Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.

This is a qualitative data collection. The Pioneers of Social Research collection includes the full interview transcripts, interview summaries, edited thematic highlights, short biographies and links to audio extracts from detailed life story interviews conducted with some fifty pioneers of social research. Undertaken by pioneering oral historian, Paul Thompson and his colleagues, over a 20 year period (1996-2018) the interviews record the researcher’s own account of the influences which shaped the major phases of their research work, and how the research was carried out, including the problems encountered. The interviews begin with family background and education, in order to understand the key influences that originally shaped the researcher’s interests, and also include some brief account of later family life, but the focus is primarily on understanding the research work. Because of their detail, these interviews are long, in Peter Townsend’s case extending to some twenty hours of recording. The material provides a valuable insight into their lives and careers and the trajectory of social research in some key disciplines in the social sciences. Those recorded include: Frank Bechhofer on researching The Affluent Worker, the petite bourgeoisie and identity on the Anglo-Scottish borderColin Bell on middle class families in Wales, the second Banbury community study and East Anglian farmersDaniel Bertaux on life stories in France and social mobility in France and UKMildred Blaxter on Scottish women and healthGeorge Brown and Tirril Harris on the social origins of depression among London womenSir David Butler on quantitative and qualitative sources in the media in politicsJohn Bynner on youth cultures and on longitudinal studiesPat Caplan on community and gender in Nepal, Madras and TanzaniaStan Cohen on moral panics, teenage culture, prisons and working for peace in IsraelLeonore Davidoff on feminism, gender, work and the familyJohn Davis on community and land in rural southern ItalyGlen Elder on methods and interpretation of American community studiesJanet Finch on qualitative and mixed methods, families and inheritanceRuth Finnegan on oral tradition in Sierra Leone and musical culture in BritainRonald Frankenberg on community study in WalesSir Raymond Firth on community, family and work in the Pacific, Malaya and in BritainJohn Goldthorpe , Daniel Bertaux and Paul Thompson on class, gender and social mobilitySir Jack Goody, Mary Douglas, Ruth Finnegan, Bruce Kapferer and Sandra Wallman on kinship and anthropological theory in AfricaSir Jack Goody on oral tradition in Ghana, the Church and the family in Europe, and the social cultures of food and flowers in Africa, North America and AsiaHarry Goulbourne, Stuart Hall and Raymond Smith on community, family, migration and race in the CaribbeanHarry Goulbourne on transnational familiesSir Peter Hall on urbanism, planning and the culture of citiesStuart Hall on New Left culture in the 1950s-60s, the development of Cultural Studies, and the impact of feminism on academic and personal livesDavid Hargreaves on the sociology of education, school cultures and training doctorsBruce Kapferer on industrialisation and the family in Zambia and network theoryDiana Leonard on the feminist revival in BritainDavid Lockwood on working class culture and social classPeter Loizos on exile from a Greek community in CyprusRobert Moore on researching class and race in Birmingham, mining communities in northern England and a Scottish fishing portHoward Newby on deferential farm workers and farmers in East AngliaAnn Oakley on gender, housework and motherhood and on evidence-based researchRay Pahl on urban sociology, gender in business families, community studies, and friendshipJudith Okely on researching marginal groups including gypsiesMargaret Stacey on the Banbury community studies and on feminism within sociologyMarilyn Strathern on her secondary study of family and community in an East Anglian villagePaul Thompson on oral history, family and the economy in fishing communities, grandparenting and social mobilityPeter Townsend on East London families, old people’s homes in England, poverty, and social policy in Britain, and social policies for Georgia and KenyaSandra Wallman on families in Lesotho, women and AIDS in Kampala, community and migration in London and London householdsMeg Stacey and Colin Bell on urban community studiesMichael Young, Janet Finch and Colin Bell on family, kinship and community The data collection results from three grants since 2009; the first from the University of Essex, and the second two from The British Academy and the Leverhulme Trust respectively. The second phase added a further 12 Pioneers including more accounts from women researchers, anthropologists and on linked social research in cultural studies and social geography. The third set added in prominent quantitative researchers, statisticians and economists. The archived collection includes interviews with 56 pioneers, set out in the Data List in the documentation. All interviews are fully transcribed and summarised, and key text extracts and audio clips, selected by Paul Thompson, have been published. As well as being available to download, from the Data Catalogue, a selection of the interviews have been published to UK Data Service’s online data browsing system, Qualibank, where the content can be explored. Audio extracts can be listened to on the UK Data Service's YouTube Pioneers channel where each Pioneer has its own playlist. Finally, the UK Data Service has also created the Pioneers Teaching Resource website to showcase the Pioneers interviews, and includes further information about the Pioneers project, and for each Pioneer, a short biography, a list of publications, and links to any data they have themselves deposited. A book from the Pioneers collection combining extracts and discussion of the material will be published by Thompson and colleagues from the University of Essex in 2020. Some of the Pioneers were also video interviewed earlier as part of the Leading Thinkers project, hosted by the University of Cambridge Video and Audio service. The collection also holds video interviews with a range of pioneering anthropologists, historians, ethno-musicologists, international travellers, amongst others.  The further 13 pioneers that have been interviewed between 2016-18 will be available in the next edition Mark Abrams on his innovative work implementing new techniques in statistical surveying and opinion polling.Avtar Brah on Asians in Uganda and BritainSir David Cox, Lord Claus Moser, John Goldthorpe, Sarah Arber, Harvey Goldstein, Jonathan Gershuny and Dame Karen Dunnell on survey and statistical methodsSir Ivor Crewe on the development of quantitative methods in political research, and of archiving social researchMeghnad Desai economic theory, fieldwork and interpreting class power in rural IndiaDuncan Gallie on economic sociology, work and unemployment in France and BritainRichard Lipsey on his theory of Positive Economics, and practical applications in CanadaMaxine Molyneux on colonial society in India and in Latin America, on the position of women in socialist Yemen and Ethiopia and on women in Latin AmericaKen Plummer on researching sexuality and on qualitative methodsHilary Rose on researching marginal groups including squatters and the unemployedElizabeth Thomas-Hope on community, family, migration and race in the CaribbeanW.M. Williams on rural community studies

Main Topics:

The interviews offer an insight into the research pioneers' backgrounds, their motivations for undertaking particular pieces of research and some useful observations about the study of sociology in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. Topics covered include family, social background, intellectual and career development and key influences. Detailed accounts of the major research projects associated with that researcher are also included.

Purposive selection/case studies

Interview

Audio recording