Ian Cooke, co-curator of Propaganda: Power and Persuasion showcases some of the photographs and messages created by members of the public during the 'Write, Camera, Action!' days at the end of July. - See more at: http://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/socialscience/2013/08/write-camera-action.html#sthash.KM288701.dpuf

Ian Cooke, co-curator of 'Propaganda: Power and Persuasion' writes about how radio programmes such as 'The Kitchen Front' were used to communicate with the public about rationing and food-use during wartime.

In our exhibition, Propaganda: Power and Persuasion, you can hear an excerpt from the BBC radio programme The Kitchen Front. Broadcast on 20 December 1941, it features the characters Gert and Daisy, giving a recipe for mutton cooked as turkey (“murkey”).

The Kitchen Front was broadcast daily, following the 8am news bulletin, and was one of the BBC’s most-popular shows during the Second World War, with regular audiences of 5- 7 million. The programme was conceived as a means by which the Ministry of Food could communicate with the British public, explaining about rationing schemes, encouraging the use of foods which were more generally-available, and discouraging food waste. Additionally, the programme intended to boost morale, using humour and characters who were recognisable or familiar to the listening public.

Gert and Daisy were the creations of performers Elsie Waters and her sister Doris Ethel Waters. The characters were already popular before the War, having appeared at two Royal Variety performances in the 1920s and 1930s and releasing recordings of their sketches and songs. For two weeks in April 1940, Gert and Daisy performed Feed the Brute, a 5 minute programme broadcast at the end of the 6pm evening news, to give recipes and advice on food. The use of humour, and popular characters, was a huge success.

Above: Gert and Daisy's Wartime Cookery Book

Public response to the April 1940 broadcasts were analysed by Mass Observation, who interviewed 300 listeners in London and Lancashire. The survey found that positive comments outweighed negative by 8 to 1, and that the information given on food was regarded as useful. Referring to the use of comedy in the broadcasts, Mass Observation concluded, ‘This experimental series was an undoubted success, and revealed a valuable new method of giving out serious educational instruction to millions of housewives’ – comparing this approach to more “high-brow” forms of delivery, the authors state, ‘Gert and Daisy knock spots off Professor Harlow’s Empire Crusade’. However, it wasn’t just the comedy and popularity of the characters, but also their apparent familiarity, that was seen as effective. The language used in their dialogue, and their working class London accents, made them identifiable to their target audience. The two criticisms of the programmes related to the perceived extravagance and complexity of the recipes (a complaint that would persist through The Kitchen Front broadcasts), and the timing of the programme. Many women commented that they were too busy to listen at this time in the evening.    

Within two months, The Kitchen Front began broadcasting at the earlier time of 8.15am, following the news broadcast. Following on from the success of Feed the Brute, popular broadcasters and use of humour were the show’s staple ingredients. Alongside Gert and Daisy, series regulars included S P B Mais, Freddie Grisewood (best known for his later role as chair of the series Any Questions?), and Mabel Constanduros (performing as the Buggins family).  

The popularity of the programme was marked by letters sent to the presenters, addressed both to the BBC and Ministry of Food, suggesting recipes and asking for more information. Recipe books from the series were published regularly, and included listener suggestions (described by S P B Mais as, ‘invitations to adventures in the unknown’). As well as broadcasts on the radio, demonstrations were held at schools, factories and other public places.

Throughout the war, the BBC remained active in evaluating the impact of all its broadcasts, and, as one of its most listened-to programmes, The Kitchen Front featured in many of its reports. As well as commissioning research from Mass Observation, public opinion was monitored through the BBC’s Listener Research Department. Listener Research was set up in 1936, using social research methods to develop reliable indicators of listener habits and preferences. As well as quantitative estimates of audience figures, qualitative methods were used to understand listener values and behaviours. Methods had much in common with Mass Observation, which was set up in 1937, and the Ministry of Information’s own Home Intelligence Division. At the start of the War, the Listener Research Department set about creating a cohort of 2,000 listeners who would be asked to complete monthly questionnaires. The questionnaires would ask about specific programmes and viewing habits, but also about attitudes relating to the war, and more general matters of personal taste. This information supplemented the daily interviews conducted with a changing sample of 800 members of the population, used to determine audience figures.

