vistudies

Wednesday, February 07, 2007

Ben Vautier

Nice: Ben Vautier

Ben Vautier

Ben Vautier (born on July 18, 1935 in Naples, Italy), also known as just Ben, is a French artist.
He's living and working in Nice, where he ran a disc shop when he was young. He discovered Yves Klein and the Nouveau Réalisme in the 1950's, but he became quickly interested in the french dada artist Marcel Duchamp, the music of John Cage and all the Fluxus artistic movement in the 1960's. He is also active in Mail-Art and is mostly know for writing his texts as a statement for example his work "L'art est inutile. Rentrez chez vous" (Art is Useless, Go Home).

He always defended the right of the minorities in any coutry, and he's been influenced by the theories of François Fontan about ethnism. For example, he has always defended the occitan language (south of France), which is about to be extinct because spokers are shifting to French.

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

suits speak volumes

A suit isn't just a suit anymore. In today's rocky economy, a man's suit indicates whether he's just starting out, quickly climbing the executive ladder or firmly entrenched in executive row. Don't think a suit speaks volumes? Try showing up at a four-star restaurant in an £80 blazer and see whether the maitre d' smiles and says, "Your table is waiting," or sniffs, "Sorry, please wait at the bar."

Jim Dine - Suits work

About - Jim Dine

Jim Dine (born June 16, 1935) is an American pop artist. He is sometimes considered to be a part of the Neo-Dada movement. He was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, attended the University of Cincinnati and received a BFA from Ohio University in 1957. He first earned respect in the art world with his Happenings. Pioneered with artists Claes Oldenburg and Allan Kaprow, in conjunction with musician John Cage the "Happenings" were chaotic performance art that was a stark contrast with the more somber mood of the expressionists popular in the New York art world. The first of these was the 30 second The Smiling Worker performed in 1959.

In the early 1960s Dine produced pop art with items from everyday life. These provided commercial as well as critical success, but left Dine unsatisfied. In 1967 he moved to London, England where he was represented by the art dealer Robert Fraser spending the next four years developing his art. Returning to the United States in 1971 he focused on several series of drawings. In the 1980s sculpture resumed a prominent place in his art. In the time since then there has been an apparent shift in the subject of his art from manmade objects to nature.

In 1984, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, exhibited his work as "Jim Dine: Five Themes," and in 1989, the Minneapolis Institute of Arts hosted "Jim Dine Drawings: 1973-1987". In 2004, the National Gallery of Art, Washington organized the exhibition, "Drawings of Jim Dine."

Cameron YouTube Spoofer Fights Back

Sky News, sion simon backing up his spoof you tube post...

david cameron - spoof

This is a spoof from a labour MP (sion simon) that has created upset with politions over the false David cameron you tube post's.

Introduction to webcameron

David Cameron trying to connect to the people via youtube. he is trying to convey that he is like the majority of the people in the UK when he most definatly isnt.

Maslow and his needs

Hierarchy of Human Needs
Diagram of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, represented as a pyramid with more primitive needs at the bottom.
Enlarge
Diagram of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, represented as a pyramid with more primitive needs at the bottom.

Maslow's primary contribution to psychology is his Hierarchy of Human Needs, which he often presented as a pyramid. Maslow contended that humans have a number of needs that are instinctoid, that is, innate. These needs are classified as "conative needs", "cognitive needs", and "aesthetic needs". "Neurotic needs" are included in Maslow's theory but do not exist within the hierarchy.

Maslow assumed our needs are arranged in a hierarchy in terms of their potency. Although all needs are instinctive, some are more powerful than others. The lower the need is in the pyramid, the more powerful it is. The higher the need is in the pyramid, the weaker and more distinctly human it is. The lower, or basic, needs on the pyramid are similar to those possessed by non-human animals, but only humans possess the higher needs.

The first four layers of the pyramid are what Maslow called "deficiency needs" or "D-needs": the individual does not feel anything if they are met, but feels anxious if they are not met. Needs beyond the D-needs are "growth needs", "being values", or "B-needs". When fulfilled, they do not go away; rather, they motivate further.

The base of the pyramid is formed by the physiological needs, including the biological requirements for food, water, air, and sleep.

Once the physiological needs are met, an individual can concentrate on the second level, the need for safety and security. Included here are the needs for structure, order, security, and predictability.

The third level is the need for love and belonging. Included here are the needs for friends and companions, a supportive family, identification with a group, and an intimate relationship.

The fourth level is the esteem needs. This group of needs requires both recognition from other people that results in feelings of prestige, acceptance, and status, and self-esteem that results in feelings of adequacy, competence, and confidence. Lack of satisfaction of the esteem needs results in discouragement and feelings of inferiority.

Finally, self-actualization sits at the apex of the original pyramid.

In 1970 Maslow published a revision to his original 1954 pyramid ([1]), adding the cognitive needs (first the need to acquire knowledge, then the need to understand that knowledge) above the need for self-actualization, and the aesthetic needs (the needs to create and/or experience beauty, balance, structure, etc.) at the top of the pyramid. However, not all versions of Maslow's pyramid include the top two levels.

Maslow theorized that unfulfilled cognitive needs can become redirected into neurotic needs. For example, children whose safety needs are not adequately met may grow into adults who compulsively hoard money or possessions (see[2]). Unlike other needs, however, neurotic needs do not promote health or growth if they are satisfied.

Maslow also proposed that people who have reached self-actualization will sometimes experience a state he referred to as "transcendence", in which they become aware of not only their own fullest potential, but the fullest potential of human beings at large. He described this transcendence and its characteristics in an essay in the posthumously published The Farther Reaches of Human Nature. (Also see Flow).

