Social Mobility and Social class in Industrial Communities [written in 1957]

The problems discussed in this chapter have risen out of field-work carried out some years ago in a Scottish coal-mining community. The object of the research is to investigate the connexion between the educational achievements of children and the occupational and social standing of their families. The educational institutions within the Burgh, which were the main channel for occupational and social mobility, were part of a national system. The concepts of social class current in sociological theory appeared to be too blunt an instrument for a satisfactory comprehension of the different prestige systems involved, and the connexion between them, particularly as there is a good deal of occupational and social mobility in the Burgh. The chapter also presents a tentative outline of Burgh's internal social system, and its implications and refinements, together with its further application to local community studies.