Above: The Kitchen Front - 122 Wartime Recipes

As the war continued research showed that, while audience numbers held up, the popularity of The Kitchen Front began to wane. BBC Listener Research in 1942 showed that 31% of those expressing an opinion thought that the quality of the programme had deteriorated. By 1943, the series was described as ‘going off’’. Reasons for the decline were uncertain, with the 1943 report suggesting that, ‘It may well be that the charge of declining quality is no more than a reflection of the housewife’s increasing weariness of the whole business of catering under wartime conditions’. A Home Intelligence Division report titled ‘Housewives’ attitudes towards Official Campaigns and Instructions’, dated 14 May 1943, suggested a similar problem for home propaganda more generally. The report argued, ‘housewives are now impervious to “the flood of official propaganda” and that they select from it only the information that seems essential to them.’ Cinema and radio faired better than other formats with posters and leaflets being seen by some at this time as, ‘a waste of paper’.

Radio broadcasting was seen as highly important in influencing opinion and behaviour in Britain during the Second World War, and became viewed as a more durable medium than print-based sources. The BBC was therefore of high strategic importance (its only competitors were enemy stations such as Radio Hamburg, broadcasting to Britain), and research on public opinion seen as vital in maintaining effectiveness and understanding what worked in gaining public support. The research methods developed and used by Mass Observation and the BBC’s own Listener Research Department became an essential tool in Britain’s war effort.   

References and sources used

BBC Listener Research Department. 1942 (February). Trend in the quality of ten long series. LR/770.

BBC Listener Research Department. 1943 (July). Trend in the quality of long series. LR/1973. (Accessed via British Online Archives, available in the British Library’s Reading Rooms.)

1941. Food Facts for the Kitchen Front: A book of wartime recipes and hints. British Library shelfmark: 7946.aa.15

P.J. Bruce (ed.). 1942. The Kitchen Front: 122 recommended recipes selected from broadcasts by Mabel Constanduros, Freddie Grisewood, etc. British Library shelfmark: 7946.df.24.

Ambrose Heath. 1941. Kitchen Front recipes & hints: Extracts from the first seven month’s early morning broadcasts. British Library shelfmark: 7945.p.12

Ambrose Heath. 1941. More Kitchen Front recipes: Further extracts from the early morning broadcasts with other recipes and hints. British Library shelfmark: 7946.a.17

S.P.B. Mais. 1941. Calling again: My Kitchen Front talks with some results on the listener. British Library shelfmark: 7946.a.8

Mass Observation. 1940 (April). Gert and Daisy’s BBC talks. File Report 77.

Mass Observation. 1941. Home Propaganda: A Report Prepared by Mass-Observation for the Advertising Service Guild.

Accessed via Mass Observation Online, available in the British Library’s Reading Rooms

Ministry of Information. 1943. Housewives’ attitudes towards official campaigns and instructions. Home Intelligence special report number 44, 14 May. Available at The National Archives, reference INF 1/293

Siân Nicholas. 2006. The good servant: the origins and development of BBC Listener Research 1936-1950, Accessed via British Online Archives. Last updated: 27 February 2008.
(Available in the British Library’s Reading Rooms)

Dorothy Santer (ed.). 1944. The Kitchen Front: Recipes broadcast during 1942-43 by Frederick Grisewood, Mabel Constanduros and others, specially selected by the Ministry of Food. British Library shelfmark: 7948.a.16

Elsie & Doris Waters. 1941. Gert & Daisy’s Wartime Cookery Book. British Library shelfmark: 7945.p.9

The ORCiD and DataCite Interoperability Network (ODIN) project, which BL Social Sciences are a project partner are holding a community event for those interested in persistent identifiers for research objects and researchers and contributors.

