Large Northern Cities Research Articles

'Perhaps a Bit Different to What We Did Twenty Years Ago': Senior Teachers' Perceptions of Outdoor Adventure within Primary Education in England.

Outdoor and adventurous activities (OAA) are now a compulsory component of the primary education curriculum in England, with senior leadership teams exerting significant influence on its delivery in schools. This study considers senior teachers’ perceptions and value of the OAA strand of the Physical Education (PE) National Curriculum (NC) in primary education. Six senior teachers from across a large northern city took part in semi-structured interviews. Data was analysed using an interpretivist paradigm incorporating a multistage thematic coding process. Findings centred on the lack of guidance given by the NC within OAA and ensuing issues for experienced and less confident teachers of the subject. Different interpretations of OAA were prevalent from traditional skills-based activities to personal and social development through basic activities delivered outside the classroom. Finally, all senior staff highly regarded OAA and offered a strong rationale for its inclusion within curriculum time. The full potential of OAA as a cross-curricular approach to learning in primary education is not being realised and can be partially mitigated by more purposeful integration within teacher education programmes.

Vulnerability and child sexual exploitation: Towards an approach grounded in life experiences

As child sexual exploitation (CSE) has risen towards the top of the UK’s political agenda, the concept of vulnerability has become a central frame through which to understand and address the issue. This article analyses problems with the concept of vulnerability as it is commonly understood in relation to CSE, taking first steps towards developing an empirically-grounded account of the notion which is more sensitive to the lived realities of victimhood for sexually exploited young people. Drawing on data from participatory qualitative research into life stories of ‘moving on’ from CSE in a large Northern city in England, the article illustrates how vulnerability is shaped through individual factors, situational dynamics and structural forces, connected by human agency through time. It argues that to respond effectively to vulnerability within the field of CSE, we need to move beyond discussion of ‘risk factors’ and denial of agency, towards an understanding of intersectional social divisions, social marginality, ‘critical moments’ and how these shape the investments and actions of vulnerable young people.

Self-Employment or Government Work? Blacks’ and Whites’ Responses to Long-Term Joblessness during the Great Depression

ABSTRACTInvestigations of survivalist entrepreneurship often fail to adequately examine displaced workers who suffer exceptionally long unemployment spells. The present study addresses this oversight by analyzing Census data on large northern cities during the Great Depression, exploring how unemployment duration is related to two presumably competing responses to joblessness: self-employment and government relief work. The analysis shows that among persons looking for work two years or more, blacks’ unemployment is positively associated with the odds of self-employment, whereas whites’ unemployment is positively associated with the odds of public emergency work. These findings accord with the theory that when resource-disadvantaged minorities face extraordinary labor market obstacles, they are more likely to become survivalist entrepreneurs than are majority-group members, who have a wider variety of options in the mainstream economy. Yet the results also imply that survivalist entrepreneurship was a viable option for only a small number of displaced black workers.

The organization of an ethnic economy: Urban black communities in the early twentieth century

Pioneering investigations of urban black communities have asserted that during the early twentieth century, the diverse activities of black entrepreneurs were not organized into a coherent ethnic economy. However, in the present study, multivariate analyses of Census data cast doubt on this assertion. They show that in large northern cities, measures of black participation in numerous entrepreneurial and professional occupations were positively and significantly associated with one another and were, in some cases, positively associated with measures of black participation in various public service, artistic, entertainment, and mass media occupations. There is evidence, then, for a revisionist view of black enterprise that suggests that important economic and social endeavors coexisted in beneficial relationships within the black communities of cities that were the principal destinations of black migrants from the South in the early twentieth century.

