Auch differenzierte Interpretationen neigen dazu, zu übersehen, daß Marcuse zu einer Denkfigur zurückkehrte, die er so bereits 1937  in seinem  kulturtheoretischen Aufsatz Über den „affirmativen Charakter der Kultur“ formuliert hatte.

A racial incident revolving around the teaching of To Kill a Mockingbird in a South African school has prompted this examination of how set works are implicated in the dissemination race-related beliefs. The way the book is taught, it is argued, cements the continuation of the alienation of blackness by affirming ubiquitous white normativity. It perpetuates the notion that the fault lies in an ‘existential deviation’ that inheres in black people. This examination highlights how, through the purposive propagation of white normality, the book exhibits anti-black sentiments. The sympathetic white psyche that subsists simultaneously with the continuing enjoyment of racial favouritism, is appraised. The stance of the book is confronted by noting the contrived largely absent voices of black people in the narrative. This book positions the black characters as props, for the absolution of the white protagonists (and by proxy sympathetic white people) during circumstances of the unremitting ...

One of the key factors that led to the emergence of sociology was research into poverty. In both Britain and France the rise of sociology was accompanied by poverty studies. Yet from 1940s sociologists moved away from poverty studies. One path of exit was a change of ...

This article offers a case study of the adaptation strategies of a section of second-generation young male Alevi Kurds in London and the social conditions which make some of them more prone to join gangs and to reject mainstream institutions in their search for instant material rewards. It is instructive to use Durkheim’s analysis of society’s integrative and regulative functions and particularly his concept of anomie to understand a situation where the legitimate means in the pursuit of material wealth and comfort are out of balance with the demand, calling into question the legitimacy of the institutions which provide these functions. Those who cannot compete through existing institutions are more likely to seek alternative means to achieve these ends. Durkheim identified youth as more vulnerable to such unregulated desires and I argue that his approach offers valuable insights into the anomic pressures confronting second-generation migrant young men in particular.  in Kurmanji Ar...

This study of the unusually high incidence of young male suicides in the transnational Alevi-Kurdish community in London demonstrates the benefits of combining a Durkheimian structural approach with a qualitatively driven ethnographic methodology. Examination of the life experiences of those who committed suicide is located within the underlying social organization of the transnational community in which the suicides occurred, enabling us to explore unanticipated events that render certain groups more at risk of committing suicide. Interviews with significant others facilitated a deeper understanding of the personal life paths of those who committed suicide. The suicide cases followed a particular assimilation trajectory that gradually positioned them in a ‘rainbow underclass’, an anomic social position leading to suicide. Despite the sensitivity of the subject, participants appreciated the opportunity to discuss their experience frankly and contribute towards a better understanding...

BACKGROUND OF THE PROBLEM The constitution of Haitian society and practical consciousnesses are the parallel evolution and reification of two social class language games (the term, "language game" is borrowed from Ludwig Wittgenstein and synthesized with structural Marxism and structurationist sociology to capture the mode of production, language, ideology, ideological apparatuses, communicative discourse, and practical consciousness or purposive-rationality, which constitute the form of system and social integration of a society), the Vodou Ethic and the spirit of communism and the ABSTRACT This work, using a structurationist approach, phenomenological structuralism, argues that unlike the traditional leaderships of Haiti what makes Emperor Jean-Jacques Dessalines unique is the fact that after avenging the Taino natives and Africans of the island against the French, Spanish, and British, he attempted to mediate between two diametrically opposing forms of system and social integration, the Catholic/Protestant Ethic and the spirit of capitalism of the mulatto elites and creole petit-bourgeois blacks who adopted the worldview of their former colonial masters; and the Vodou Ethic and the spirit of communism of the African majority who synthesized their ethos with that of the Taino natives. While the former two social classes, mulatto elites and petit-bourgeois blacks, sought to integrate Haiti into the global capitalist world-system of the European powers of the nineteenth century, Dessalines attempted to constitute the Haitian nation within the enframing ideology of the two distinct forms of social and system integration of the social actors on the island. Using a structurationist, structural Marxist, understanding of practical consciousness constitution, the work explores the origins and basis for Dessalines's social, political, and economic policies. The death of Dessalines, I conclude, would undermine the Revolutionary impetus of the Haitian Revolution, and converted Haiti into the so-called poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.