We are now only two months away from the first major ODIN community event. The combined codesprint and 1st year conference which mark the half-way point of the 2-year project will take place over three days October 15-17, hosted by ODIN partners CERN. This event - the first of the two major ODIN community events - will be a combination of a traditional-style conference and a technology-focused, hands-on codesprint geared towards developers. The conference part of the event will enable the ODIN partners to disseminate findings and to obtain feedback & validation on the work completed so far. The codesprint part will be a venue for participants and invited experts to work together to assemble concrete demonstrations of the potential of open and interoperable identifier systems.

Coding with confidence

The codesprint part of the event is a 11/2 day-and-night hands-on technical workshop. Participants from several ODIN partner organizations and external experts will come together to pool their resources and work on coding projects. These projects will demonstrate the potential of the identifier “awareness layer” which is at the heart of ODIN’s mission.

See this page for a provisional list of codesprint projects. We will have more to say about the specific goals and practicalities for the codesprint in the coming weeks, so stay tuned!

In the meantime, feel free to register, to contact us with questions, and/or to leave suggestions about additional projects.

Engaging with the community

The final day of the event is a conventional plenary-style conference open to all, where ODIN partners will present results from the first half of the 2-year project and receive feedback from the community. In addition to ODIN partners themselves, representatives from numerous stakeholder organizations will attend and present, including CrossRef, CERIF/EuroCRIS, UK Data Service, PLoS and others.

A provisional schedule for the conference is available here.

Date with a supercollider

Large Hadron Collider (credit: http://www.universetoday.com)

For those of us who have not visited CERN before, one item in the event programme looks particularly exciting: a guided tour of the massive Large Hadron Collider facility which our hosts at CERN have organized.

Check the event page on the ODIN website for the latest information, including the tentative programme, a list of confirmed speakers, accommodation and more:

http://odin-project.eu/events/1st-year-big-bang-and-codesprint/ 

 

This entry was re-posted from the ODIN Project blog

 

Ian Cooke, co-curator of Propaganda: Power and Persuasion showcases some of the photographs and messages created by members of the public during the 'Write, Camera, Action!' days at the end of July.

Art of Persuasian

What does propaganda mean to you? What message would you want to spread and how would you do it? On 30- 31 July, we held “Write, Camera, Action!” - for two days you could write your own message and have your picture taken in our pop-up photo studio, in costume if you liked. It was an event for all ages, linked to our Propaganda: Power and Persuasion exhibition. Looking over the 80 or so photographs from the day, it’s interesting to see how people reacted to the exhibition and the idea of campaigning.

Picking up on the call to ‘Action!’ lots of the photographs encouraged others to do or stop doing something, or to adopt a point of view. This comes close to our interpretation of propaganda in the exhibition, of communication intended to change opinions and behaviour, or reinforce existing opinions or behaviour in a way that benefits the communicator. The most popular theme was around rights, equality and respect.

The Right to Live for everyone

Other messages were about peace and non-violence, the importance of sport and arts, and other personal interests (including origami).

Art is for everyone!

I could only see one case where the attempt was to make a change that was to benefit the communicator – although you can decide for yourself who is the most successful propagandist here.

Homework is Torture!! Homework is very important for learning

Although a lot of the contributions were light-hearted and not always serious, there were some reminders of the power of humour in more serious campaigns, providing a sense of solidarity or hope.

I am Bradley Manning

Cancer can be stopped. Don’t give up hope!

Some people also commented directly about propaganda, or drew on images and themes from the exhibition. My favourite uses the famous “I want you” recruitment pose, and creates a simple division between ‘us’ and ‘them’ (although personally I’m uncertain where I stand on the Daft Punk/ Kraftwerk divide).

daft Punk needs you!!! to destroy Kraftwerk/ Nas

Of the costumes and props available, the magician’s top hat appeared frequently, perhaps reflecting an association between ‘propaganda’ and sleight-of-hand misdirection.

'Propaganda’ is a distraction away from the truth. Got ya!

Exclamation marks and simple pictures made for effective images. One of the strongest photos, from quite a young child, simply had a picture of a person in uniform holding a gun at another figure with an empty speech bubble coming out of their mouth.

The two days showed a great variety and creativity in the use of quite simple materials and props. A lot of people just wanted to record a personal message, and these were overwhelmingly positive ones. Almost without exception, people wanted to talk about what they loved and what enthused them.

