Flows
Subtitle: a network approach to social inequality
By: Lorne Tepperman and Sally Chiang
Contributors: Chiang, Sally, author
Publisher: Rock's Mills Press
Published: 2015
Place of publication: Oakville, Ontario
Language: eng
Number of pages: 329
ISBN-13: 9781772440034
Subjects: Equality
Description: "In 'Flows : a network approach to social inequality,' authors Lorne Tepperman and Sally Chiang propose an exciting new way of looking at the social world. Society, the authors suggest, is an enormously complicated, interrelated system of flows -- flows of information, flows of people, and flows of capital, to name just a few. Through processes like diffusion and migration, manifested in everyday life through such phenomena as gossip, the formation of cliques, and the movement of people among and within nations, flows reshape the world we live in, determining its shape and future. The authors examine what social scientists have learned about flows, drawing on research not only from sociology but from related fields such as psychology, medicine and management. In particular, they focus on what the study of flows reveals about the age-old problem of human inequality: why it exists and why it persists." --
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (pages 296-323) and index.
Table of contents: title: Introduction: Why study flows?:; title: Social analysis and flows ; Inequality -- -- 1.; title: Diffusion and inequality:; title: Flows of information ; Flows of support ; Flows of culture ; Flows of influence -- -- 2.; title: Migration and inequality:; title: Migration: an overview ; Movers and stayers ; Chain migration ; Return migration ; Diasporas -- -- 3.; title: Mobility and inequality:; title: Social mobility ; Careers ; Downward mobility ; Glass ceilings and glass escalators -- -- 4.; title: Inequality structures:; title: Cliques ; Kinship systems ; Clientelism ; Bureaucracies ; Cyberspace: the domain of friends and strangers ; The criminal organization as family business -- -- 5.; title: Resistance:; title: Social movements ; Gossip ; Rumours ; Searches ; Contagion ; Secret communities: the strength of strong ties ; 'The search for an abortionist' -- -- 6.; title: The renewal of inequalities: some conclusions:; title: Population flows ; Flows as renewal processes ; How social structures are (slightly) different ; Flows, institutions and inequalities ; Flows reproduce inequalities ; Applying flows to 'The vertical mosaic' ; Final thoughts.