ABSTRACT
One evolutionary aspect of the social sciences is that it is common for language to be used in a particularly loose way to outline new concepts, with a considerable need emerging later for more precision and tightening up. To take but two recent examples, this has happened with the term ‘gentrification’ and, more recently, with what has become a catch-phrase of much urban research – ‘social polarisation’ (Hamnett 1994a).