The Suppression Hypothesis Reconsidered: Competition Between Blacks and White Immigrants in the Retail Trade in Large Northern Cities, 1910-1930

Introduction The development of entrepreneurship in retail trade in large northern cities during early 20th century was viewed by many leaders as essential to economic progress of blacks as group. If retail entrepreneurs could monopolize local trade in communities that were created in these cities by first wave of Black Migration to North (circa 1915-1930), then, it was believed, number of benefits would follow: These entrepreneurs would expand their businesses, hire additional employees, and, over long run, sustain network of black-owned wholesaling and manufacturing enterprises that could provide foundation for economy, that is, a cooperative arrangement of industries and services within Negro group such that group tends to be closed economic circle largely independent of surrounding white world (Du Bois 1907: 179, quoted in Waldinger and Aldrich 1990: 59). The basis of this belief was doctrine of double-duty dollar, which was popularized by church and press in urban North in 1920s and 1930s. This doctrine, which was evidently based on concept of multiplier effect in economic theory (Pearce 1986: 288), argued that money spent in retail stores owned by blacks would circulate within community and, in so doing, generate greater employment and incomes for blacks, locally and nationally (Drake and Cayton 1962: 430-431; see also Light 1972: 119, citing Harris 1936; Myrdal 1944). Accordingly, in wake of Great Migration, support for entrepreneurship in retail trade was vigorously encouraged in northern cities by churches, newspapers, and voluntary organizations, such as lodges and fraternal orders. This support often took form of buy black campaigns. These campaigns originated in urban North (Frazier 1957: 166) and emphasized the duty of to trade with Negroes and promised to blacks ultimate 'racial' salvation through their loyal patronage of black-owned retail stores (Drake and Cayton 1962: 430; see also Ofari 1970: 52). Sometimes support for entrepreneurship took form of attempts to promote cooperative ventures among those entrepreneurs who sought to become retail merchants. These attempts were motivated by belief that in retail trade would be achieved through efficiencies gained by pooling of resources, coordination of business practices, such as advertising, and standardization of goods and equipment. The Colored Merchants Association, founded in New York City by Albon Holsey in 1929 under auspices of late Booker T. Washington's National Negro Business League, was an example of such collective venture (Light 1972: 125, citing Harris 1936). In spite of these efforts, though, entrepreneurs struggled to establish themselves in retail trade in urban North. They faced numerous obstacles, including racial bias in lending and in extension of credit, exclusion from main commercial districts, restricted access to business training, and denial of both property rights and police protection (Boyd 2001: 242, citing Bates 1973; Butler 1991; Harmon 1929; Harris 1936; Higgs 1977; Myrdal 1944). Furthermore, by some accounts, they were also hampered by limited opportunities to gain experience in buying and selling (Frazier 1949: 411), dearth of entrepreneurial success symbols (Foley 1966: 572), and absence of socio-cultural heritage that included rotating credit associations that could generate financial capital for business startups (Light 1972: 22). As consequence of these and other difficulties, blacks were greatly underrepresented in retail trade. For example, in 60 large northern cities in 1930, number of retail merchants was, on average, 81 percent less than what would be expected on basis of representation of blacks in these cities' workforces (Boyd 2003a: 451). …

Music, Letters and National Identity: Reading the 1890s' Italian Music Press

Much ink was spilled on the subject of music infin-de-siècleItaly. With the rapid expansion of the bourgeoisie during the last decades of the nineteenth century, opera-going in Italy was at its apogee, and as opera attendance surged so too did the demand for gossip about singers, titbits about the lives of composers and reviews of the latest works. This was a moment at which the booming Italian opera and journalism industries converged, particularly in the large northern cities, to produce an explosion of periodicals devoted to opera, encompassing a range of critical methods. The 1890s, however, also saw the development in Italy of a new branch of criticism devoted to more ‘serious’ types of music, penned by writers explicitly hostile to opera's domination of Italian musical life, who looked to the north as their cultural spiritual home.

Child Sexual Abuse

The problem of child sexual abuse is a growing reality in Italy. The experience of over 200 children seen by the SVS (Soccorso Violenza Sessuale) Centre in Milan (the first Italian large-scale study) may give more information on the European situation. This study is a retrospective study based on information contained in the files of children beneath the age of 14 seen at the SVS Centre between May 1996 and May 2003, who arrived with a suspicion of child sexual abuse. Over 80% of all cases fell within the normal-aspecific category according to Adams' 2001 classification. This first Italian survey, though not based on substantiated cases but only on cases of suspected sexual abuse, supplies a perspective on a large northern European city such as Milan. Data seem similar to those published in other non-European studies, particularly as regards clinical signs observed. Thus, the results of this study, with all their limitations, start to give a perspective on the frequency and type of child population reaching this Italian center, what the scenarios are, what signs the children present and how infrequent it is to find clinical anogenital signs concerning for sexual abuse.

