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Episode details

Radio 4,01 May 2013,28 mins

British class survey; Tribute to Geoff Pearson

Thinking Allowed

Available for over a year

Laurie Taylor discusses the 'Great British Class Survey', a unique piece of research conducted by BBC Lab UK and academics from six different universities. The researchers devised a new way of measuring class, which doesn't define it by occupation but by the different kinds of economic, cultural and social resources or 'capitals' that people possess. But how have other academics with an interest in class reacted to this research? Mike Savage, one of the survey researchers and Professor in Sociology at the University of Essex, debates the merits of this new approach to class stratification with Colin Mills, lecturer in Sociology at Nuffield College, Oxford and Beverly Skeggs, Professor of Sociology at Goldsmiths College, London. Also, Dick Hobbs, Professor of Sociology at the University of Essex, offers a tribute to the eminent criminologist, Geoff Pearson who died recently. Producer: Jayne Egerton.

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