So perhaps the best advice is to appeal to this sense of optimism and keep your message simple.

Always wear pink!

And look like you mean it.

Ian Cooke, co-curator of Propaganda: Power and Persuasion provides a round-up of propaganda inspired blogs from other British Library bloggers. - See more at: http://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/socialscience/2013/07/index.html#sthash.il633Bxv.dpuf

Vote for Vee (for Victory and be happy)

With thanks to everyone who took part in 'Write, Camera, Action!' and particularly those who gave permission for us to reuse their images, and our photographer Othello De’Souza-Hartley. Our pop-up photography studio, and workshops for children, will be back on 8 September for Super Family Sunday: The end of Propaganda.

You may have already read blog posts which talk about the 'Sisterhood and After' learning resource at the British Library which includes extracts from oral history interviews with 60 women involved in the UK second wave feminist movement. This resource and the oral history interviews from which these extracts were taken (now part of the British Library collections) are really the tip of the iceberg in terms of the collections here which are relevant to researching women's lives. So I thought I'd write a post about some of the inspiring collections which are available and about some of the guides which you can use to help you research women's history, gender studies and feminism at the British Library.

'Men wouldn't wear it' (c) The Fawcett Society

As well as the 'Sisterhood and After' oral history collection, there are many oral history collections which specifically explore women's experiences. For example, the Harman-Shephard collection of interviews includes interviews with 83 women members of Parliament, most of whom entered Parliament after the 1997 election. This could be a really valuable resource for those interested in women's political participation in the UK.

There are a number of collections relevant to the changes in birth control in the latter part of the twentieth century. As well as women talking about their own experiences of contraception and abortion in the 'Sisterhood and After' collection, there are collections such as the Lara Marks contraceptive pill interviews - a collection of 53 recordings of interviews with different people involved in the development of the contraceptive pill. The oral history collections at the British Library include interviews with women nurses, doctors and other medical practitioners; women protesters and activists; women working in male-dominated professions such as merchant and investment banking; women inventors and scientists and many, many more. These collections hold incredible research potential to those seeking first-hand accounts of women's lives. For more information on oral histories about women see these pages.

Well-known historical figures feature strongly in our collections which include personal items such as letters, diaries and manuscripts (some of which are on display in our Treasures gallery). The manuscripts collections include letters by Virginia Woolf and Leonard Woolf. For instance, there is a collection of letters from Virginia and Leonard to the writer and critic John Lehmann which also includes three by Leonard in which he writes of Virginia's illness and suicide. These items can be found on the Archives and Manuscripts catalogue.

Cover of the The Charleston Bulletin Supplements, edited by Claudia Olk
Price: £12.99 / ISBN 9780712358910 / Hardback / 144 pages. Illustration (c) 2013 the Estates of Virginia Woolf and Quentin Bell

More recently, the British Library has published previously unpublished work by Woolf as The Charleston Bulletin Supplements which were illustrated by her nephew, Quentin Bell, in the form of a family newspaper.

Some of the more hidden histories of women, such as military women, feature in the collections with bibliographies such as this one on Women and War to get you started. This bibliography shows a picture of Kit Cavanagh also known as Christian Davies and Mother Ross, an Irish woman of the late 17th and early 18th centuries who disguised herself as a man and enlisted in the British Army, fighting in several battles and successfully concealing her true sex. The collections at the British Library include 18th century accounts of her life and adventures such as The Life and Adventures of Mrs. Christian Davies, published in 1740.

Finally, as the Propaganda exhibition shows, women have been the target of many different forms of propaganda by the State, particularly around the health and well-being of the family and child. The Propaganda exhibition includes examples of public health messages about (for example) the cleanliness of the home, diet and nutrition of children and babies, vaccinations and hygiene, which (usually) being targeted at women, are resources for the study of the history and prevalence of gendered expectations about caring and domestic responsibilities.

Other useful links:

For more British Library bibliographies relating to women's lives see this list.

For another blog post about 'Sisterhood and After' see here.

