Class and social stratification: Integrating theories with empirical analysisSession I - Sociological Approaches to Class and Social StratificationDr Wendy Bottero is a lecturer in sociology at the University of Manchester. Her main research interests are in the areas of stratification, hierarchy and 'class' with a particular focus on social mobility and social reproduction. Outline This session looks at different approaches to conceptualising and measuring stratification in the influential quantitative research tradition. In producing increasingly sophisticated measures of stratification, enabling the development of national and cross-national research programmes, these approaches have built an impressively detailed picture of how stratification affects individual prospects and collective fates. Because of this influence, stratification research has developed a reputation as an essentially quantitative discipline, wedded to structural models of social life, and adopting the most sophisticated statistical techniques. However, this reputation is not wholly positive, and we will explore the various problems and difficulties that different approaches must grapple with. To explore the difficulties stratification research, we will also look in some detail at some of the practical problems that emerge when constructing measures of inequality. We will explore these topics by looking at the Family History Project, which examined the inheritance of family social position in Britain over a 160 year period (1790 – 1950), by looking at the records of amateur family historians. We will explore how social position can be measured in different ways, and what can - and can’t - be said with quantitative data. Topics covered:
Required readings: General overviews:
Social interaction approaches to inequality:
The family history project:
Session II - Research on Social Stratification in China in American SociologyProfessor Xueguang Zhou is a professor of sociology and a senior fellow at Freeman and Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University. His research is in the areas of social stratification and the sociology of organisations. His current research focuses on microprocesses of institutional change in China's transition economy. Outline This lecture aims to highlight major research activities in American sociology on changing patterns of social stratification in post-Mao China. I will review the debate on "market transition theory" and several areas of active research. Building on this, I outline a set of emerging research agenda as a critque of this literature. Readings
Urban Redundancy: Reproduction of Social Inequalities in ChinaDr Liu Jieyu is an Academic Fellow of the White Rose East Asia Centre based at the University of Leeds, having previously been a lecturer in Sociology at the University of Glasgow. She is the author of Gender and Work in Urban China: Women Workers of the Unlucky Generation (Routledge 2007) and of journal articles on women in China. Outline In the first half of the workshop, I will start by introducing the concept of reproduction and then demonstrate its application by examining some case studies of western feminist research in Britain, followed by group discussions among the students. In the second half, I will discuss urban redundancy in China and explore how it is a gendered and classed process, then students will be worked in groups analysing the patterns of reproductions of inequalities in contemporary China and then present their findings in the workshop. Essential readings
Futher references
Conducting Fieldwork in ChinaSession I - Social Stratification Dr. Stig Thøgersen is a Professor of Chinese Language and Society, East Asian Department, Institute of History and Area Studies, Aarhus University,
Denmark. He has been the member of the editorial board of The
European Journal of East Asian Studies (since 1999), The China Journal
(since1995), China's Education, Shanghai (since 2000), and the member of
theboard of Nordic Association of Chinese Studies (NACS) (since 1997). Unit 1. Introduction to fieldwork in China An outline of the history of fieldwork in China, and of the main issues that you will be dealing with during fieldwork. The presentation will be followed by small group discussions where the participants identify what they believe to be the major problems they will be facing during their own fieldwork (access, research partners, language, rapport, validity of interview data, etc.). At the end of this unit the different problems raised in the groups will be discussed. Unit 2: Preparing the interviews Discussion of the purpose of the interview. Introduction to the interview situation, and to linguistic aspects of the interview. Preparing in small groups (4-5 people) for interviews on social stratification. Unit 3. Conducting interviews Participants will conduct a one hour interview with a Chinese interviewee related to the topic of social stratification. Participants work in groups of 4 to 5 people. Afterwards, the groups will reflect on the form and content of their interview and draw up a short written report on the main results and problems. Unit 4. Discussion in
plenum The groups will present their main findings, and there will be time for general questions and discussion on methodological issues. Session II - MigrationDr Bettina Gransow is an Associate Professor of Chinese Studies at Freie Universität Berlin. She previous worked in Free University Berlin Sinology in Sociology, Political Science. Unit 1:
Unit 2:
Required readings
Further readings
Language, Social Life and StratificationDr Rachel Murphy is a Lecturer in the Sociology of China at the University of Oxford and visiting research fellow in East Asian Studies at the University of Bristol. Previously she completed her PhD in sociology at Cambridge where she held a British Academy Post Doctoral Fellow and was then a research fellow in Chinese Studies at Oxford. Her main interests are in development studies with relevance to China, in particular, rural-urban interactions, population, and media and culture. She has written articles and chapters on rural education, rural land conflicts, and gender and population policy and is currently researching human development in rural and urban China. Outline In this section we look at how language, categories, discourses (systems of meaning that operate across a range of texts) and narratives (a subset of discourse in the form of stories which draw on and contribute to discourses) contain and reproduce various kinds of social stratification in everyday life. How does the state use language, categories and valorisations to position some kinds of people above others? How do individuals use and subvert state categories and discourses to claim higher status for themselves? How do individuals use language, knowledge and social rules to exclude others and to benefit themselves? How do different kinds of stratification such as class and gender, reinforce or modify each other? By considering questions such as these we will gain insight into how social stratification and boundaries of inclusion and exclusion are produced and reproduced in everyday life through language and social rules. Thematic reading
Illustrative reading
Literature search for your PhD in an online environmentDr Xiyi Huang works as an East Asian and Southeast Asian studies librarian in the University of Leeds. In addition to being specialised in information collection and management, she is the author of "Power, Entitlement and Social Practice: Resource Distribution in North China Villages" (The Chinese University Press, 2007) and a number of journal articles on rural reforms in China. Mr Dan Pullinger is an information literacy officer at Leeds University Library. He gained an MSC in Information Studies (Distinction, 2004), an MA in English Literature (2002) and a BA (Hons) in English Language and Literature (1998). Outline In the information agem academic resources largely present themselves in the format of electronic books and journals, databases and CD-ROMs and through the Internet. This workshop will show you:
Format The workshop consists of four parts:
Dealing with New Risks: Social Policy in the context of Transition and GlobalisationDr Heather Xiaoquan Zhang, Senior Lecturer in Chinese Studies, Department of East Asian Studies, University of Leeds, has published widely in socio-economic and human development, global-local linkages and the impact of globalisation on development, gender, the socio-economic consequences of HIV/AIDS, livelihood analysis, rural-urban migration and social policy research in China. Outline In this session, we attempt to look at the social risks emerging with market transition and increasing globalisation in China and how the Chinese institutions, such as the family, the market and state, have responded to such risks. Based on a comparison of social policy as a means of mediating and managing risks before and after the market reforms, we explore the changing nature of risks in Chinese society and examine the ways in which exposure to risks has been differentiated along the lines of existing or emerging inequalities and shifting social stratification during the past three decades, leading to new forms of poverty, vulnerability, insecurity and social exclusion. We discuss the more recent institutional responses to such risks through, e.g. building social safety nets, identify the goals and objectives of such measures and assess their effectiveness. We reflect on relevant concepts like risk society, risk and citizenship as well as risk and class before applying them to the analysis of the evolution and changes in China’s social policy and welfare regimes, and their implications for development and well-being in the country. Indicative reading (key readings are underlined)
On risk and social policy
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