Weder im Kapitalismus noch woanders. Sondern ich will eine Welt, in der der Mensch sich in seinem Produkt, das er selber herstellt, sich selber erkennt. In dem der Gebrauchswert im Produkt erscheint und nicht nur der Tauschwert. In dem das Produkt in seinem Gebrauch sichtbar und erkennbar ist und nicht im Preis auf dem Markt. In dem also alle Formen des "Waren-Charakters" der Natur und des Menschen aufhören. Der "Lohn", den der Mensch heute bekommt, ist ein "Sozialausgleich" sozialdemokratischer Provenienz.

Past research suggests that despite the substantial strengths of Black kin networks, they are not always up to the task of supporting young mothers. This study is an analysis of potential barriers to women‐centered kin support for present‐day urban Black teen mothers and possible implications for kin support mandates specified in the 1996 federal welfare reforms. In‐depth interviews with African American midlife women, who themselves were teen mothers, shed light on their attitudes and perceptions about Black kinship systems and teen childbearing. Study results suggest that these women perceive governmental intervention, age‐condensation among urban Black families, and urban “underclass” culture to have undermined traditional Black intergenerational support.

The series Snowpiercer (2020– ) deals with the social restructuring processes on board the ›Snowpiercer‹. This paper investigates the socio-political structures of the train and the modalities of the protagonists’ ethical decision-making. In a world frozen to -120°C, the last humans seek to survive on this 1001-wagon-long train, whose constant movement is the guarantor of the energy supply necessary to withstand the cold. The series takes up collective ethical questions and discusses them within the framework of a dystopian scenario. In doing so, the series confronts two antagonistic heroes, whose actions are emblematic of two completely different ethical world views. While Andre Layton strives for social justice and freedom for the train’s underclass, Melanie Cavill pursues a system-ethical approach that gives top priority to the smooth running of operations. The study will emphasize a gender studies perspective as the invention of Cavill as a female leader is of particular interes...

Concern with the prospects and experience of the 'new' second generation now stands at the top of the immigration research agenda in the United States. In contrast to the past, many immigrant offspring appear to be rapidly heading upward, exemplified by the large number of Chinese, Korean, Indian and other Asian-origin students enrolled in the nation's leading universities, some the children of workers, others the descendants of immigrants who moved straight into the middle class. On the other hand, knowledgeable observers tell us that the offspring of today's poorly educated immigrants are likely to experience a very different fate. In their view, post-industrial America is an inhospitable place for low-skilled immigrants and their offspring, as the latter are likely not to be integrated into the mainstream but acculturated into the ways and lifestyles of their underclass neighbours. We advance an alternative perspective, not captured by these two opposing views: namely, that the children of recent immigrants will follow in the footsteps of the offspring of Italian or Polish labour migrants of the turn of the last century, gaining incorporation into working-class America. Using samples of the Current Population Survey (CPS), we evaluate these hypotheses, comparing job holding and job quality patterns among the descendants of immigrants and their native counterparts.

The paper addresses NEET as an ideological and discursive formation, lodging the discussion within its socioeconomic context-one of increasing insecurity and precariousness. It argues that frequently quasi-political and ideological constructions of NEET can readily fold over into and articulate with discourses of the underclass, the broken society as well as, paradoxically, that of social recession. Consequently, such arguments divert attention from processes of 'othering', the secular changes facing society as well as the spectre of a return to a form of nineteenth century liberalism. Although the argument is located within the English context it has a relevance to other western societies in which we can discern similar tendencies. Both those inside the policy discourse and those whose professional identities are established through antagonism towards the discourse benefit from the uncertainties and tragedies of reform. Critical researchers, apparently ensconced in the moral high ground, nonetheless make a livelihood trading in the artefacts of misery and broken dreams of practitioners. None of us remains untainted by the incentives and disciplines of the new moral economy. (Ball, 1997: 257) The Deviant Imagination assumes and sets out to establish that learning about deviance and social control is not simply a question of memorising the formulae, aetiologies and prognoses of certain kinds of deviant act. Rather it involves an imaginative enterprise as to how men [sic] construct and conceive of social order, reasonableness, familiarity and events which go bump in the order of things. It is part of what Paulo Freire calls 'a difficult apprenticeship in naming the world'.