In this guest post Jenni Orme, Records Specialist for Diverse Histories at The National Archives, introduces their 'Files on film' competition which hopes to use archive material to inspire budding film makers.

Like many other heritage organisations, The National Archives is always looking for new ways of engaging with as many audiences as possible to make them aware of the collections we hold. As part of this goal, we have launched a short film competition, Files on film, supported by the Friends of The National Archives, highlighting some of the diversity that is contained within our records. We wanted to bring what are often ‘hidden histories’ in national collections like ours, in to the spotlight.

Image taken from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/filesonfilm.

The competition was inspired by similar ideas in other sectors, particularly charities, which have used film competitions in the past to enhance particular campaigns or launch new initiatives. We’re hoping to engage with a creative, technology-savvy audience to see what they could do when inspired by The National Archives’ records and encourage similar creative use of our collections in the future.

As you might imagine, narrowing down a selection of documents from our collection of over 11 million was not an easy task! We could have had a hundred documents very easily, but didn’t want to overwhelm people, so finally settled on ten items, mainly extracts from files. In the pieces we chose, we aimed to reflect some of the underrepresented histories in our collection. Some are well known areas of history on which the documents provide a slightly different slant, for example the plans to evacuate disabled children during the Second World War and how to provide them with safe accommodation and shelters. Others are areas that are perhaps less well known within our collections, such as the treatment of lesbians in the Women’s Royal Air Force (WRAF) in the mid-twentieth century.

Another is a ‘document’ in the loosest sense of the word. A true mystery lies in the jewellery box and contents left behind by Mary Smith, “a lunatic”. No more is known about her, other than her personal effects were never collected after being submitted as exhibits at the Court of Chancery in 1811. After the court case was settled, her possessions became part of the Chancery holdings which eventually passed to The National Archives.

 “Mary Smith of Middx, a lunatic": Jewellery box containing various articles of jewellery. The articles were deposited by Thomas Long of Christ Hospital, London.” 1811. The National Archives (TNA): C 114/190.

Other women appear in the selection in the form of the suffragette protest on the night of the 1911 census. Two contrasting householder forms are included, one showing the personal protest of a female head of household, “No vote, no census”, the other showing the opinion of the husband of a suffragette, who as the head of household objects to the “silly subterfuge” of his wife having crossed her name off the family list.

1911 Census householder schedule for Louisa Burnham. Registration Sub-District: Clapham Civil Parish, Township or Place: Wandsworth Borough (part), 1911.  TNA: RG 14/2277/362.

All 10 documents are available to download from the Files on film website, along with brief contexts to accompany each one. You can also read more about some of them on our blog.

We’re asking budding filmmakers to be inspired by any part of the documents and submit a 3 minute film. Entries close on 24 September, 2013 and the winner will be chosen by a panel of judges including Oliver Morley, Chief Executive and Keeper of The National Archives and BAFTA award-winning filmmaker David Katznelson whose credits include Downton Abbey and Games of Thrones.

The winning entry will be shown on The National Archives' website and will receive a cash prize of £450, while one runner-up will receive £200.

For inspiration, and to prove that anyone can do it (!), some of the staff at The National Archives have put together a short film of our own to introduce the competition.

 

Full details of how to enter, terms and conditions and the digitised documents are available on the competition page, and check #filesonfilm on twitter for updates.

We hope you’ll feel inspired to get involved. As they (almost) say in the ‘business’, Lights, Camera, Archives! (Sorry.)

In the wake of the fire at Southwark's Cuming Museum and Newington Library, Robert Davies, Social Sciences Engagement Officer, explores local history resources for Walworth and Southwark

“Forward then, but still remember how the course of Time will swerve,

Crook and turn upon itself in many a backward streaming curve”

(From ‘Locksley Hall – Sixty Year’s after’ by Alfred, Lord Tennyson)

When I toured our ‘Propaganda: Power and Persuasion’ exhibition recently I was rather surprised by the strength of my reaction to one of the exhibits; namely the ‘London has taken it! London can take it again! headscarf, c.1942’ which was designed and printed by Nicol V.Gray as a limited edition of ten scarves.

