Beyond the binge in 'booze Britain': market-led liminalization and the spectacle of binge drinking

The contemporary night-time economy has transformed British town centres into liminal spaces where transgression does not subvert normative space, but establishes public drunkenness as integral to a negotiated order. The focus of this paper is the wider dialectic surrounding contemporary 'binge drinking', and in particular the relationship between aesthetic processes aimed at encouraging alcohol-related excitement and excess, and those that seek to exert a measure of rational control over the drink 'problem'. It is the logic of the market that informs governmental policy on alcohol, and the binge drinker is central to the spectacle of the night-time economy as a form of self gratification which also embodies forms of repression.     

Sleep Behaviors in Older African American Females Reporting Nonmalignant Chronic Pain: Understanding the Psychosocial Implications of General Sleep Disturbance

This study examined factors that influence sleep quality in older African American women (N = 181) reporting chronic pain. Participants completed a series of questions assessing demographic and behavioral characteristics, health status, pain intensity, and sleep disturbance. Findings indicated that younger participants and those experiencing poorer physical functioning reported more difficulty sleeping due to pain. Similarly, participants who reported being awakened from sleep due to pain were younger and experienced greater pain intensity. Understanding the relationship between sleep and pain in this group of women may be useful in promoting effective disease management and sleep awareness among patients, caregivers, and healthcare professionals.     

Toward a Theoretical Framework for Perinatal Bereavement

Correspondence to Dr Keith Brownlee, School of Social Work, Lakehead University, 955 Oliver Road, Thunder Bay, Ontario, P7B 5E1 CANADA. E-mail: keith.brownlee{at}lakeheadu.ca or oikonenj{at}imail.tbh.net Summary For many women a foetal or neonatal death is a significant life-alteringevent. Modern medicine has offered pregnant women an early awarenessof their developing foetus coupled with an opportunity for advancedfeelings of attachment, which, in most cases, accentuates thegrief and sense of loss. While crisis intervention serviceshave become standard practice in hospital settings and typicallymeet many clinical and short-term needs of bereaved parents,conventionally held theories of grief fall short of the realitiesdescribed by such parents. This paper critically examines theclinical and research support for current approaches to perinatalgrief and argues that theory development specific to perinatalloss is needed within the field and that social workers canplay an important role in this respect. Some emerging ideasare discussed that appear to hold promise for establishing modelsthat would be more responsive to the particular complexitiesof perinatal bereavement.     

A Critique of the Concept of Social Exclusion and its Utility for Australian Social Housing Policy

The paper reviews the usefulness of the concept of social exclusion for Australian social housing policy. We draw on recent theoretical and empirical research from Europe and the UK to develop a critique of the concept of social exclusion. It is argued that any assessment of social exclusion needs to distinguish between its utility as an academic explanatory concept and its political deployment to justify new forms of policy intervention. Policy targeting anti‐social behaviour through increasingly more punitive means, for instance, is often justified on the basis that it ameliorates the problems of social exclusion experienced by tenants residing in public housing estates. We conclude that, in spite of the limitations of social exclusion as an analytical concept, for political and pragmatic reasons it is likely to become an important component of the emerging Australian housing policy agenda.     

Father–Daughter Incest: Data from an Anonymous Computerized Survey

Retrospective data were entered anonymously by 1,521 adult women using computer-assisted self-interview. Nineteen were classified as victims of father–daughter incest, and 241 were classified as victims of sexual abuse by an adult other than their father before reaching 18 years of age. The remaining 1,261 served as controls. Incest victims were more likely than controls to endorse feeling damaged, psychologically injured, estranged from one or both parents, and shamed by others when they tried to open up about their experience. They had been eroticized early on by the incest experience, and it interfered with their adult sexuality. Incest victims experienced coitus earlier than controls and after reaching age 18 had more sex partners and were more likely to have casual sex outside their primary relationship and engage in sex for money than controls. They also had worse scores on scales measuring depression, sexual satisfaction, and communication about sex than controls.     