Race, gender, and survivalist entrepreneurship in large northern cities during the Great Depression

In times of widespread joblessness, displaced workers often become self-employed, in order to survive economically. Applying the theory of survivalist entrepreneurship, this article examines racial and gender differences in the relationship between unemployment and self-employment, analyzing census data on northern U.S. cities during the Great Depression. The results show that, consistent with the theory, the entrepreneurial response to long-term joblessness varied by race and gender. White men, the most resource-advantaged group, reacted by becoming self-employed retailers in the mainstream economy. Yet, Non-white women, the most resource-disadvantaged group, responded by becoming self-employed in the personal services sector of the informal economy, where resource deprivation did not impede their entrepreneurial efforts.

Opinions on renal transplantation and organ donation in high school students in two large northern (Torino) and southern (Napoli) Italian cities

Organ shortage for transplantation has focused attention on educational interventions. Italy is a nonhomogenous country whose cultural and economic differences are reflected in the health-care system: dialysis is mainly public in the north versus private in the south; and transplantation rates display a wide range from 3.4 to 37.8 per million people in 2002.The aim of the present study was to analyze the opinions of population of high school students (last two years) in two large cities: northern (Torino) and southern (Napoli) Italy, as a knowledge base for a randomized controlled trial on the efficacy of educational interventions on renal replacement therapy and organ donation, targeted to high school students. MethodsThis preliminary study included eight public high schools that completed a first and anonymous semistructured questionnaire. Five hundred and eighty nine questionnaires were retrieved in Torino and 539 in Napoli. In both cities most students answered that they would give a kidney to a brother, sister, or partner needing dialysis (Torino: yes 80.6%; no 2.2%, uncertain—blank 17.2%; Napoli: yes 86.1%, no 1.1%; uncertain—blank 12.8%). Only 36.3% of the students in Torino and 37.7% in Napoli answered that they would consent to organ donation, if they had to choose for a strict relative with brain death. Opposition was 28% in Torino and 23.7% in Napoli; 35.7% in Torino and 38.6% in Napoli were blank—uncertain. These data underline the need for detailed information on the opinions of the overall population as basis for tailored educational campaigns.

Did Retail Enterprise Among White Immigrants Benefit from the Residential Segregation of Blacks? A Study of Large Northern Cities in the Early 20th Century*

Objective. This study tests the proposition, suggested by the middleman minority theory of entrepreneurship, that retail enterprise among white immigrants in the urban North was aided by the emergence of segregated black communities during the Great Migration of 1915–1930.Methods. Census data on major Northern cities in 1910, 1920, and 1930 are analyzed in several multivariate regressions.Results. The merchant participation rate of foreign‐born white men was unrelated to the index of black spatial isolation but was positively associated with the relative size of the black population, implying that the existence of large black consumer markets did promote the entry of the immigrants into the retail trade.Conclusions. White immigrants in the early 20th century North had a retailing niche based partly on serving blacks. Yet, there was no evidence that the immigrants benefited from a “captive market” that arose because of residential segregation by race.

Perceptions of Social Adjustment of Hearing-Impaired Pupils in an Integrated Secondary School Unit

The aim of this case study was to investigate issues surrounding the social inclusion of hearing-impaired pupils within a mainstream comprehensive school in a large northern city. The study focused on the four hearing-impaired pupils in Years 8 and 10. Year 7, Year 9 and Year 11 pupils, were omitted on the grounds that they were relatively new to the school (Year 7) or were involved in external examinations (Years 9 and 11). Sociometric questionnaires were completed by the hearing-impaired pupils and their form-group peers. Interviews were carried out with the hearing-impaired pupils, with their form-group peers identified as popular (sociometrically), and with those identified as having few friends. Form tutors and mainstream subject teachers of the hearing-impaired pupils were also interviewed. The data collected suggested that these hearing-impaired pupils were not particularly well integrated socially with their hearing peers. The sociometric data showed the hearing-impaired pupils to be of low status within friendship groups. Interview data from pupils suggested that the hearing-impaired young people's social experience was very akin to that of those children with very low sociometric status, and very unlike that of the 'popular' pupils, those with the highest sociometric status. Of note was the belief of popular pupils that the role of friendship--and the role of communication in establishing and maintaining friendship--was crucial to their happiness in school. Interview data from mainstream teachers suggested that they had little relevant knowledge of the personal concepts and social experiences of hearing-impaired pupils. Recommendations are made to improve the social skills of the hearing-impaired young people, and to foster a greater degree of peer-group support, with some adaptations to their curriculum to stress social learning and communication skills.

