Cultural and Structural Dimensions of Occupational Prestige in an East Indian Community in Trinidad

Abstract

One consequence of the far-reaching social and economic changes taking place among the East Indians in a rural Trinidadian village has been a lengthening of the status hierarchy. Traditional labor activities have been replaced by a broad spectrum of occupational possibilities, with local aspirations geared to urban and white-collar employment. However, while the processes of economic development seem to have altered the social structure of the community, they have not yet completely transformed the cognitive bases of social differentiation, as suggested by the differences between informants' assignments of occupational prestige and what they report as community-wide evaluations of these occupations. This ideological time lag between personal and communal representations of occupational prestige will continue to exist until a new ideology emerges to accommodate the new status criteria.