Popular gambling and English culture, c.1845 to 1961

The years 1853 to 1960 constituted a period of prohibition for off-course cash betting on horses. Despite this, and in the face of a vocal anti-gambling lobby, the working-class flutter flourished as the basis of a commercialised betting market. Over this period, gambling changed from the informal wagering between friends and associates which characterised pre-industrial society, to the commercialised forms, supplied by bookmakers and leisure entrepreneurs, in which, ostensibly, the punters were mere passive consumers. By 1939, the three most popular forms of gambling were off-course betting on horses, the football pools, and betting at greyhound tracks. Beyond this was a hinterland of friendly but competitive petty gaming with coins and cards, and on local sports, which remained relatively untouched by commercialisation. A study of popular gambling tells us much about the relationship of the state to working-class recreation, and about the nature of working-class recreation itself. The unifying theme of this thesis is that the predominant forms of betting which had developed by 1960 were a testament to the moderation and self-determination of working-class leisure. Betting had become central to a shared national culture which defined itself only apolitically in class terms, and more in terms of `sportsman' or punter versus `faddist'. Those who berated gambling were un-English. The law was ignored by those who enjoyed, as they saw it, a harmless flutter. The state eventually came round to this viewpoint

The new suburban history, New Urbanism and the spaces in between

A review article of three recent books on suburbanization and suburbia in the USA: Andrew Friedman, Covert Capital: Landscapes of Denial and the Making of the US Empire in the Suburbs of Northern Virginia. Berkeley, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2013. 416pp. £19.95 pbk. Elaine Lewinnek, The Working Man's Reward: Chicago's Early Suburbs and the Roots of American Sprawl. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. 239pp. 20 b&w illustrations. £30.99 hbk. Benjamin Ross, Dead End: Suburban Sprawl and the Rebirth of American Urbanism. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2014. 249pp. £20.99 hbk

Student-centered Pedagogy and Real-world Research: Using Documents as Sources of Data in Teaching Social Science Skills and Methods

This teaching note describes the design and implementation of an activity in a 90-minute teaching session that was developed to introduce a diverse cohort of first year criminology and sociology students to the use of documents as sources of data. This approach was contextualised in real world research through scaffolded, student-centered tasks focused on archival material and a contemporary estate agents’ brochure so as to investigate changes in the suburbs that surround a university in North London, United Kingdom. In order to contribute to the growing discussion on pedagogic dialogical spaces in teaching research methods, we provide empirical evidence of students’ greater engagement via group work and the opportunity to draw on experiential knowledge in analysing sources. Beyond stimulating students’ engagement with research skills and methods, the data also shows the value of our approach in helping students to develop their analytical skills, particularly through a process of comparison and contrast

Street, beat and respectability : the culture and self-image of the Victorian and Edwardian policeman

... This chapter will explore aspects of the self-image of the late Victorian and Edwardian policeman. ... Primarliy, we are concerned with the relationship between self-discipline, self-help, and self-respect, as measured against those who had fallen by the wayside: the unrespectable and, in Booth's late Victorian terminology, "the vicious and semicrimanal poor"

An Education in Sport

"The story of sporting communities and individuals at the University of Westminster over 150 years is the second book to explore the institution's diverse history including its role as a pioneer of women's sports. Drawing upon the University's extensive archives this richly illustrated book celebrates its unique, ground-breaking sports heritage. A print paperback can be purchased direct from the University of Westminster for £20 following this link: www.westminster.ac.uk/historybooks Staff, students and alumni can claim a 20% discount on this price.

The Plan for Milton Keynes, Volume One:

The UK’s largest new town, Milton Keynes, is the product of a transatlantic planning culture and a plan for a relatively low-density motorised city generously endowed with roads, parklands, and the infrastructure of cabling for communications technology. At its heart was the charismatic and infl uential Richard (Lord) Llewelyn-Davies. A Labour peer with various personal and professional interests in the USA, he drew upon the writings of American academics Melvin Webber and Herbert J. Gans, who were also invited to advise on social trends in relation to the urban context in the preparation for the Plan. The Plan for Milton Keynes bristled with an understanding that motorised transport and communications technology would shape the city of the future, and infl uence the nature and reach of ‘community’ and social interactions beyond the localised realm. Prepared by Llewelyn-Davies, Weeks, Forestier-Walker and Bor, for Milton Keynes Development Corporation, and presented to the Minister for Housing and Local Government in 1970, the Plan for Milton Keynes is a vibrant expression of Sixties’ idealism and forward thinking. In creating the ‘Little Los Angeles in North Buckinghamshire’, a low-density city whose citizens mostly rely upon the private motor car for their mobility, the Plan has become increasingly unfashionable as agendas for sustainability have called motorisation into question. Yet the grid-roads and the gridsquares within them have been very popular with the people of Milton Keynes. The Plan was in two volumes, but it is Volume 1, the shorter of the two, that encapsulates the key thinking and the principles that informed the planning of the new city. The second volume is more concerned with evidence and implementation, so Volume 1 is reproduced here. The expansive thinking behind the Plan for Milton Keynes has important lessons for the limitations of current urban transport policy, and that cosy notions of neighbourhood and locally-driven community have little resonance for understanding the character of social relations in the twenty-fi rst century. The planning of Milton Keynes was more realistic and nuanced than much urban policy formulation today