In the essay, he describes this experience as not always being transitory, but that certain individuals might have ready access to it, and spend more time in this state. He makes a point that these individuals experience not only ecstatic joy, but also profound "cosmic-sadness" (Maslow, 1971) at the ability of humans to foil chances of transcendence in their own lives and in the world at large.

Maslow's theory of human needs draws strongly on the pioneering work of Henry Murray (1938). This provides the basis for wide-ranging and extensively validated work relating to Achievement, Affiliation, Power and Ambition.

Collar workers

White Collar

Refers to employees who perform knowledge work, such as those in professional, managerial or administrative positions.

Blue Collar

Refers to employees who perform manual labor, such as in a factory.

Fantastic website

http://www.businessballs.com/demographicsclassifications.htm

The website above is fantastic for showing the social classes in the UK and how they are defined today. There is a lot of interesting thing on the website, but there is too much to put onto my blog. It is well worth checking out for defined classes in the UK today.

the information given can be quite specific and even splits the social classes into 7 categories and gives a level of income for them too...

http://booth.lse.ac.uk/cgi-bin/do.pl?sub=view_booth_and_barth&args=531000,180400,6,large,5

Another GOOD website to look at, this one has interactive maps of London and a key to aid the user. They idea is, that it points out the areas where different social classes live within London.

UK - north south divide

North-south split 'getting wider'
Key elements in the growing divide between North and South.

In maps

The poor are getting poorer while the north-south divide is getting wider, researchers have claimed.

People living in the south are likely to be better educated and earn more money than their northern counterparts, a Sheffield University study suggests.

Southerners will also have more doctors and dentists to treat them - but are less likely to be ill.

The researchers used census data from 1991 and 2001 to compile an atlas of 500 maps tracking population trends.

Combining this data with surveys designed to measure poverty, they found that overall more households in the UK were poorer (up from 21% to 24%).

The largely London-based financial sector had created more than 1.7m jobs in the 10-year period, fuelling the divide.

Skilled trade workers, based almost exclusively in the North, suffered the biggest decline of any sector over the same period - with a 500,000 drop in the workforce.

'Divided kingdom'

The North was defined as Wales and all counties north of Leicestershire, Lincolnshire and Gloucestershire.

Most northern major cities experienced a drop in population - Manchester declining by 10%, Liverpool by 8% and Birmingham by 3%.

But London's graduate population jumped from 16% in 1991 to 20% in 2001.

KEY FINDINGS
Hart in Hampshire and South Buckinghamshire are the two richest boroughs
Hackney and Tower Hamlets, both in London, are the poorest
Poverty in Hackney has increased by 9%
Glasgow has the highest poverty rate outside London - 41%
Gwent and Merthyr Tydfil have the lowest concentration of dentists - 1 in 9,370
Corby in Northants has the highest concentration of unskilled workers - 9.8%
Richmond upon Thames has the lowest - 2.5%

Durham graduate moves south
Co-author of the report, Professor Daniel Dorling, concluded that the country was being "split in half".

He said: "To the south is the metropolis of Greater London, to the north and west is the 'archipelago of the provinces' - city islands that appear to be slowly sinking demographically, socially and economically.

"On the maps shown here, the UK is looking more and more like a city-state. It is a kingdom united only by history, increasingly divided by its geography."

The government has been trying to attract businesses to the North and several cities have undergone regeneration projects.

Yvette Cooper, minister for regeneration and social exclusion, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "The divide used to be characterised by high unemployment rates and by economic decline in a lot of the northern regions.

"That's changed and it's changed already because we're seeing now economic growth taking place in every region.

"You're also seeing unemployment falling faster in the most deprived districts than in the national average, so we are seeing improvements taking place.

MEASURING POVERTY
The number of households in poverty rose from 21% in 1991 to 24% in 2001
The poverty measure used is the Breadline Britain measure
This defines a household as poor if the majority of people in Britain, at the time of calculation, would think that household to be poor
This means that as overall living standards rise, poverty can also rise if society becomes more unequal
"And I certainly don't think we should see the divide as inevitable, quite the reverse, we should be doing something about it, as [Deputy Prime Minister] John Prescott has set out."

But Professor Dorling, speaking on the same programme, said there was no indication the pattern was changing.

He said: "It's a long and slow and steady trend and has many reasons behind it. The population of Britain has been moving southwards for over 100 years.

"There's only been a few years in the last century when on average the population hasn't moved southwards.

"So we should expect this divide to widen over the next 10 or 20 years, unless something dramatic was to happen."

There were pockets of affluence in the North, such as parts of Leeds and Manchester, which "governed" those regions, he said.

London has large chunks of poverty, including the UK's poorest boroughs - Hackney and Tower Hamlets, which have become almost 10% poorer since 1991.

The wealthiest boroughs in 1991 - Hart in Hampshire and South Buckinghamshire - remained the richest in 2001.

KEY FINDINGS
Hart in Hampshire and South Buckinghamshire are the two richest boroughs
Hackney and Tower Hamlets, both in London, are the poorest
Poverty in Hackney has increased by 9%
Glasgow has the highest poverty rate outside London - 41%
Gwent and Merthyr Tydfil have the lowest concentration of dentists - 1 in 9,370
Corby in Northants has the highest concentration of unskilled workers - 9.8%
Richmond upon Thames has the lowest - 2.5%

MEASURING POVERTY
The number of households in poverty rose from 21% in 1991 to 24% in 2001
The poverty measure used is the Breadline Britain measure
This defines a household as poor if the majority of people in Britain, at the time of calculation, would think that household to be poor
This means that as overall living standards rise, poverty can also rise if society becomes more unequal

Upper Class in UK

In the United Kingdom, entry to the upper class is still considered difficult, if not impossible to attain unless one is born into it. Marriage into upper-class families rarely results in complete integration, since many factors (to be outlined below) raise a challenging barrier between the upper, upper middle, and middle classes.