Loan and Image courtesy of the Museum of London (MoL reference LW.COS.U.B21.D1.10.)

The scarf shows a map of London with the legend “arrows indicate famous buildings bombed or burned out and areas devastated by air raids 1940-41". The map is surrounded by borders quoting Churchill’s ‘We Shall Fight Them on the Beaches, We shall fight on the Seas and Oceans, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the streets and in the hills and we shall never surrender!’ speech and American broadcaster Ed Murrow’s famous exultation ‘London can take it!’

However, my emotional reaction was not in response to the quotes themselves, but triggered by the conjunction of text and images found towards the bottom left corner of the scarf:

Loan and Image courtesy of the Museum of London (MoL reference LW.COS.U.B21.D1.10.)

The comment which immediately came to mind was one made to me on the 26th March 2013 by a neighbour whilst we were standing surveying the damage caused to the town hall by the fire which had occurred the day before: ‘‘that building survived the blitz, now look at it”.

Part of the roof of the town hall, built between 1864-5 and extended c.1900, can be glimpsed in the bottom left hand corner of the photograph below which was taken during the fire of the 25th.  The building houses council offices and services and the Cuming Museum  and forms part of a complex of civic buildings including the Newington Library (the building wreathed in smoke in the mid-ground of the image below) and the ‘Walworth Clinic’ building (not visible in the photograph) which was completed in 1937 and with its plaque above the door which states ‘the health of the people is the highest law’.

Image reproduced with the kind permission of www.tomleighton.co.uk (Further images of the fire and the resultant damage can be found by using the search term Cuming Museum Fire)

A set of buildings, services and museum and library collections, and recent circumstances, which perhaps evoke many different memories and thoughts:  from having lived through the blitz and witnessing the changes wrought on the area by bombing and the associated re-developments over the following decades; the continuities of particular places, sites and activities; the development of ‘integrated’ health care systems which prefigured the formation of the NHS; getting married or, in my case, getting to learn about the history of the Cuming Family Collections, the history of SE17 and the Borough of Southwark more generally after moving to London.

All of this has prompted me to explore some of the resources the British Library might hold not only in relation to the history of the area but also how we perhaps develop and maintain a sense of place and belonging.  As always the starting point was searching the main catalogue.

Searching for ‘Walworth’ - not including Walworth Castle, County Durham (near where I spent part of my childhood) and Walworth County, Wisconsin - alone retrieved 22 Oral Histories recorded under a wide variety of projects including the Millennium Memory Bank; Food: From Source to Salespoint; the Methodist Church Oral Archive; Labour Oral History Project; Oral History of the Post Office; Lives in the Oil Industry and Oral History of British Photography; plus many articles, books, maps and journals.

I’ve discovered a plethora of books, journals and articles relating to the study and research of the formation and maintenance of a sense (or senses) of belonging and identity in an era or globalisation.  The bibliography below provides only a small selection of such works, so I am off to call up more volumes from the stacks and, on a slightly different note, book an appointment to see a chiropodist at the Walworth Clinic.

It almost goes without saying that I look forward to the re-opening of the Cuming Museum and Newington Library in the not too distant future.

Bibliography

Appadurai, A.  The Production of Locality (in Counterworks, Managing the diversity of Knowledge). Shelfmark 6963.140000

Baxter, M. / Lock, D.  Walworth through time (2011 reprint) Shelfmark YK.2011.a.33958

Boast, M.  The Story of Walworth, (revised edition, 1993) Shelfmark YK 1993.a.10636

Humphrey, S.  An introduction to the Cuming Family and the Cuming Musem (2002)  Shelfmark YC.2003.b.966

Huyssen, A. Present Pasts: Urban Palimpsests and the Politics of Memory (2003) Shelfmark M03/18743

Krapp, P.  Deja Vu: Aberrations of Cultural Memory(2004) Shelfmark YC.2006.a.2010

Najafi, F. / Mustafa Kamal Bin Mohd Shariff The Concept of Place and Sense of Place in Architectural Studies, International Journal of Human and Social Sciences 6.3.2011  