Liczba perspektyw poznawczych proponujących różne ujęcia zjawiska ubóstwa jest imponująca, i to zarówno na gruncie filozofii społecznej, jak i socjologii, nauk ekonomicznych oraz politycznych. Perspektywy te uwzględniają elementy wyróżniane przez badaczy jako relewantne z uwagi na możliwość zdefiniowania pojęcia ubóstwa. Badacze i teoretycy rozważają bowiem odnośne pojęcie, mając na względzie takie aspekty zjawiska ubóstwa jak jego skutki, przyczyny, cechy charakterystyczne, skalę występowania oraz to, czy ma ono indywidualny, zbiorowy, bądź grupowy (obejmujący wzajemne powiązania, np. międzypokoleniowe powielanie wzorców życia i zachowania) charakter. Wśród badaczy nie ma zgody co do jednego ścisłego wyznacznika-bądź zestawu wyznaczników-które można by uznać za konstytutywne dla ubóstwa, ani też co do tego, jakie znamiona tego zjawiska uznać można za jego cechy istotowe, dystynktywne, odróżniające je od innych zjawisk. I tak też mamy do czynienia z teoriami w ujęciu absolutnym, relatywny, wielowymiarowym, próbami ujęcia ubóstwa jako brak zdolności do funkcjonowania (Sen), łączeniem zjawiska ubóstwa z marginalizacją i wkluczeniem. Prezentowane są różne nurty, jak kulturowy wiążący ubóstwo ze specyficzną subkulturą, często przejawami patologii i eksponujący mechanizm dziedziczenia nędzy; nurt liberalny, w którym źródło ubóstwa upatrywane jest w nieskrępowanych działaniach mechanizmów rynkowych czy nurt strukturalny, koncentrujący się głównie na problemach stratyfikacji społecznej, jako główny czynnik prowadzący do ubóstwa wskazując zajmowanie niższych warstwy społecznych, które blokuje i zamyka możliwości rozwoju. Przy tak licznych sposobach konceptualizacji problemu ubóstwa, różnicach w metodologii, wynikach badawczych, definicjach i sposobie określaniu jego granic (mających wpływ na charakter i liczebność jednostek, które obejmuje kategoria ubogich),

In this paper, I consider whether a theoretically defined concept of underclass can be helpful in social scientific discourse. I analyze, review and categorize the concept of a underclass and I made some suggestions for a use of the concept application in the study of social, psychological and moral consequences of poverty. It begins with a discussion of the continuing and pervasive appeal of structural explanations as the root cause of poverty. Then are also examined cultural theories, which by contrast find explanation for poverty in various elements of culture (ex. cultural traits of poor are thought to be different from those of the rest society). A third, a synthetic review of the urban underclass concept is explored. The article also describes the concept of a „culture of poverty” (taking into account the context of the subculture) and „lower class value stretch” as influential concepts in analyses of contemporary poverty and in explanations of the behavior of the poor.

