Drawing on data generated by a two-year ethnographic study in a high security Spanish prison, this article explores the multiple meanings given to the social practices of sport and physical activity. We provide details of the following key themes that emerged from the analysis: (a) escaping time; (b) perceived therapeutic benefits; (c) social…

Classified primitive societies as high, moderate, or low on independent measures of social integration and social regulation to test Durkheim's theory of suicide. Estimated frequency of suicide did not differ between those societies predicted to have high, moderate, and low suicide rates. Durkheim's theory was not confirmed. (Author/NB)

Comments on the article by G. M. Herek, "Legal recognition of same-sex relationships in the United States." There are many arguable contentions Herek made in his defense of same-sex marriage. We have chosen to focus on only one in this commentary: What is the active ingredient in marriage that serves the socially advantageous goal of civilizing…

There is a recurrent conflict concerning law and judgment in the Catholic tradition. The tension between the manner in which just punitive judgments are to be rendered and the possibility of judging justly, if at all, is found frequently in Scripture and in Church history. This paper will give an overview of the dynamics of this tension in…

Little is known about the relationship between school characteristics, such as teacher-student ratios, and the risk of incarceration in adulthood. Educational skeptics argue that investment in schools has little effect on outcomes, such as criminality or the risk of incarceration, because criminal propensities are fixed at an early age and…

Contemporary social transformations of the body are essentially mediated by medical discourse. With the body conceived of as "soft and modifiable," we are witnessing an unprecedented rise in recourse to medicine in order to validate primarily social conditions. In this context, plastic surgery functions as a modality of social control and…

Using a qualitative approach, I study two processes of intra-organizational cooperation and coordination--control and trust--in creative organizations. Specifically, I analyze the complex nature of trust-control relationships in Orpheus orchestra, the world's largest contemporary conductorless orchestra. I discuss how it rehearses and performs…

This article compares and contrasts the theories of three major writers on societal change: Chirot discusses the economic power struggles within and among core, peripheral, and semiperipheral societies, Toffler exposes a future in which major power shifts could have cataclysmic results, and Bruner emphasizes the importance of education to temper…

There has been a tremendous increase in the prevalence of nonmedical prescription drug use among adolescents in recent years. Research now indicates that the prevalence of nonmedical prescription drug use is greater than the prevalence of other illicit drug use, excluding marijuana. Despite these recent trends, there is a dearth of research in the…

Debate over the role that young people should play in politics reflects different conceptions of childhood and adult concerns about loss of authority and political hegemony. Coverage of youth protests against the Second Iraq War by the British national press echoes adult discourse on the nature of childhood and exposes the limits set by adults on…

During May 2006 a group of teaching assistants were asked a series of questions about their opinions of morality, power and leadership to inform a conference on this topic funded by the three bodies involved in educational leadership (BELMAS, BERA and SCRELM). This article investigates how teaching assistants perceive the location of power within…

Juvenile delinquency remains a significant problem for child welfare systems throughout the United States. Victims of child abuse and neglect are more likely relative to children in the general population to engage in delinquency (Ryan & Testa, 2005; Widom, 1989). Although the magnitude of this relationship is not fully understood (Zingraff,…

Previous work has shown that school achievement is lower in children living in poor neighborhoods. In this study, the authors hypothesized a role of neighborhood social capital. Data on 11-year-olds were obtained from the baseline measurements of a family cohort study (n = 328). The data had a cross-level structure: neighborhood level, school…

This paper reports results from an ethnographic study of African-American youth subculture in a New Orleans high school. The paper contends that youth subculture remains an important construct to situate stylistic resistance among subaltern groups like urban black youth that confront demands for conformity from representatives of institutional…

For decades sociologists, criminologists, political scientists and socio-legal scholars alike have focused on the symbolic and instrumental dimensions of law in examinations of the effects of social reform and policy implementation. Following in this tradition, we focus on the relationship between hate crime policy and hate crime reporting to…