Rogagly, B. / Taylor, B. Moving Histories of Class and Community – Identity Place and Belonging in Contemporary England, Identity Studies in the Social Sciences(2009)  Shelfmark YC.2012.a.6736

Said, Edward W. Invention, Memory and Place (in Critical Inquiry 26, Winter 2000) available via JSTOR

Savage, M./ Bagnall, G./ Longhurst, B. Globalization and Belonging(2005) Shelfmark YC.2009.a.10770

Links to external resources:

Southwark Local History Library: http://www.southwark.gov.uk/info/200161/local_history_library

BBC WW2 Peoples War: http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ww2peopleswar/

Bomb Sight: Mapping the WW2 Bomb Census http://www.bombsight.org/#15/51.4881/-0.1222

 

Robert Davies can be found on twitter @blrobertdavies

Abiola Olanipekun is an intern at the British Library. For her latest series of blog posts she will write a four posts which review reports by Reform that have been uploaded onto our Management and Business Studies Portal. This first blog in the series is about the report ‘Class of 2005: The IPOD generation – Insecure, Pressured, Over-taxed and Debt-ridden'.

As a member of the Generation Y, and the iPod Generation, I only know too well the constant reminders about how my generation are riddled with some form of debt or are broke, lost, underemployed and…broke again.

As the younger generation, we are said to be carrying a substantial financial burden of an ageing population on our backs whilst at the same time benefiting less from the state than the generations before us.

Our apparently declining morale is exacerbated by the strong-hold that older generations have on the property ladder which is of a kind that is no longer available to us. Whether it be restricted through receipt of erased housing benefit (young person single room rate anyone?) or through difficulty of affording (let alone attaining) a first mortgage…I think it’s safe to say that things seem a tad bleak.

All this, from my point of view, has been looking this way more or less since 2008. But no, it seems I am wrong. The iPod Generation folks were suffering way before the 2008 financial crisis, according to Reform. (Oh, and in case if you are wondering what iPod stands for then here is a mouthful of sombreness: Insecure, Pressured, Over-taxed and Debt-Ridden.) Nice isn’t it? Well actually no, it is not. I’m afraid there will be more acronyms to follow within this blog post.

As I was working through my latest assignment for the MBS Portal, I was introduced to the think-tank Reform. According to their work, the younger generation (who are under 35), have experienced systematic unfairness and financial insecurity for some time.

We pay higher taxes, have fewer benefits and, as Reform put it, have experienced the end of the ‘welfare bargain’. According to Reform, a substantial number of young people don’t save as much as older generations (and that’s when we do save), are taking care of an aging population and pay higher taxes than previous generations did. We are then nicely reminded (being sarcastic by the way!) in the report of how the baby boomers had free education, jobs for life and the best of the housing property ladder.

Thanks! At such a financially sensitive time, that information definitely just helped my morale. Reading this report tastes rather like a dish served pure and raw (insert straight face icon here).

Above: some members of the iPod generation during happier times - at a silent disco at the Tate Modern. Photo © Dean Ayres

So, when did we ever have it so good?

Or let us just ask the real question, when will the under 35s ever have it as good as previous generations?

The initial aims listed in the report are to review the impact of tax, public expenditure and higher education policies on young people. Other points stressed in the report include the overall economic position of the younger generation, how policy decisions affect their financial standing (such as the tax increases on stamp duty and inheritance tax, introduction of tuition fees, and increased spending requirements for the NHS and social care).

Identified in this report are the following groups of young people (worrying reading - please take caution):

NEETS (Not in Education or Training)

KIPPERS (Kids in Parents Pockets, Ending Retirement Savings)

YADS (Young and Determined Savers)

SKIERS (Spending the Kids Inheritance)

Overall, I find this report bleak but nonetheless full of useful facts. Reform has made a clean effort with facts to show a particular type of financial sombreness for the younger generation that I did know entirely existed before 2008.