This paper examines the demographic and economic conditions underlying the differential rise of concentrated urban poverty in large northern cities. These cities are shown to have experienced substantially more occupational and industrial restructuring since 1970 than have major cities in the South and the West, particularly losses of jobs that had been held by less educated residents. Despite improvements in their overall schooling levels, relatively few inner-city blacks have acquired education beyond high school, in contrast with employees in new urban growth industries. Underclass blacks with exceptionally high rates of school dropout are especially handicapped in transforming city economies. Whereas the number of jobs not requiring education beyond high school has been increasing in the suburbs, less educated blacks have been spatially constrained to remain in inner-city housing. Within underclass neighborhoods, few households possess private vehicles, which are shown to be increasingly necessary for employment in dispersing metropolitan economies. The implications of interactions between skill mismatches and spatial mismatches are explored. Policies that may have inadvertently contributed to the rise of the urban underclass are discussed as are policies needed to reduce skill and spatial mismatches in metropolitan areas. America's cities are much different places today than they were in the 1960s when many of our assumptions about poverty were formed. Perhaps most striking have been the dramatic changes during the past two decades in the demographic and industrial compositions of our largest northern cities, where the growth of concentrated poverty has been most severe. This paper highlights how these structural transformations placed the residential and employment bases of major northern cities on a collision course that fundamentally altered opportunity ladders for their educationally disadvantaged minority residents and contributed to the rise of a subgroup that has come to be labeled the "urban underclass." To set the stage, I summarize research on the spatial redistribution of poverty concentrations and outline my working theses. I then document locational and temporal features of urban industrial change, weakening demands for less educated laborers residing in the cities, and emerging skills mismatches. Next, the consequences of these changes for post-1970 rises in inner-city black joblessness are illustrated. I conclude with some suggestions about how to improve employment opportunities for disadvantaged urban blacks and reduce their isolation from areas where jobs better matched to their skills are expanding.

Ruth Cain, 'This growing genetic disaster': obesogenic mothers, the obesity 'epidemic' and the persistence of eugenics Studies in the Maternal, 5(2), 2013, www.mamsie.bbk.ac.uk Ruth Cain 'This growing genetic disaster': obesogenic mothers, the obesity 'epidemic' and the persistence of eugenics …this dramatic increase in omega-6 fatty acids in the diet of… mothers is causing transgeneration changes in our children due to fetal programming… This is called epigenetic programming and begins to explain why each succeeding generation …is getting fatter and fatter.…the "reward" response…induced by consuming junk food…can also be transferred to the next generation by fetal programming. So what can you do about this growing genetic disaster? If you are contemplating having a child, then beginning to cut back on omega-6 fatty acids and eating more omega-3 fatty acids is a good starting point. The benefits include having a thinner and smarter child. If you already have children whose gene expression has already been altered by fetal programming, then you have to control their diet for a lifetime to prevent reverting to that altered gene expression. (Sears 2011, np) 1 This article examines recent refigurations of maternal risk to child health within the heated debate on childhood obesity. Following theorists such as Lauren Berlant (1997; 2011) and Ian Hacking (1986; 1999), I wish to highlight and problematise the affective socio-cultural embodiment or 'making up' (Hacking 1986) of 'obesogenic' mothers-women who supposedly create 'obese' children both in and out of the womb, and thus engender a supposed public health crisis, which must be managed through various forms of regulation and surveillance. A popularscientific, medical and regulatory literature which frequently takes a remarkably gothic tone regarding the future of public health in affluent countries helps to shape a particular type of affective economy. Certain types of dangerous or abject bodies come to substitute social actors and agents so that the 'bad'/obesogenic mother becomes literally embodied through a variety of discursive, regulatory and representational means; an avatar of gendered 'truths' and anxieties. As recently described by Tracey Jensen (2012), the austerity agenda set in place by the British Coalition Government following the financial collapses of 2008/9, and the huge state of bailout of major banks, has been accompanied by a marked intensification in the rhetoric of 'undeserving' poverty (especially poverty relieved by state benefit payments). This also engendered a new politics of 'tough love', an affect associated with a rosy vision of functional 2 Ruth Cain, 'This growing genetic disaster': obesogenic mothers, the obesity 'epidemic' and the persistence of eugenics Studies in the Maternal, 5(2), 2013, www.mamsie.bbk.ac.uk families past, which appears to mandate thrift, self-control and refusal of waste; all characteristics associated with the responsible, self-sufficient post-austerity citizen who relieves the state of burdens of dependence, and embodies private respectability and a tidy, contained, and (crucially) inexpensive embodiment. Thus, I argue here, the figure of the wasteful, fat and irresponsible mother identified with working class (or 'workless' 2) families has become a particular scourge of the post-austerity state. Closely related to the working class/workless 'chav mum' stereotype identified by Imogen Tyler (2008), a highly recognisable caricature who stands in for a host of fears and assumptions about the nature of classed sexuality and reproductivity, the obesogenic mother comes into being as a 'real', socially problematic figure who is nonetheless hard to map onto any actual individual. Embodied as a 'social problem', she performs moral/ regulatory functions, emblematising the obsessional and simplistic 'dividing practices' (Foucault 1982). In turn, this repeatedly splits women, and particularly mothers, into the good/nurturing and the bad/toxic. Nikolas Rose (1999) has demonstrated that contemporary governance works by 'cutting' experience in specific ways, amid the ever more complex and confusing informational swirl which must be successfully negotiated by the good neoliberal citizen (Quiney 2007). Accordingly, I explore here how the contemporary neoliberal emphasis on personal responsibility refigures old and discredited eugenic ideas (i.e. rumours of the death of which, as Hanson (2012) argues, have been much exaggerated) about degenerative 'breeding' within the new 'social residuum' or 'bio-underclass' (Litt and McNeil 2003). The later is a group reconfigured as a dangerous drag on national fitness; and how the 'made-up' body and subjectivity of the obesogenic mother feeds into this revived tale of degeneration amid the accompanying scientific/regulatory narrative of an 'obesity epidemic'. The division of 'high-risk' from 'low-risk' mothers occurs repeatedly at various levels of political, medical and personal governance. From the directly legal/coercive measures of punishment, surveillance and segregation usually targeted at the most 'troublesome', to the popular, media-based, personalised forms of (self-)discipline through which the mother learns to become 'either divided inside (her)self or divided from others' (Foucault 1982, p. 208). The grim affective force of the purely-bad maternal figure produces a certain 'self-evident' and 'taken for granted' status in politics and culture, despite the apparent variety of her manifestations. This overwhelming and wearily familiar 'monstrous mother' fantasy 'tends to limit and inhibit thinking' about who or what mothers actually are or do (Seddon 2007, p. 3). Thus, specific fears spread from the false self-evidence of certain popularly conceived mother-fantasies and their

