It is not lost on commercial organisations that where we live colours how we view ourselves and others. That is why so many now place us into social groups on the basis of the type of postcode in which we live. Social scientists call this practice ‘commercial sociology’.
Richard Webber originated Acorn and Mosaic, the two most successful geodemographic classifications. Roger Burrows is a critical interdisciplinary social scientist. Together they chart the origins of this practice and explain the challenges it poses to long-established social scientific beliefs such as:
- the role of the questionnaire in an era of ‘big data’
- the primacy of theory
- the relationship between qualitative and quantitative modes of understanding
- the relevance of visual clues to lay understanding.
To help readers evaluate the validity of this form of classification, the book assesses how well geodemographic categories track the emergence of new types of residential neighbourhood and subject a number of key contemporary issues to geodemographic modes of analysis.
Tabella dei contenuti
Part I: Neighbourhood Classification and the Analysis of Social Behaviour
Chapter 1: Neighbourhoods and their Classification
Chapter 2: The Precursors to Geodemographic Classification
Chapter 3: The Emergence of Contemporary Geodemographics
Chapter 4: The Wider Adoption of ′Commercial Sociology′
Chapter 5: Who Do They Think You Are? Capturing the Changing Face of British Society
Part II: A Geodemographic Account of Social Change
Chapter 6: The Liberal Metropolitan Elite: ′Citizens of Nowhere′?
Chapter 7: Municipal Overspill Estates: Educational Under-Achievement among the ′Left Behinds′?
Chapter 8: Minority Communities: Melting Pots or Parallel Lives?
Chapter 9: The British Countryside: Playgrounds for the Middle Classes?
Chapter 10: Coastal Communities: All Victims of Low-Cost Airline Travel?
Part III: Coda
Chapter 11: A Geodemographic Travelogue
Chapter 12: Geodemographics in the Future
Circa l’autore
Roger Burrows is Professor of Cities at Newcastle University and also Visiting Professor of Sociology at Goldsmiths, University of London. He was previously Pro-Warden for Interdisciplinary Development at Goldsmiths. He has also worked at the University of York, the University of Teesside, the University of Surrey and the University of East London. He has published mainly on: housing and urban studies; the sociology of digital technologies; health, illness and the body; methods; and the metricization of higher education.
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