Nevertheless, all this hurts. It hurts as a young person, a young adult and another individual trying to make it through life on non-borrowed means and a testing wage. It hurts that these reports provide evidence that is visceral and relatable to such a degree, that my usual interrogation for anything I read is somewhat disabled when I read what Reform have to say. I believe that this is so because of how this information directly correlates with the fears that I have for my own future, and links to the other issues described in reports about Generation Y that I am facing now.

Form your own opinion and read it the report by Reform here which has been added as taster content to our portal.

Let’s hope that my own future along with the rest of the under 35s is actually bright, like that really catchy Orange slogan.

Joshua, a student who has just finished year 10 at his secondary school in North London, came to spend two weeks within the Social Science department for a work experience placement in July. During his time with us he undertook lots of different pieces of work, including this one which he has given permission for us to post on this blog.

Joshua spent one morning with us where we brought along our favourite novels or novellas and talked about what they tell us about the social world of the main protagonist. We were interested in how the social world is described in the books we had chosen and talked about how themes of interest to social scientists (such as family, social class, the home, childhood and youth, gender and the relationship between the social world and imagination) were included in the books we like. We talked about how our own social world has influenced our interpretations of the books we like and about how different authors have written about social issues such as power, wealth and poverty.

Here are Joshua’s responses to ‘Coraline’ by Neil Gaiman (Bloomsbury Press, 2002).

1. What are the material circumstances in which the main protagonists live? How is their house and everyday life described?

The main protagonist’s home is a flat within a house. The large house has been shared into four parts, which are flats. Coraline, the protagonist, lives in one of these flats. Her parents work at home and are constantly typing on their computers instead of interacting with Coraline. She has just moved house so she is starting school soon.

2. What clues are in the book about social class, gender inequalities, education, health etc. which help us to understand how the protagonist is situated in their social world?

They are not known to have a high social class, but nor a low social class. They seem to be a middle class family. There are no gender inequalities shown in this book. Coraline is educated as she goes to school. The family seems to be physically and mentally healthy.

They are not looked down upon by people regarding their social class.

3. What seems realistic to you about the social world presented in the book? What is unrealistic? Why?

The realistic parts of this social world are that Coraline lives in a flat with her parents, she goes to school, her parents work and she goes shopping like anyone else would normally do. She has just moved house and is struggling to get used to the new area and being away from her friends which I think is quite realistic.  The unrealistic parts of this are when she goes through the door that leads to the Other Mother’s world and everything is perfect and any imperfections in her normal world are corrected in this other world. For example she is upset that her mother will not buy the gloves that she wants, but in the other world her Other Mother gets her the gloves, and in the normal world, her parents give her disgusting food, but in the other world her other makes her delicious meals. This is not realistic as no one is so perfect that they know exactly what is wrong and has a solution.

Above: The front cover of Coraline and Other Stories by Neil Gaiman with illustations by Dave McKean. Published by Bloomsbury Press. Image © Bloomsbury Publishing PLC and reproduced on this blog with their kind permission.

4. Who holds power in the book and who doesn’t? How can looking at the social world help us to explain this?

In a way, her parents hold the control, but in another way she holds the control. Her parents tell her what to do and she listens, sometimes, but mostly she does what she likes, for example her mother told her not to open the door again, but she did what she wanted and opened the door herself. Looking at her social world we can see that she would probably not want to listen to her parents as they are too busy to spend any time with her.

5. How do the social circumstances of the protagonist help explain their actions?

The reason that her parents are not spending any time with her is an acceptable excuse for not doing what they ask her as they do not have any time for her and so she shouldn’t need to have any time for them. She goes through the door to find a more exciting life, as hers is pretty boring.

6. What, if anything, does your favourite novel tell us about our own social world?

'Coraline' tells us that even if your parents don’t have any time to play with you, feed you nice meals or buy you things that you like, it doesn’t mean that you should do something risky and dangerous and just generally not normal just so you can get what you want, you should appreciate the things that you already have, and not seek perfection in risky or dangerous ways.

Useful links

Find 'Coraline' and other books by Neil Gaiman on the British Library's catalogue here.

Find resources for schools, students and teachers on our Learning webpages here.

Explore wealth and poverty in Dicken's novels here.