Titles, while often considered central to the upper class, are not always strictly so. Both Captain Mark Phillips and Rear-Admiral Timothy Laurence, the respective first and second husbands of HRH The Princess Anne lacked any rank of peerage, yet could scarcely be considered to be anything other than upper class. The same is true of Francis Fulford, who memorably featured in Channel 4's documentary The F***ing Fulfords and whose family has owned estates in Devon for over 800 years. That being said, those in possession of an hereditary (as opposed, importantly, to a conferred) peerage - for example an Earldom or a Baronetcy - will, almost invariably be members of the upper class.

In terms of education, it is often considered to be more important where one was educated, as opposed to the level of education attained. Traditionally, upper class children will be raised - at home - by a Nanny for the first few years of life, until old enough to attend a well-established prep school. Moving into secondary education, it is still commonplace for upper-class children to attend one of Britain's prestigious public schools (Eton, Harrow and Rugby are three of the most prominent examples), although it is not unheard of for certain families to send their children to Grammar schools.

Insofar as continuing education goes, this can vary from family to family; it may, in part, be based on the educational history of the family. In the past, both the British Army and Clergy have been the institutions of choice, but the same can equally apply to the Royal Navy, or work in the Diplomatic Corps. HRH Prince Harry of Wales, for instance, has recently completed his training at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in preparation for entry into the Army. Otherwise, Oxbridge and other 'traditional' universities (such as Durham) are the most popular sources of higher education for the upper class.

Language, pronunciation and writing style have been, consistently, one of the most reliable indicators of class. (Upper and otherwise.) The variations between the language employed by the upper classes and those not of the upper classes has, perhaps, been best documented by linguistic Professor Alan Ross's 1954 article on U and non-U English usage. The discussion was perhaps most famously furthered in Noblesse Oblige - and featured contributions from, among others, Nancy Mitford. Interestingly, the debate was revisited in the mid-seventies, in a publication by Debrett's called 'U and Non-U revisited'. Ross contributed to this volume too, and it is remarkable to notice how little the language (amongst other factors) changed in the passing of a quarter of a century.
Woburn Abbey, family seat of the Duke of Bedford
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Woburn Abbey, family seat of the Duke of Bedford

The choice of house, too, is an important feature of the upper classes. While it is true that there are fewer upper class families nowadays that are able to maintain both the well-staffed town house and country house than earlier in the century, there are still many families which have an hereditary 'seat' somewhere in the country that they have managed to retain: Woburn Abbey, for example, has been in the family of the Duke of Bedford for centuries. Many upper class country homes are now open to the public, or have been placed in the care of the National Trust to aid with the funding of much-needed repairs. (In some cases, both are true.)

Money and material possessions are often thought of as a less important factor as regards the United Kingdom's upper class than those upper classes of other countries. That is not to say the case is always true, however. Many upper class families will be in possession of works of art by old masters, valuable sculpture or period furniture, having had said pieces handed down through several generations. Indeed, inheriting the vast majority of one's possessions is the traditional form in upper class families. On that point, there is a well-known derisory quotation from Conservative politician Michael Jopling, who referred to cabinet colleague Michael Heseltine as the kind of person who 'bought his own furniture'.

Official Social Classifications in the UK

The practice of officially classifying the British population according to occupation and industry began in 1851. The occupational element was gradually increased from 1881, and in 1887 the idea was first mooted by the Assistant Registrar General that, for mortality analyses, the population might be divided into broad groups based on social standing. However, it was only in 1911 that government recognised that the concepts of occupation and industry were distinct and so included separate questions on each in that year's Census. Although at this time it was still not thought possible to classify occupations without reference to industry, we can take 1911 as a watershed year in the history of official UK social classifications based on occupations. The Registrar General's Annual Report for 1911 (not published until 1913) included, without any fanfare, a summary of occupations designed to represent 'social grades'. These were later referred to as 'social classes' and were used for the analysis of mortality data and the 1911 Census tables on Fertility of Marriage. Thus were inaugurated the Registrar General's Social Classes (RGSC), re-named in 1990, Social Class based on Occupation.

The history of social class schemes

The person responsible for devising the social class scheme was T H C Stevenson, a medical statistician in the General Register Office. His 1913 classification mixed occupational and industrial groups. While Stevenson conceived society as divided into three basic social classes (the upper, middle and working classes), in fact he produced an eight-fold classification by introducing intermediate classes between the upper and middle classes and between the middle and working classes; and adding three industrial groups for those working in mining, textiles and agriculture.

In 1921 there was a major revision of the class scheme. This was made possible by the introduction of the first proper classification of occupations. The three industrial social classes were re-allocated between the other classes and the new five class scheme was used for the analysis of infant and occupational mortality and fertility. Not only did this revision give stronger emphasis to 'skill', but there is persuasive evidence that the revision was constructed in the light of knowledge of mortality rates. Thereby it produced the mortality gradients so long cherished by those who use RGSC for this purpose.

In 1928, Stevenson gave the first indication of the conceptual basis of his scheme. In a paper on 'The Vital Statistics of Wealth and Poverty' read to the Royal Statistical Society, Stevenson noted that 'culture' was more important than material factors in explaining the lower mortality of the 'wealthier classes'. And 'culture' (which for Stevenson included knowledge of health and hygiene issues) was more easily equated to occupation than to income and wealth. Hence Stevenson inferred social position from occupation as an indicator of 'culture'. He admitted that the assignment of occupations to classes was largely an empirical matter and thus dependent on individual judgement. The validation of the scheme could be seen in the results it produced, for example the mortality gradients associated with the scheme which showed a uniform increase as one moved down the social scale.

