What we talk about when we talk about ‘walking in the city’1

Originally published. in France in 1980 (and translated. into English in 1984), Michel de Certeau's The Practice of Everyday Life has assumed. the status of an ur-text for many cultural studies academics and students. In particular, his chapter on ‘Walking in the City’ is often cited. as a blueprint for understanding key terms in the cultural studies repertoire such as ‘power’ and ‘resistance’. This article revisits ‘Walking in the City’ in order to supplement some of the established. understandings of his work circulating in the field of cultural studies, as well as the intersecting fields of cultural geography and urban studies. The paper begins by suggesting ways in which established. understandings of Certeau's work might be usefully rethought and extended. through a consideration of differentiated. instances of walking. Critiquing the account of body-subject relations posited. by Certeau through reference to the writings of Marcel Mauss on techniques of the body and self, the author calls, in particular, for a greater consideration of the role of assemblages and affect in understanding everyday urban practices. By the conclusion of the article, the author arrives at a more nuanced. understanding of the feedback loop between the body-subject and the city, and suggests ways in which Certeau's writing on walking remains productive for those strains of cultural studies interested. in the practices of an increasingly virtualized. urban space.     

Archetype Change in Professional Organizations: Survey Evidence from Large Law Firms

This paper examines the proposition that the traditional archetype of the professional partnership is said to have changed into a more 'business-like' entity, the managed professional business. It broadens the restricted case sample base on which much of the evidence has been adduced, by developing a survey questionnaire through which 197 large British law firms were sampled. Change, consistent with the notion of a more commercially oriented and consciously managed organization, is concentrated in the market-facing area of the firm but coexists with areas of continuity in the governance of the firm and its strategic management. The findings reveal a more managerial form of organization in which the core elements of the traditional form of professional organization have not been transformed. These results contest the assertion of either transformational or sedimented change found in other, case-based research and suggest that archetype change needs theoretically to be distinguished from the general phenomenon of greater managerialism within the professional service firm.     

Political and Cultural Dimensions of Tea Party Support, 2009–2012

The Tea Party Movement (TPM) burst onto the political scene following the 2008 elections. Early on, the movement attracted broad public support and seemed to tap into a variety of cultural concerns rooted in the changing demographic, political, and economic face of the nation. However, some observers questioned whether the Tea Party represented anything more than routine partisan backlash. And what had started as a seemingly grassroots movement that changed the face of American politics in the 2010 election was reduced to being mainly a caucus within Congress by 2012. In this article, we examine the cultural and political dimensions of Tea Party support over time. Using polling data from North Carolina and Tennessee and quantitative media analysis, we provide new evidence that cultural dispositions in addition to conservative identification were associated with TPM favorability in 2010; that these dispositions crystallized into shared political positions in 2011; and that by 2012 little distinguished TPM adherents from other conservatives.