Sociology Theses and Dissertations
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2804
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Item The Sociological Study of Expert Knowledge Work: Current Trends and Changes in the Study of the Professions, Professionalization, and Professionalism(2018) Yagatich, William; Fisher, Dana R; Sociology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This dissertation is a collection of three papers, separate but related investigations in the sociological study of expert knowledge. Drawing on the theoretical perspectives developed in the study of the professions, this work continues the current trend of applying the revised concepts to occupational groups that more accurately reflect contemporary economic arrangements. To contribute to the most recent trends in the study of expert knowledge, this dissertation endeavors to integrate the concepts of professionalism and professionalization to the study of expert knowledge—specifically, a group’s ability to control an area of labor and define its practice. The first case study builds on previous research pertaining to professionalization to argue control over consumers is integral to understanding how expert knowledge is leveraged and cordoned off from competition. Using a qualitative approach to the study of tattoo artists and their interactions with clientele and the public, the findings provide support for recognizing informal and formal means of control over consumers, in addition to controls over standards of practice and membership. The second case study investigates the professionalization of volunteer work. This study aims to explicate the ways in which volunteer work may operate and be understood in the same ways as paid occupational groups. Employing survey and in-depth interview data to evaluate the effects of volunteers’ training, the study reveals training programs for volunteer work can instill a sense legitimacy in volunteers and make them more effective in their work, however, like other occupational groups, to attain social closure they would also need a strong, active network of members and a coordinated means of influencing their public image. The last case study investigates how professionalism is maintained or diminished in the wake of change spurred by external bureaucratic arrangements. Taking faculty members of higher education as the focus of this study, situating them in the context of expanding enrollments and online course instruction, this work demonstrates how professionalism is exercised through defining problems in terms of their expertise. In that way, engagement with problems posed by external pressures may foster disciplinary identity and new boundaries of professional practice.Item WORKING FOR PAY OR RAISING A FAMILY? THREE PAPERS ON WOMEN'S WORK EXPECTATIONS AND MARKET OUTCOMES(2013) García-Manglano, Javier; Bianchi, Suzanne M; Kahn, Joan R; Sociology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Since the gender revolution of the 1970s, we have learned a great deal about the determinants of female employment. One of the themes most frequently discussed in the literature refers to the role played by work expectations in shaping women's market achievement. As a supply-side explanation for women's market performance, work expectations emphasize women's internalized attitudes and preferences, which might lead some of them to make work and family decisions that will curtail their options down the road. To this point, most scholars have favored demand-side and contextual accounts of women's market achievement; these highlight mechanisms such as workplace discrimination against women or mothers, and similar structural constraints embedded in the larger cultural, social and economic systems. In this dissertation, I use longitudinal data to expand our understanding of women's work expectations in three directions. First, I revisit the neoclassical human capital argument's claim that individuals with low work expectations will invest less in human capital and choose jobs with lower penalties for work interruptions. I find support for this argument: work expectations are relatively good predictors of early baby-boom women's human capital accumulation, job characteristics, employment rates, hourly wages, and occupational prestige. Second, I explore variation in the role of work expectations across two cohorts of American women, early and late baby boomers. I find that rapid social change made it easier for later cohorts to absorb the negative market consequences of holding low work expectations in young adulthood. Third, I model the life-course employment trajectories of early baby boomers from ages 20 to 54, and find that a significant proportion of them exhibited intricate work patterns throughout adulthood, with periods in which they were focused on their career and other periods in which they seemed to pursue other life interests. My research shows that -when observed over time- most women's work behavior is characterized by a high degree of complexity. This calls for a more nuanced approach to the study of women's market performance, one that -together with the structural forces constraining their action- explicitly accounts for women's subjective expectations, preferences and attitudes towards work and family.