This article endeavours to make a significant contribution to the broadening of local school athletics history in Cape Town. By focusing on certain historical documents, the article explores the state and scope of athletics in black schools in Cape Town prior to 1956, a largely under-researched field in South African sport history. It does so by identifying prominent administrators, outstanding athletes, and participating schools. Many of these histories have disappeared or have been erased from public consciousness. The article shows how organised school athletics in Cape Town's oppressed communities have been shaped by a myriad of teachers, politicians, and sport administrators of varying political and social backgrounds. It also provides details of the Trafalgar High School's Wiener's Day competitions. Next, a history of the Central School Sports Union and its offshoots is unpacked. Finally, the early years of the Western Province School Sports Board are overviewed. The article concludes by suggesting why it is important to reclaim this particular history.

This article endeavours to make a significant contribution to the broadening of local school athletics history in Cape Town. By focusing on certain historical documents, the article explores the state and scope of athletics in black schools in Cape Town prior to 1956, a largely under-researched field in South African sport history. It does so by identifying prominent administrators, outstanding athletes, and participating schools. Many of these histories have disappeared or have been erased from public consciousness. The article shows how organised school athletics in Cape Town's oppressed communities have been shaped by a myriad of teachers, politicians, and sport administrators of varying political and social backgrounds. It also provides details of the Trafalgar High School's Wiener's Day competitions. Next, a history of the Central School Sports Union and its offshoots is unpacked. Finally, the early years of the Western Province School Sports Board are overviewed. T...