Thus, the Registrar-General's class scheme rested on the assumption that society is a graded hierarchy of occupations. The five basic social classes recognised by the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys (OPCS) were described, from 1921 to 1971, as an ordinal classification of occupations according to their reputed 'standing within the community'. In 1980, this was changed so that social class was equated directly with occupational skill. Unfortunately, OPCS did not explain the principles behind this reconceptualization. Since only about 7 per cent of cases were awarded different class codes when the same data were coded according to both 1970 and 1980 procedures and then cross-classified, it seems that, in practice, the changes in mechanism for allocating occupations to classes achieved little beyond further obfuscation of the already somewhat unclear class categories themselves. The 1990 Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) is much more explicitly related to skill in the sense of competence required to perform in an occupation. Again the introduction of SOC affected the allocation of occupations to classes, although its full effect was deliberately minimised (see Elias, 1995).

However, these are by no means the only changes made to the official social class scheme since 1921. At every subsequent Census changes have been implemented not only in the method of classifying occupations but also in the allocation of particular occupations to social classes. These make time-series comparisons extremely difficult. In 1931, for example, male clerks were demoted from class II to class III; in 1960 airline pilots were promoted from class III to class II; and in 1961 postmen and telephone operators were demoted from class II to class IV. These piecemeal changes have important cumulative effects, yet have to be made because of social and employment change.

Allocating people to social classes

While individual occupations have been reallocated to different classes, the overall shape of the model has changed very little during the past sixty years. The classes are now described as follows:

I

Professional etc occupations

II

Managerial and Technical occupations

III

Skilled occupations

(N): non-manual
(M): manual

IV

Partly-skilled occupations

V

Unskilled occupations

It should already be apparent that social class is a derived classification achieved by mapping occupation and employment status to class categories. But where do the raw data come from? The principal source of reliable national data comes from the decennial Population Census. Census data on occupation, employer and employment status are collected for the whole working population and 10 per cent of these data are then coded and used in analyses. Between Censuses, government social surveys also collect data required for social classifications, as do many academic studies. In addition valuable data for health and medical researchers are derived from death registration records which include the occupations of deceased persons.

In practice individuals are assigned to social classes by a threefold process. First, they are allocated an occupational group, defined according to the kind of work done and the nature of the operation performed. Each occupational category is then assigned as a whole to one or other social class and no account is taken of differences between individuals in the same occupation group, e.g. differences of education or level of remuneration. Finally, persons of particular employment status within occupational groups are removed to social classes different from that allocated the occupation as a whole. Most notably, individuals of foreman status whose basic social class is IV or V are reallocated to social class III, and persons of managerial status are (with certain minor exceptions) placed in social class II (see OPCS, 1980:vi and xi; OPCS, 1991:12).

Ultimately, however, occupations are placed in social classes on the basis of judgements made by the Registrar-General's staff and various other experts whom they consult, and not in accordance with any coherent body of social theory. This is why the classification has rightly been described as an intuitive or a priori scale. This does not mean, however, that no theory lay at the basis of Stevenson's scheme. His notion of 'culture' as embodied by occupation did depend upon a definite view of social processes. We can see this when we examine why the scheme was deemed necessary.

Leete and Fox (1977) note that the social class scheme was designed to analyse infant mortality, although Boston (1984) reports Stevenson's primary interest as being in the study of fertility, and especially the then vexed question as to whether the upper and middle classes were reproducing themselves. Clearly, the two issues are related, but, as Szreter (1985) shows, they must also be seen as central to one of the earliest debates in UK social science - that between the eugenicists and the environmentalists.

Although the first published application of the class schema in 1913 was to the interpretation of infant mortality statistics, the real inspiration for its construction came from the nineteenth-century debate about differential fertility, between hereditarian eugenicists on the one hand and environmentalists on the other. Stevenson, an environmentalist and advocate of interventionist public health measures, developed the social class scheme in order to test and disprove eugenicist theories, Thus, while there is no explicit sociological theory to support the scheme, it is nevertheless an assertion of the importance of social factors in accounting for observed trends in fertility and mortality.

The social class scheme has been widely used by OPCS in census reports, decennial supplements, the 1% Longitudinal Study and various survey reports, as well as in many academic studies. Not surprisingly, given its origins, it has been particularly used in research on health and in demography. However, for a variety of reasons some government departments and agencies, and academics in disciplines other than health studies and demography have used alternatives to the RGSC, and notably the second of the official social classifications - Socio-economic Groups (SEG).

For many sociologists, SEG is seen as a better measure than social class for social scientific purposes. Its seventeen groups can be collapsed to produce a scheme not dissimilar from that proposed by Goldthorpe and his associates for their studies of social mobility and class structure (see Erikson and Goldthorpe, 1992). The reason for this similarity is apparent: SEG is a measure of employment status (not 'skill' or 'social standing') and thus speaks theory without knowing it. The fact that the SEG scheme was originally proposed to government (in 1950) by David Glass, Goldthorpe's intellectual predecessor in the mobility field, goes far in accounting for its social scientific potential.

Thus we have two official ways of classifying people in terms of their employment, based on different principles and conceptions and without any straightforward mapping between them. Given this fact, and given also that the two schemes have remained largely unaltered for decades while society itself has changed rapidly, OPCS recently requested the Economic and Social Research Council to undertake a review of RGSC and SEG. Not only was it thought that two occupationally-based social classifications might be one too many, but increasingly government departments and academic researchers have bemoaned the fact that the classifications can ignore the 40 per cent of the population who are not in paid employment.

The ESRC Review is in two phases. Phase 1, now completed, examined whether there was a continuing need for official social classifications; whether the current ones needed revision; and, if so, how that revision might be achieved. Phase 2, now underway, is charged with the task of producing, validating and testing a single, revised social classification which could be used from the time of the next Census

Miners

1986: Coal mine canaries made redundant

More than 200 canary birds are being phased out of Britain's mining pits, according to new plans by the government.

Modern technology is being favoured over the long-serving yellow feathered friend of the miner in detecting harmful gases which may be present underground.

