Workers Not Wasters: Masculinity, Social Status and Respectability in Central Scotland (Edinburgh Education & Society Series) - Hardcover

Wight, Daniel

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0748604448 ISBN 13: 9780748604449

Publisher: Edinburgh University Press, 1994

Synopsis

"Workers Not Wasters" looks at the central issues of masculine respectability and regular employment. It describes the employment ethic in a small community in industrial Scotland and explores how men retain their self-esteem in a period of mass unemployment. Consumption, particularly of alcohol, becomes a sign of social status with the result that poverty is seen as almost the worst consequence of unemployment. This study describes men's strategies developed to cope with poverty - some illegal, others less dangerous - and provides a partial ethnography of working class consumption. Based on participant observation, this book provides a view into the cultural factors governing a community's response to unemployment.

Edition details

• Publisher: Edinburgh University Press
• Publication date: 1994
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0748604448
• ISBN 13: 9780748604449
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 240