The concept of an 'underclass' originates in the United States and is widespread in political and social science discourse today. Its power is most visible in discussions about deep cuts to social safety nets. The foundation of this discourse is the assigning of negative character traits and behaviours to poor people. This promotes the claim that they have brought negative consequences upon themselves and furthers the idea that poor people are personally responsible for their poverty. Discussion about an 'underclass' must be understood in the larger context of a comprehensive neoliberal ideological transformation, or 'Newspeak'. Newspeak is implicitly based on the schema of a game in which everyone has the same chances, but which inevitably results in winners and losers.

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The !Kung San of Namibia and Botswana are among the most widely researched and documented hunting and gathering societies in the area of African Anthropology. From the research conducted in the past, two radically opposing viewpoints about the people have emerged. One, "sees the !Kung as hunters and gatherers living under changed circumstances and maintaining an old but adaptable way of life: the characteristic features associated with the hunter-gatherer subsistence or foraging mode of production. The other sees these same !Kung as products of a very different history, a history of long association with Bantu-speaking overlords, followed by intense involvement with merchant capital" (Lee and Guenther, 1993, p.185).

Historically, libraries, archives, and museums—or LAM institutions—have been complicit in enacting state power by surveilling and policing communities. This article broadens previous scholars’ critiques about individual institutions to LAM institutions writ large, drawing connections between these sites and ongoing racist, classist, and oppressive designs. We do so by dialing in on the ethical premise that justifies panoptic systems, utilitarianism, and how the glorification of pragmatism reifies systems of control and oppression. First, we revisit LIS applications of Benthamian and Foucauldian ideas of panoptic power to examine the role of LAM institutions as sites of social enmity. We then describe examples of surveillance and state power as they manifest in contemporary data infrastructure and information practices, showing how LAM institutional fixations with utilitarianism reify the U.S. carceral state through norms such as the aggregation and weaponization of user data and the...

Für Deutschland gilt nach wie vor, wie Olaf Briese es jüngst formulierte, "dass anarchistische Theorieanalysen aus dem Feld derjenigen kommen, die sich selbst als Anarchisten verstehen." Völlig zutreffend stellt er fest, dass "[u]niversitär-akademisches Milieu und anarchistisches Milieu sich nicht [...] aneinander beflecken [wollen]." Der vorliegende Band hat den Anspruch, diesem Muster nicht zu entsprechen. Er versammelt Beiträge aus beiden "Milieus", wobei insbesondere darauf hinzuweisen ist, dass sich gerade die deutsche Literaturgeschichtsschreibung mit der Thematik Anarchismus in der Literatur bislang so gut wie gar nicht beschäftigt hat. Und sicher wird es auch überraschen, wenn in diesem Kontext neben den explizit philosophischen Bezügen von Autoren wie Friedrich Schlegel, Christian Dietrich Grabbe, Gottfried Keller oder Friedrich Theodor Vischer die Rede ist

Pedagogisation is a theoretical construct, an interpretative category, means used by researchers in order to explain certain forms and trends in educational practice. This concept proved to be fruitful in identifying the omnipresent orientation to search for solutions for broader social and economic problems in education. The goal of this paper is critical reconsideration of different meanings of pedagogisation as a possible conceptual framework for understanding modern education, and shedding light on the phenomenon of pedagogisation in the historical and contemporary context. From the perspective of pedagogical historiography, pedagogisation is observed as a kind of dark shadow of modernisation processes in the society and education and the paper discusses two of its poles: 'pedagogisation of childhood world', which assumes observing children's world thorough pedagogical prism, and 'towards school' oriented concept of pedagogisation, manifested through tendency...