New electronic detectors will replace the bird because they are said to be cheaper in the long run and more effective in indicating the presence of pollutants in the air otherwise unnoticed by miners.

Bournville Village

Established by Richard and George Cadbury, two Victorian businessmen with great industrial and social vision, Bournville Village is a story of industrial organisation and community planning covering well over a century. It embraces the building of a factory in a pleasant 'green' environment (in stark contrast to the oppressive conditions of the Victorian industrial scene), the enhancement of employees' working conditions and overall quality of life and the creation of a village community with a balanced residential mix (both employees and non-employees).

George Cadbury was a housing reformer interested in improving the living conditions of working people in addition to advancing working practices. Having built some houses for key workers when the Bournville factory was built, in 1895 he bought 120 acres near the works and began to build houses in line with the ideals of the embryonic Garden City movement.

Motivation for building the Bournville Village was two-fold. George Cadbury wanted to provide affordable housing in pleasant surroundings for wage earners. But as the Bournville factory grew, local land increased in value and was ready to fall into the hands of developers. The last thing the brothers wanted was that their 'factory in a garden' would be hemmed in by monotonous streets.

Dame Elizabeth Cadbury was involved in the planning of Bournville with her husband, George. Her memoirs tell us how these plans became reality:

"When I first came to Birmingham and we were living at Woodbrooke, morning after morning I would walk across the fields and farmland between our home and the Works planning how a village could be developed, where the roads should run and the type of cottages and buildings.

Gradually this dream became reality, houses arose and many of the first tenants being men in Mr Cadbury's Adult School Class - which met every Sunday morning at 8.00am in Bristol Street - who had previously lived in the centre of the city and had never had a garden. Also workers in the factory became tenants.

They too enjoyed their homes in the healthy surroundings, cultivating their gardens, rewarded in many instances by splendid crops of apples from the belt of apple trees which each tenant found at the bottom of his garden."

In 1897 Richard Cadbury built the Bournville Almshouses, an attractive quadrangle of cottage-like homes around a central garden, on the southern edge of the village, on the corner of Linden and Mary Vale Roads. Built mainly, but not exclusively for pensioners of Cadbury Brothers, this group of almshouses still exists today. The Bournville Almshouses Trust was established to administer them, endowed by rents from 35 houses built at the same time.

By 1900, the estate included 330 acres of land with 313 cottages. Although plans had been set out for 'schools, baths and an institute', none had yet been built.

The City of Birmingham had not yet pushed its boundaries beyond Edgbaston, four miles away, to the north of Bournville; Selly Oak was developing fast; and to the east and south Stirchley and King's Norton were spreading.

George Cadbury therefore decided to turn his Bournville Building Estate into a Charitable Trust: 'The Bournville Village Trust'. He decided to preserve his works for future generations and protect the rural aspect of the village from speculators, handing over the land and houses to the Bournville Village Trust with the proviso that revenue should be devoted to the extension of the estate and the promotion of housing reform.

The Trust has always been entirely separate from the Cadbury business, although members of the Cadbury family continue to act as Trustees, closely involved with its work at the forefront of improving housing conditions in the UK, which still continues today.

Social Effects Of Industrial Revolution

Social effects

In terms of social structure, the Industrial Revolution witnessed the triumph of a middle class of industrialists and businessmen over a landed class of nobility & gentry.

Ordinary working people found increased opportunities for employment in the new mills and factories but these were often under strict working conditions with long hours of labour dominated by a pace set by machines. Harsh working conditions were prevalent long before the industrial revolution took place as well. Pre-industrial society was very static and often cruel-child labour, dirty living conditions and long working hours were just as prevalent before the Industrial Revolution.[11]

Child labour

Child labour had existed before the Industrial Revolution.

The Industrial Revolution led to a population increase. Industrial workers were better paid than those in agriculture. With more money, women ate better, had healthier babies, who were themselves better fed. Death rates declined and the distribution of age in the population became more youthful. There was limited opportunity for education and children were expected to work. Employers also liked the fact they could pay a child less than an adult.

Politicians and the government tried to limit child labour by law but factory owners resisted; some felt that they were aiding the poor by giving their children money to buy food to avoid starvation, and others simply welcomed the cheap labour. In 1833, the first law against child labour, the Factory Act of 1833, was passed in England: Children younger than nine were not allowed to work, children were not permitted to work at night and the work day of youth under the age of 18 was limited to twelve hours. Factory inspectors supervised the execution of this law. About ten years later, the employment of children and women in mining was forbidden. These laws decreased the number of child labourers; however, child labour remained in Europe up to the 20th century.

Housing

Living Conditions during the Industrial Revolution varied from the splendour of the homes of the owners to the squalor of the lives of the workers. Cliffe Castle, Keighley, is a good example of how the newly rich chose to live. This is a large home modelled loosely on a castle, towers and garden walls. The home is very large and was surrounded by a massive garden, the estate itself stretching for a number of miles. Cliffe Castle is now open to the public as a museum. Poor people lived in small houses in cramped streets. These homes would share toilet facilities, have open sewers and would be at risk of damp. Conditions did improve during the 19th century as a number of public health acts were introduced covering things such as sewage, hygiene and making some boundaries upon the construction of homes. Not everybody lived in homes like these. The Industrial Revolution led to there being a larger middle class of professionals such as lawyers and doctors. The conditions for the poor improved over the course of the 19th century due to a number of government and local plans which led to cities becoming cleaner places but life hadn't been easy for the poor before industrialisation.

