Talk changes things: The implications of McCloskey's Bourgeois Dignity for historical inquiry

In The Bourgeois Dignity, Deidre McCloskey asserts that although there were many reasons that have been posited for the rise of the bourgeois class and the tremendous increase in the world's standard of living that occurred during the Industrial Revolution, including the enlightenment and the Protestant ethic, something else was required. For her, that something else was a change in the esteem that was afforded to the bourgeois, to capitalists and to capitalism. The talk changed and a change in the talk was what ultimately changed things. In this article, we briefly explore and defend McCloskey's (2010) claim that a change in talk was at the root of the Industrial Revolution. Further, contrary to much of the literature on the relationship between discourse and social change which tends to focus on discourse as an artifact rather than a driver of change, we argue using examples from outside of economics and economic history that a change in talk not only tends to accompany but often precedes dramatic social transformation.     

A Sociology of Human Rights: Rights through a Social Movements Lens

Cet article propose un cadre théorique pour développer une sociologie des droits humains en s'intéressant aux mouvements sociaux dans le but de comprendre les cultures de droits locales. Si le droit humain est une idée qui se développe historiquement principalement à travers l'État, on remarque qu'au Canada, les avancées des droits de l'homme sont le fait de militants travaillant sur le terrain. Dans cet article, on explore aussi les écrits en sociologie au Canada. Les auteurs argumentent qu'on observe un sérieux manque d'engagement de la part des sociologues anglophones et francophones au Canada et que trop peu d'entres eux proposent de réelles études nationales. Évidemment, l'accès restreint à l'information législative représente un obstacle sérieux à la recherche académique au Canada. This article offers a framework for developing a sociology of human rights using social movements to understand local rights cultures. The idea of human rights has historically been highly statist, but grass‐roots activism has been at the heart of the most profound human rights advances in Canada. The article also raises questions about the current state of sociological writing about Canada. The author contends that there is a serious lack of engagement among English and French sociologists, and too few scholars provide genuine “national” studies. Moreover, restrictive access to information legislation represents a serious obstacle to academic research in Canada.     

‘I guess it’s kind of elitist’: the formation and mobilisation of cultural,social and physical capital in youth sport volunteering

Policy and research portray sport volunteering as a means by which young people can develop skills and perform active citizenship. This paper draws on qualitative research with participants in a UK sport volunteering programme to critically examine young people’s volunteering journeys and how these are shaped by their formation and mobilisation of capital. The results show how programme structures and practices, such as selection criteria, privilege young people with higher levels of cultural and physical capital, and afford these youth additional opportunities to accumulate and mobilise cultural and social capital. The paper argues for a more critical understanding of youth sport volunteering; one that recognises that sport volunteering can reserve the practice of active citizenship for privileged youth.     

Establishing Independence in Low‐Income Urban Areas: The Relationship to Adolescent Aggressive Behavior

Although adolescents in poor urban areas often assume independent, adult‐like roles, relatively little is known about the relationship between these roles and other adolescent behaviors. This research examines the association between independent roles occurring within different contexts (e.g. family, peer, work) and aggressive behavior among 516 low‐income, urban middle school students. Overall, adolescent employment is related to increases in aggressive behavior. However, associations that familial and peer independent roles have with aggression differ by the extent of youth involvement in paid work. Greater engagement in familial independent roles is associated with decreased aggression among employed adolescents, but with increased aggression among unemployed youth. Also, peer independent roles are related to significantly greater increases in aggression among unemployed, compared with employed, adolescents.     

Social capital as collective narratives and post‐disaster community recovery

This paper examines how social capital aids in post‐disaster community recovery and redevelopment. While previous studies on social capital and post‐disaster recovery have tended to focus on social networks as a source of necessary assistance, the primary focus of this study is on how social capital in the form of collective narratives affects post‐disaster recovery. We argue that collective narratives can shape the recovery strategies that individuals adopt. To illustrate this we examine the post‐Katrina recovery efforts in St. Bernard Parish, an area devastated by flooding and significant environmental damage. In particular, we focus on the shared narrative that dominated qualitative interview data collected in St. Bernard, namely, its shared identity as a close‐knit, family‐oriented community comprised of hard workers. This narrative led community members to adopt a strategy that emphasized self‐reliance.     

Gambling and Adverse Life Events Among Urban Adolescents

This study explored the cross sectional association between adverse life events and gambling in a sample of 515 urban adolescents (average age 17, 55% male, 88% African American). Approximately half of the sample had gambled in the past year (51%); 78% of the gamblers gambled monthly and 39% had a gambling-related problem. On the other hand, 88% of the sample had experienced at least one life event in the past year, and those experiencing events tended to live in more disadvantaged neighborhoods. The mere acknowledgement of experiencing a stressful life event in the past year (yes/no) was not associated with an increase in odds of being a gambler, with gambling more frequently, or with having a gambling problem. However, when the context of the event was considered, an association was found between directly experiencing threatening and deviant/violent types of events and frequent gambling (OR > 2). Additionally, the probability of being a gambler increased as the number of events experienced increased (aOR = 1.07, 95% CI = 1.01, 1.13, P = 0.013), but problems among gamblers were not associated with the number of events experienced (aOR = 1.01, 95% CI = 0.92, 1.11, P = 0.876). During adolescence, life events appear to be connected more with the frequency of gambling rather than with problems related to gambling.