A társadalmi periférián élő gyermekek és fiatalok droghasználati szokásainak feltárására irányuló kutatásunkat 2017-ben végeztük a telepszerű körülmények között, valamint a gyermekvédelmi szakellátásban élő 14–25 év közötti fiatalokkal Szabolcs-Szatmár-Bereg megyében. A kutatás célja a társadalmi periférián élő fiatalok droghasználati szokásainak és a rizikómagatartások feltárása volt.Tanulmányunkban a gyermekvédelmi szakellátásban élő fiatalok drogfogyasztásának rizikótényezőire keresünk magyarázatokat. A drogfogyasztás hatásának vizsgálatához kifejtjük az anómia jellemzőit a célcsoportnál. A rendelkezésünkre álló adatokból választ keresünk a rezilienciára, illetve rávilágítunk a szerhasználat kialakulását befolyásoló védő- és kockázati faktorokra a célcsoportnál.Eredményeink szerint a szakellátásban élő fiatalok körében összességében 26 százalék azok aránya, akik fogyasztottak már valamilyen drogot, vagy droghatású szert. Jelentős eltérés mutatkozik a drogfogyasztás tekintetében, ...

Whiteness is often detached from the notion of diaspora in the recent flurry of interest in the phenomenon, yet it is a key feature of some of the largest and oldest displacements. This paper explores the specific contexts of white racial belonging and status over two centuries in two main destinations of the Irish diaspora, the USA and Britain. Its major contribution is a tracing of the untold story of 'How the Irish became white in Britain' to parallel and contrast with the much more fully developed narrative in the USA. It argues that, contrary to popular belief, the racialisation of the Irish in England did not fade away at the end of the nineteenth century but became transmuted in new forms which have continued to place the 'white' Irish outside the boundaries of the English nation. These have been strangely ignored by social scientists, who conflate Irishness and working-class identities in England without acknowledging the distinctive contribution of Irish backgrounds to constructions of class difference. Gender locates Irish women and men differently in relation to these class positions, for example allowing mothers to be blamed for the perpetuation of the underclass. Class and gender are also largely unrecognised dimensions of Irish ethnicity in the USA, where the presence of 'poor white' neighbourhoods continues to challenge the iconic story of Irish upward mobility. Irishness thus remains central to the construction of mainstream 'white' identities in both the USA and Britain into the twenty-first century.

The article examines The Man Who Fell to Earth by Nicholas Roeg and Under the Skin by Jonathan Glazer, comparing them with each other and their respective literary originals (hypotexts), in order to establish how aliens and humans are represented in these films and how these representations reflect their respective ideologies. The authors argue that while Roeg’s film, in common with its original, uses the story of Newton to criticise corporate capitalism, Glazer’s film plays down the political aspect of the film, concerning industrial farming and exploitation of the underclass by the political elites, pertaining to neoliberalism, to focus on the problems of identity.

O artigo é dividido em duas partes. A primeira parte trata da discussão do conceito de pobreza, com destaque para as noções de marginalidade, de underclass e de exclusão e pobreza urbana. Na segunda parte é comentada a situação dos pobres em Salvador e a formação dos bairros populares na longa duração (1549-2005), seguindo uma periodização em oito etapas, em conformidade com o meu livro sobre as transformações e permanências em Salvador (2002.). PALAVRAS-CHAVE: marginalidade, pobreza urbana, exclusão, bairros populares. RESUMÉ: L´article comprend deux parties. La première discute le concept de la pauvreté, en particulier les notions de marginalité, underclass, exclusion et pauvreté urbaine. La situation des pauvres et la formation des quartiers populaires à Salvador, pendant la longue durée (1549-2005), sont analysées dans la deuxième partie, suivant une périodisation en huit étapes, conformément à mon livre sur les transformations et permanences à Salvador (2002).

Black Americans who exist outside of the American Dream have historically had a direct relationship with street revolutionaries and ghetto superstars more than the appointed Black leadership. Hence, it continues to be an unfair criticism for any “integrated” Black leader to suggest that another Black leader is not authentic enough to have universal appeal, particularly when there is a noticeable social distance between the majority of Black leaders (past and present) who emerge from the middle class and the Black underclass. The gang has traditionally been a significant socialization agent in gangland areas; thus, Black leadership should access the wisdom of the gang when looking for answers to the tough life course conditions of the urban underclass resident. This article provides a brief history about Black gangs in an attempt to provide some insight relative to just how significant the Black gang has been to the Black experience in America.