Luddites

Main article: Luddite

The rapid industrialisation of the English economy cost many craft workers their jobs. The textile industry in particular industrialized early, and many weavers found themselves suddenly unemployed since they could no longer compete with machines which only required relatively limited (and unskilled) labour to produce more cloth than a single weaver. Many such unemployed workers, weavers and others, turned their animosity towards the machines that had taken their jobs and began destroying factories and machinery. These attackers became known as Luddites, supposedly followers of Ned Ludd, a folklore figure. The first attacks of the Luddite movement began in 1811. The Luddites rapidly gained popularity, and the British government had to take drastic measures to protect industry.

Organization of Labour

See also Labour history

Conditions for the working class had been bad for millennia. The Industrial Revolution, however, concentrated labour into mills, factories and mines and this facilitated the organisation of trade unions to help advance the interests of working people. The power of a union could demand better terms by withdrawing all labour and cause a consequent cessation of production. Employers had to decide between giving in to the union demands at a cost to themselves or suffer the cost of the lost production. Skilled workers were hard to replace and these were the first groups to successfully advance their conditions through this kind of bargaining.

The main method the unions used to effect change was strike action. Strikes were painful events for both sides, the unions and the management. The management was upset because strikes took their precious working force away for a long period of time; the unions had to deal with riot police and various middle class prejudices that striking workers were the same as criminals, as well as loss of income. The strikes often led to violent and bloody clashes between police or military and workers. Factory managers usually reluctantly gave in to various demands made by strikers, but the conflict was generally long standing.

In England, the Combination Act forbade workers to form any kind of trade union from 1799 until its repeal in 1824. Even after this, unions were still severely restricted.

In 1842, a General Strike involving cotton workers and colliers and organised through the Chartist movement stopped production across Great Britain.[12]

Other effects
World GDP/capita changed very little for most of human history before the industrial revolution. (Note the empty areas mean no data, not very low levels. There are data for the years 1, 1000, 1500, 1600, 1700, 1820, 1900, and 2003.)
Enlarge
World GDP/capita changed very little for most of human history before the industrial revolution. (Note the empty areas mean no data, not very low levels. There are data for the years 1, 1000, 1500, 1600, 1700, 1820, 1900, and 2003.)
Enlarge
Roughly exponential increase in carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels, driven by increasing energy demands since the Industrial Revolution
Enlarge
Roughly exponential increase in carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels, driven by increasing energy demands since the Industrial Revolution

The application of steam power to the industrial processes of printing supported a massive expansion of newspaper and popular book publishing, which reinforced rising literacy and demands for mass political participation.

During the Industrial Revolution, the life expectancy of children increased dramatically. The percentage of the children born in London which died before the age of five decreased from 74.5% in 1730 - 1749 to 31.8% in 1810 - 1829.[13] Besides, there was a significant increase in worker wages during the period 1813-1913.[14][15][16]

The Industrial Revolution had significant impacts on the structure of society. Prior to its rise, the public and private spheres held strong overlaps; work was often conducted through the home, and thus was shared in many cases by both a wife and her husband. However, during this period the two began to separate, with work and home life considered quite distinct from one another. This shift made it necessary for one partner to maintain the home and care for children. Women, holding the distinction of being able to breastfeed, thus more often maintained the home, with men making up a sizeable fraction of the workforce. With much of the family income coming from men, then, their power in relation to women increased further, with the latter often dependent on men's income.[citation needed] This had enormous impacts on the defining of gender roles and was effectively the model for what was later termed the traditional family.

However, the need for a large workforce and resulting wages also enticed many women into industrial work, where they were often paid much less in relation to men. This was in large part due to a lack of organised labour among women to push for benefits and wage increases, and in part to ensure women's continued dependence on a man's income to survive.

The Industrial Revolution

The Industrial Revolution was the major shift of technological, socioeconomic and cultural conditions in the late 18th and early 19th century that began in Britain and spread throughout the world. During that time, an economy based on manual labour was replaced by one dominated by industry and the manufacture of machinery. It began with the mechanisation of the textile industries and the development of iron-making techniques, and trade expansion was enabled by the introduction of canals, improved roads and then railways. The introduction of steam power (fuelled primarily by coal) and powered machinery (mainly in textile manufacturing) underpinned the dramatic increases in production capacity.[1] The development of all-metal machine tools in the first two decades of the 19th century facilitated the manufacture of more production machines for manufacturing in other industries.

The period of time covered by the Industrial Revolution varies with different historians. Eric Hobsbawm held that it 'broke out' in the 1780s and was not fully felt until the 1830s or 1840s,[2] while T.S. Ashton held that it occurred roughly between 1760 and 1830 (in effect the reigns of George III, The Regency, and George IV).[3]

The effects spread throughout Western Europe and North America during the 19th century, eventually affecting most of the world. The impact of this change on society was enormous and is often compared to the Neolithic revolution, when various human subgroups embraced agriculture and in the process, forswore the nomadic lifestyle.[4]

The first Industrial Revolution merged into the Second Industrial Revolution around 1850, when technological and economic progress gained momentum with the development of steam-powered ships, railways, and later in the nineteenth century with the internal combustion engine and electrical power generation. At the turn of the century, innovator Henry Ford, father of the assembly line, stated, "There is but one rule for the industrialist, and that is: Make the highest quality goods possible at the lowest cost possible, paying the highest wages possible."

It has been argued that GDP per capita was much more stable and progressed at a much slower rate until the Industrial Revolution and the emergence of the modern capitalist economy, and that it has since increased rapidly in capitalist countries.

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

Music & Class Combined

The relationship between social status and aesthetic sensitivities has long been observed, producing "highbrow" and "lowbrow" distinctions of tastes. Underly such designations, of course, is the implied superiority of the former over the latter. To be "highbrow" means having cultivated aesthetic sensitivities and appreciation which the "uncultured" masses don't have as they require considerable education, sophistication, and "class." In other words, it is another dimension by which the social elite can claim specialness and worthiness of others' deference. To be "high" means not being "low" in the social hierarchy, and it is those in power positions who so label their social lessers in order to protect their power and prestige.

