Solitary pleasures
BBC – Radio 4 Woman’s Hour -Solitary pleasures.
When are women happy on their own?
It is one of the last social faux pas: eating out alone, the cinema for one, or going to the theatre or a concert on your own. Yet flouting it is becoming more common. It is not unusual to find people enjoying a solitary drink or meal, or even escaping on holiday with just themselves for company. But a lone woman is often viewed differently to a man. The journalist Katherine Whitehorn and the writer Natasha Walters join Jenni to discuss their solitary pleasures, what women are comfortable doing on their own and how important is the choice.
Interesting discussion about a topic close to my heart. Very interesting point made that British women have only had the option of going to the pub alone for a short period of time and that in my countries women can’t go anywhere alone.
Think you’re not earning very much?
Take the test:
I was shocked to discover how well-off in comparison to the rest of the UK, despite what I think of as a fairly low salary.
Blimey.
(Hello, I’m back. More to come soon!)
Understanding the Social World – Class 7
Date: 5 November 2009
Session topics: Modernity, essay writing, education and inequality
Three things that I learned:
These are all about theories of inequality and education
- Ivan Illich posits there is a “hidden curriculum” which consists of: custodial care, distribution of people among occupational roles, instruction in the dominant values, teaching of socially approved skills and knowledge, also that schooling inculcates ‘passive consumption’
- Basil Bernstein’s main thesis is that children come to school with a “language code”, either “restricted” (used to direct language without abstract explanation – prevalent in the working class) or “elaborated” (where ideas are explained more fully – prevalent in middle class)
- Pierre Bourdieu carries across his theory of “cultural reproduction” and “cultural capital” to education – schools reinforce variations in cultural values
Foundations of Politics – Anarchism
Gosh, it’s been three weeks since my last Politics class – I’d forgotten what everyone in my class looked like!
Date: 2 November 2009
Session topics: Anarchism
Three things that I learned:
- According to Anarchists: the State is the root of all evil; there must be unity of means and ends;we can have order with law, society without state and civilisation without authority
- Two main types of anarchist thinking: Individualist (Bukunin) and Collectivist (Kropotkin)
- Anarchists hate Capitalism because it is a symptom of the State, not a cause (as opposed to Marxists who see it t’other way around)
Understanding the Social World – Class 6
Date: 29 October 2009
Session topics: Modernity, essay writing, return of first assignment
Three things that I learned:
- That Modernity is an period, an era, not a conceptual framework. This also goes for Post-modern – which is post-1970 (or, some might argue post-1950) which is marked by the rise of challenges to Modernity
- According to Bordieu, three concepts for describing how society replicates itself: Capital (one’s resources), Field (one’s mileux), Habitus (one’s actions within and responses to one’s field)
- Types of capital according to Bordieu: Cultural, Social, Financial
Doth I protest too much? | Mark Thomas
Mark Thomas writing in The Guardian.
Protest is part of the democratic process. It wasn’t the goodwill of politicians that led them to cancel developing countries’ debt, but the protests and campaigning of millions of ordinary people around the world. The political leaders were merely the rubber stamp in the democratic process. Thus any targeting and treatment of demonstrators (at the G20 for example) that creates a “chilling effect” – deterring those who may wish to exercise their right to protest – is profoundly undemocratic.
Word. Up.