ETHNICITY, NICHES, AND RETAIL ENTERPRISE IN NORTHERN CITIES, 1900

During the early twentieth century, the ethnic neighborhoods of large northern cities supposedly created conditions that promoted the concentration of European ethnic groups in niches in the retail trade. Yet this popular assertion is based mainly on studies of one group in one location (e.g., Jews in New York). Following the “interactionist approach” to ethnic business, I use a multigroup/multilocality research strategy to show that in 1900 the groups most heavily concentrated in niches in the retail trade (Russians, Italians, and Poles) had their highest rates of retail enterprise in cities far removed from the sizable ethnic communities and large populations of major urban centers. The results suggest that (1) past studies have overstated the importance of ethnic communities and big cities for the formation of ethnic niches in retailing, and (2) the extraordinary concentration of entrepreneurial groups in such niches during the early twentieth century is best explained by a theoretical and analytic app...

The work by the developing primary care team in China: a survey in two cities.

China is in the process of converting its existing primary care resources into general practice. The infrastructure is different from that of many other countries. We surveyed patients' reasons for encounter (RFE) and the health providers' diagnoses in the general practice clinics of two large northern cities in order to assess the nature of the work of these practices. Practices whose staff had a short course of training in the theory and practice of the International Classification of Primary Care (ICPC) were recruited to document the RFE and diagnoses of patient encounters in two separate winter weeks. The practices dealt mainly with chronic illness in older patients. Hypertension-related problems were the most frequent diagnoses, followed by upper respiratory tract infection. Patients also consulted very frequently for dizziness. Overall, there was good agreement between RFE and diagnosis in some organ systems. In their present form, the Chinese practices surveyed were delivering the full range of general practice care to a self-selected age group of patients. The ICPC was very useful for monitoring the work of general practice from the perspective of both the patients and the providers.

Locational effects on AFDC exits: Examining local labor markets

Recent welfare reform limits welfare recipients to a maximum of five years of cash assistance. This policy change raises the question of whether it is reasonable to expect welfare recipients to be able to leave the rolls within a five year period, regardless of the economic conditions of the state or area in which they live. This article pursues this issue by examining the effects of economic conditions and residential location on a welfare recipient’s likelihood of leaving welfare over time. The analysis uses linked files from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, the 1970 and 1980 U.S. Censuses, and County and City Data Book data from 1972 to 1994 to determine AFDC exit probabilities. The results indicate that being low-skilled and living within one of the largest U.S. cities dramatically decreases the likelihood of exit from AFDC via increased earnings. The results also show that the job loss within cities has a significant negative impact on AFDC exit probabilities for marriage, increased earnings and all exits for high school dropouts and African American AFDC recipients. However, including city employment variables did not decrease the negative effects of living within large northern cities for earnings exits. These results indicate that negative economic conditions and poor transportation within cities impede low-skilled AFDC recipients from increasing earnings and leaving welfare.

Too much like school: Social class, age, marital status and attendance/non-attendance at antenatal classes

Objective: to investigate patterns of attendance and non-attendance at National Health Service antenatal classes of first-time mothers in the indigenous white population of a large northern city of the UK. Design: survey using questionnaires, and selected participants were then given an in-depth interview. Setting: five maternity wards in two large northern hospitals in the UK. In-depth interviews took place in the respondents' homes. Participants: fifty newly delivered women were surveyed of whom 18 took part in the follow-up interviews. Findings: there was a clear hierarchy in attendance and non-attendance based on social class, with middle class women being the most regular attenders, closely followed by older, married, working class women. However, overall social class differences were found to be accounted for by the overwhelming non attendance of young, unmarried, working class women. Older, married, working class women were found to have attendance patterns which were close to their middle class counterparts, and what differences there were seemed to be based on material factors. Key conclusions: the majority of women felt that antenatal classes were too technical and did not address emotional and psychological issues. However, young, single, unmarried women perceived the classes most negatively. If midwives are to attract such young women, their fears and their need for peer support will have to be recognised.