How specific leisure pursuits and preferences--i.e., forms of sport (for instance, polo or fox hunting vs. boxing or bowling), dance (i.e., ballet vs. Western), reading (i.e., Thackeray vs. comic books) and movie (i.e., "Rambo" vs. "foreign films") preferences, and music -- become recognized as being either high or low pro provide many fascinating stories. For instance, Levine's Highbrow/Lowbrow argues how Shakespeare was considered in the nineteen century U.S. to be of the realm of popular culture, only to be transformed by the "cultural elite" into an author of messages deemed incomprehensible by the masses.

Critical theorists typically argue that the elite have hegemony--defined by Antonio Gramsci (1971) as the way a "certain way of life and thought is dominant, in which one concept of reality is diffused thoughout public society in all its institutions and private manifestations"-- over aesthetic orders. Given the power of art--to maximize the meaning-carrying capacity of cultural symbols and mediums, to crystallize cultural anxieties or to push a culture's emotional hot buttons--its control should, from the elites' perspective, come from the top. Thus, the diffusion of cultural modes should be expected to flow from the upper to lower classes. However, the reverse has often occurred. Consider, for instance, the "low culture" roots of such music as jazz and blues.

When considering Americans' musical tastes, in addition to social class there are matters of race, generation and age--other dimensions shaping the social hierarchy. Consider, for instance, how music serves as a group totem, a unique emblem for one's self and one's association. High schools, colleges, businesses and nations all have their anthems. Rock- and-roll is the music of adolescence, it is "their" music. With time replacing space as a basis of social solidarities, music has also become a sort of generational totem, as a focus of age group identifications: common memories are stored with the songs of the era and the "in" sound for coming-of-age individuals may well be carried with them throughout their lifespan; the World War I tunes now heard in nursing homes will be replaced by the those of Beatles (what will "When I'm Sixty-Four" mean to aging Boomers?); and generations grow old with "their artists" (i.e., Diana Ross moving from "Puppy Love" to songs capturing the complexities of midlife; Frank Sinatra taking his audience from bobby- soxers to "It Was a Very Good Year").

study from http://www.trinity.edu/mkearl/str-musc.html

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

social class defined

Warnerian social class model
Another example of a stratum class model was developed by the sociologist William Lloyd Warner in his 1949 book, Social Class in America. For many decades, the Warnerian theory was dominant in U.S. sociological theory.

Based on social anthropology, Warner divided Americans into three classes (upper, middle, and lower), then further subdivided each of these into an "upper" and "lower" segment, with the following postulates:

Upper-upper class. "Old money." People who have been born into and raised with wealth; mostly consits of old noble or prestigious families (e.g. Vanderbilt, Rockerfeller, Hilton).
Lower-upper class. "New money." Individuals who have become rich within their own lifetimes (e.g. entrepreneurs, movie stars, as well as some prominent professionals).
Upper-middle class. High-salaried professionals (e.g. doctors, lawyers, higher rung (were in the corporate market, yet left for a reason such as family time) professors, corporate executives).
True-middle class. Professional with salaries and educational attainment higher than those found among lower-middle class workers (e.g. bottom rung professors, managerial office workers, architects)
Lower-middle class. Lower-paid professionals, but not manual laborers (e.g. police officers, non-management office workers, small business owners).
Upper-lower class. Blue-collar workers and manual labourers. Also known as the "working class."
Lower-lower class. The homeless and permanently unemployed, as well as the "working poor."

Monday, October 16, 2006

Define:class

Definitions of class on the Web:

people having the same social or economic status; "the working class"; "an emerging professional class"

a body of students who are taught together; "early morning classes are always sleepy"

course: education imparted in a series of lessons or meetings; "he took a course in basket weaving"; "flirting is not unknown in college classes"

a collection of things sharing a common attribute; "there are two classes of detergents"

a body of students who graduate together; "the class of '97"; "she was in my year at Hoehandle High"

a league ranked by quality; "he played baseball in class D for two years"; "Princeton is in the NCAA Division 1-AA"

elegance in dress or behavior; "she has a lot of class"

(biology) a taxonomic group containing one or more orders

classify: arrange or order by classes or categories; "How would you classify these pottery shards--are they prehistoric?"

Class! is a school newspaper written by Clark County High School students in Las Vegas, NV. It's later edited at UNLV {University Of Nevada}.

Class is a 1983 American movie that was directed by Lewis Carlino.

Class (founded on January 1, 1997) is a notorious and prolific warez group which has been the repeated target of federal raids such as Operation Fastlink. They specialize in cracked games, and sometimes have elaborate art in the cracktro or release (ie. music, 3D animation, logo designs, et cetera). They are a global group and have many members worldwide. Class is frequently abbreviated as CLS and uses that abbreviation as a suffix at the end of the files they release.

Social class refers to the ranking of people into a hierarchy within a culture. The idea of social class entered the English lexicon about the 1770's, with no specific originator. Many sociologists and historians see that "higher" classes control subordinate classes. At times, social class can be related to elitism, and those in the higher class are usually known as the "social elite". This ranking may be legal, as in former Indian castes, or abstract.

Scientific classification or biological classification is how biologists group and categorize extinct and living species of organisms. Modern classification has its roots in the system of Carolus Linnaeus, who grouped species according to shared physical characteristics. These groupings have been revised since Linnaeus to improve consistency with the Darwinian principle of common descent. ...

Philosophers sometimes distinguish classes from types and kinds. We can talk about the class of human beings, just as we can talk about the type (or natural kind), human being, or humanity. How, then, might classes differ from types? One might well think they are not actually different categories of being, but typically, while both are treated as abstract objects, classes are not usually treated as universals, whereas types usually are. ...