Acts of resistance: the performance of women's grassroots protest in Peru

Creative approaches such as theatre are rarely addressed in analytic terms in the arena of grassroots political protest. In this article, is is argued that theatre can be an effective medium through which to engage with social change, and that theatrical protest articulates in a variety of intricate ways to achieve this. Two cases of political protest events which use theatre are examined, both performed by Peruvian grassroots women's organisations and set against a backdrop of the volatile period leading up to President Fujimori's dismissal in 2000. In a context of state authoritarianism, poverty and gendered inequality, four key aspects of the practice of performance contribute to political resistance. Firstly, the symbolic potency of making one's voice heard in public as an actively participating citizen promotes a process of ‘democratic discourse.’ Secondly, the reversals and inversions of public space and authority figures challenge established discourses of power relations. Thirdly, theatre as a ‘positive’ form of dissent provides a celebratory contrast to the ‘violence’ of traditional forms of protest. Finally, theatre contributes a space for ‘bearing witness’ to state oppression or corruption. This article demonstrates that in these crucial ways, theatrical grassroots protest is a potent tool through which marginalized sectors of civil society can engage in creative political dissent.     

EXPLAINING COMMUNICATION DISPLACEMENT AND LARGE-SCALE SOCIAL CHANGE IN CORE NETWORKS

Decline in the size and diversity of American's core networks has been tied to the displacement of face-to-face interaction and to lower societal well-being. Comparing core networks in the United States, Norway, and Ukraine, we reject the conclusions that frequent in-person contact predicts individual well-being and that large/diverse networks predict broader societal well-being. Individuals of lower socioeconomic status (SES) and societies with lower levels of overall prosperity have higher rates of in-person contact. Internet use is associated with higher in-person contact for the socioeconomically advantaged but lower rates of in-person contact for the disadvantaged. In-person and ICT-based contact is generally associated with maintaining a larger network, but in societies of lower well-being frequent interaction impedes the ability to maintain a large network. In contrast to the positive relationship between individual SES and network size, societal prosperity has a negative relationship to network size. Findings are discussed in relation to social support, democratic engagement, and the digital divide.     

‘Life stage dissolution’ in Anglo‐American advertising and popular culture: Kidults,Lil’ Britneys and Middle Youths

The ‘long road to adulthood’ that supposedly now characterizes the period from the teens to the late twenties (for individuals in developed countries) has been the subject of much recent media and academic commentary. This paper adopts a sociological perspective to review and critique this commentary, and in particular the argument made by certain developmental psychologists that the period between adolescence and fully‐fledged adulthood is now distinct enough to constitute a new stage in the life cycle known as ‘emerging adulthood’. In contrast, it is argued that, rather than anything as significant as a new life stage, what is actually happening is the erosion of established ones. To illustrate this point, the article introduces the new theoretical concept of ‘life stage dissolution’ (and its attendant bi‐directional processes of ‘adultification’ and ‘infantilization’) – a blurring (or more accurately merging) process that makes it increasingly difficult for young people to differentiate and disassociate themselves from the generation immediately ahead of them, and indeed vice versa. The paper argues that, whilst this process takes a number of cultural/psychosocial forms, it is at its most prominent in contemporary Anglo‐American advertising and marketing practices that actively seek to erode traditionally demarcated adult and childhood roles, differences, and oppositions as a new and distinct message within contemporary consumerism.     

‘Baptism of Fire’: The First Year in the Life of a Newly Qualified Social Worker

This paper describes research commissioned by Skills for Care South West to identify and track the learning and development needs of newly qualified social workers through their first year of employment. The perceptions of 22 newly qualified social workers based in statutory settings are reported concerning the effectiveness of the social work degree (England), their induction and probationary periods and their progress towards post-qualifying social work education as part of their continuing professional development. The perspectives of line managers, people who use services and carers are also discussed. Findings from the research suggest that the social work degree has been well received by most newly qualified social workers and highlights the perceived importance of a statutory placement for social work degree students. Key social work practice skills that require further development are identified and a rationale is presented for greater investment in the induction and probationary periods of newly qualified social workers.     

Evaluating the Impact of Post‐Qualifying Social Work Education

Post‐qualifying awards in social work are well established within the continuing professional development agenda for qualified social workers in the UK. The evaluation of education and training should be an integral part of this agenda because it is important to ensure that programmes continue to meet standards of delivery, are successful in meeting their aims and objectives and are making an impact on practice. However, there is a limited amount of published work on the evaluation of post‐qualifying social work education, with studies often focusing on programme delivery rather than on their impact on practice.

This paper explores evaluative work within the current post‐qualifying social work framework and discusses the results of an evaluation of the Vulnerable Adults and Community Care Practice programme, a specialist post‐qualifying social work education programme run by a UK university, as an example of an evaluation of the impact on practice. The results indicate positive evidence of impact on practice and demonstrate examples of how the programme has had a direct effect on individuals, teams, organisations and on people who use services.