Pressure sore management in the independent sector: 2.

This is the second of two articles looking at pressure sore prevention and treatment in the independent sector of a large northern city. Part one presented background information, details of data collection and analysis, baseline data on current practice and initial conclusions which included an assessment of the extent of evidence-based practice, equipment use, educational needs, patient and informal carer involvement and quality of care maintenance. Part two considers these findings in greater depth. Both positive and negative aspects of pressure sore management in the independent sector are explored. Factors such as the number and types of pressure-relieving equipment used and the lack of independent evidence regarding product efficacy are considered. The survey highlights gaps in educational provision, and the lack of research evidence on certain aspects of care. The article concludes with a detailed series of recommendations with regard to practice, education and research.

Pressure sore management in the independent sector: 1.

Little is known about pressure sore prevention and treatment in the independent sector. With a rapidly increasing number of care settings taking over responsibility for continuing care, particularly for elderly people, it is important that essential nursing care is provided at nationally agreed standards. This is the first of two articles which explore current practice in the independent sector of a large northern city. Background information on the study, details of data collection and analysis and baseline data on current practice are presented. This study investigates the extent of evidence-based practice, equipment use, educational needs, patient and informal carer involvement and maintenance of quality of care. Initial conclusions indicate that pressure sore management in the independent sector is evidence-based. However, in many areas of practice, personal observations and experience continue to take precedence over research evidence.

The story of the British special migration statistics.

"This paper describes a new data set from the 1991 Census called the Special Migration Statistics. Before release for general use by the U.K. social science and geographic community, it was essential to understand and to thoroughly check the data. This paper reports on the structure of the database and the checks carried out to verify its internal and external consistency. Finally, the paper summarises the pattern of migration revealed by the statistics for two illustrative spatial systems: wards in a large northern city and regions in Great Britain." The focus is on internal migration.

STRUCTURAL FACTORS AFFECTING THE LOCATION AND TIMING OF URBAN UNDERCLASS GROWTH

This paper examines the demographic and economic conditions underlying the differential rise of concentrated urban poverty in large northern cities. These cities are shown to have experienced substantially more occupational and industrial restructuring since 1970 than have major cities in the South and the West, particularly losses of jobs that had been held by less educated residents. Despite improvements in their overall schooling levels, relatively few inner-city blacks have acquired education beyond high school, in contrast with employees in new urban growth industries. Underclass blacks with exceptionally high rates of school dropout are especially handicapped in transforming city economies. Whereas the number of jobs not requiring education beyond high school has been increasing in the suburbs, less educated blacks have been spatially constrained to remain in inner-city housing. Within underclass neighborhoods, few households possess private vehicles, which are shown to be increasingly necessary for employment in dispersing metropolitan economies. The implications of interactions between skill mismatches and spatial mismatches are explored. Policies that may have inadvertently contributed to the rise of the urban underclass are discussed as are policies needed to reduce skill and spatial mismatches in metropolitan areas.

The Accomplishment of Divergence

Abstract The situated development of South Asian communities in the UK has led to the growth of a number of schools in which ‘ethnic minority’ pupils form a majority. Such a situation throws into higher relief issues and concerns surrounding cultural transmission and encounter, and communicative competence. This paper recounts some of the principal findings of research in which the teaching staff of a large 9‐13 middle school were interviewed individually regarding their perceptions of their South Asian pupils. The school has an almost wholly South Asian intake and is situated near the centre of a large northern city. The teachers’ markedly deficit view of their charges is detailed and this is followed by an explanation of their constructions in microsociological terms. A model is presented which clarifies the processes by which close intercultural interaction seem to accomplish worlds as divergent. The author teaches children with special educational needs at the school in which the study was undertaken.