In set theory and its applications throughout mathematics, a class is a collection of sets (or sometimes other mathematical objects) that can be unambiguously defined by a property that all its members share.Some classes are sets, for instance the class of all integers that are even, but others are not, for instance the class of all ordinal numbers or the class of all sets.Classes that are not sets are called proper classes.

The Java source files (.java files) get compiled into .class files. Since Java is a platform-independent language, it compiles its sources into bytecode, which it stores in a .class file. If the source code has more than one class, each class is compiled into a separate .class file. These .class files can be loaded by any Java Virtual Machine.

In object-oriented programming, a class consists of a collection of types of encapsulated instance variables and types of methods, possibly with implementation of those types together with a constructor function that can be used to create objects of the class. A class is a cohesive package that consists of a particular kind of compile-time metadata. A Class describes the rules by which objects behave; these objects are referred to as "instances" of that class. ...

A relative term that implies one horse is superior to another.

(or lung class or inhalation class) means a classification scheme for inhaled material according to its rate of clearance from the pulmonary region of the lung. Materials are classified as D, W, or Y, which applies to a range of clearance half-times: for Class D (Days) of less than 10 days, for Class W (Weeks) from 10 to 100 days, and for Class Y (Years) of greater than 100 days.

(1) In object-oriented design or programming, a model or template that can be instantiated to create objects with a common definition and therefore, common properties, operations, and behavior. An object is an instance of a class. (2) In the AIX operating system, pertaining to the I/O characteristics of a device. System devices are classified as block or character devices

The formal definition of an object. The class acts as the template from which an instance of an object is created at run time. The class defines the properties of the object and the methods used to control the object's behavior.

A family of derived types with a common parent type.

(klas) In the scientific system of classification (taxonomy), class is the division between phylum and order.

Options of the same type - put or call - with the same underlying security.

A class is an object which describes the structure and behaviour of a set of objects which are its instances. A class object contains inheritance information and a set of slot descriptions which define the structure of its instances. A class object is an instance of a metaclass. All classes in EuLisp are subclasses of

A class defines the behavior of its instances. Usually the class contains definitions of all methods shared by its instances.

a collection of entities satisfying a condition for membership in the class. To avoid problems arising if classes get too large, or belong to other classes, or are not completed, set theory distinguishes classes from sets.

(1) A group of objects that share a common definition and that therefore share common properties, operations, and behavior. (2) (C++ only) A user-defined type that is defined with the class-key 'class,' 'struct,' or 'union.' Objects of a class type consist of zero or more members and base class objects. See member. Classes can be defined hierarchically, allowing one class to be an expansion of another, and classes can restrict access to their members.

Lecture, tutorial, laboratory session, field trip, practicum, supervisory session and other contexts in which teaching is occurring.

The principal search mechanism in GAMS is based on a tree-structured taxonomy of mathematical and statistical problems. Each node in this tree is termed a problem class, and is designated by a tag, an alternating sequence of letters and numbers (eg, D2b1). Each module in GAMS is assigned to one or more problem classes. To locate software GAMS users find a class that describes the problem they wish to solve and then view the modules with that classification.

Rating scale of river difficulty. Scale ranges from Class I (easiest) to Class VI (most difficult or unrunnable). The scale is general and can be slightly subjective.

A factory construct from which object instances are created. The OO-Browser displays classes along with their elements, categories and formal protocols.

A group of chickens that has been developed in a particular region of the world.

The major category in biological taxonomy ranking above the order and below phylum.

Go to Top of Document - CONTENTS Class is the primary category for the data. Each Element is assigned These categories may relate to a single database table or they can also contained in, but they can also be logically grouped. Examples of Class in DOEInfo are: DEDUCTION DFWP EARNINGS EMPLOYEE LEAVE PAYROLL POSITION PROJECTION Element Name: Class Table: MetaData Length: 30 Data Type: Character

Options of the same type (ie, either puts or calls, but not both) covering the same underlying futures contract or other asset (eg, a March call with a strike price of 62 and a May call with a strike price of 58).

In the Java language, a type that defines the implementation of a particular kind of object. A class definition defines instance and class variables and methods, as well as specifying the interfaces the class implements and the immediate superclass of the class.

A taxonomic grouping below division or phylum and above order. A class may include several sub-classes.

The third group that scientists classify living things into. Each phylum is split into classes. Example: The Mammal Class is in the Chordate Phylum.

Major division of a phylum. There are six (or seven) classes in Mollusca. Clathrate: Latticed with bisecting striae or cords, or by axial and spiral ridges.

a higher taxonomic category for a group of related animals or plants which share common characteristics. This category is more specific than a phylum and broader than an order. For more information see the classification of animals.

A set of pixels in a GIS or image file that represent areas that have the same attribute or share the same condition. Classification The process and operations used to assign pixels of a continuous raster image to predefined classes.

Visual Studies - Class

Basically today we have been asked to choose a word off a wall filled with post it notes. i choose class because it didnt sound as dounting as space (for example). my very first idea for CLASS was thinking about making an advert, maybe for a car that was very elegant, simple, just like the new Jaguar advert. the first advert that came into mind though, was the mercedes benz advert "oh lord wont you buy me a mercedes benz".

The interesting thing about mercedes is that they use the word Class - to define there different models i.e. from A class to S Class. A is the cheapest, to S their most exspensive range.

vistudies

Wednesday, February 07, 2007

Ben Vautier

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

suits speak volumes

Jim Dine - Suits work

About - Jim Dine

Maslow and his needs

Collar workers

Fantastic website

UK - north south divide

Upper Class in UK

Official Social Classifications in the UK

The history of social class schemes

Allocating people to social classes

Miners

Bournville Village

Bournville Village

Social Effects Of Industrial Revolution

The Industrial Revolution

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

Music & Class Combined

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

social class defined

Monday, October 16, 2006

Define:class

Visual Studies - Class

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