ABSTRACT
Social mobility processes are integral to the very metabolism and core regulation of societies, both to their continuity and change over time. Social mobility processes in the broader sense were thus a concern in one way or another of all the founding fathers of sociology. This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book describes the life-story and oral-history methods when they met in the mid-1970s, and subsequently worked together in 1985-8 on the Anglo-French 'Families and Social Mobility' project. It is concerned with intergenerational transmission and with the roles of women in mobility. The chapter looks at some of the different kinds of desire which underlie social mobility. It also looks at the 'shadow careers', the hopes of other occupations, expressed by British men and women born at the turn of this century. The chapter explores the symbolic and practical importance of housing in mobility in Britain and France.
