Jane Pilcher
Biographic Data
| ID | 3600441 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Jane Pilcher |
| GIVEN NAMES | Jane |
| FAMILY NAME | Pilcher |
| SIGNATURE | PILCHER J |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Leicester |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-1864-1362 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 33 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 273 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 31 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 2 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1989 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 6 |
The pronunciation of students’ names in higher education: Identity work by academics and professional services staff
Changes in the national, linguistic and ethnic profiles of students in UK higher education mean that students' names are also likely to have become increasingly culturally diverse. In this article, we develop new empirical and theoretical understandings about how student-facing staff working in higher education in England experience cultural diversity in students' names and the accompanying uncertainty of how some names should be pronounced. Usin…
Renaming in Adoption: Exploring Name Ambivalence in Adoptive Parents' Name Stories
Names are central to identity, yet their role in adoption, where identity and family dynamics are complex, remains under‐researched. This article draws on findings from a qualitative study of names and adoption in England and Wales to examine adoptive parents' decisions about the first names of their children. Despite policy, which advocates the retention of a child's birth name, we found that half of the adopter participants' children had had th…
Dis/Continuity in the Representation of Gender in Names Across Cultures: An Introduction
Given names in many countries are typically sex-specific, whether this is legally enforced or completely unregulated. Gender-neutral names have been rare, have tended to evolve from masculine names, and have been seen as more advantageous for girls than boys, to whom sex stereotyping is more rigidly applied. However, in the context of recent shifts in gender equality and in conceptualizations of gender as nonbinary, linguistic marking of gender t…
I was once another person with a different name: Adult adoptees’ experiences of first name changes
This article draws on findings from a study of names and adoption to discuss first name changes from the perspective of adult adoptees. We discuss how birth first names can be seen as a lost identity or ‘a life not lived’ by adoptees and how the separation between ‘birth’ and ‘adoptive’ first names can lead to confusion, with some adoptees asking, ‘Who actually am I?’ We outline how adoptees attempt to bring into their lives their birth and adopt…
The research politics of (re)naming participants: A sociology of names perspective
In this article we argue that theoretical and empirical insights from the sociology of people's names can enrich qualitative researchers' decision-making about, and descriptions of, their practices of (re)naming participants as well as inform methodological debates about these practices. We review the research politics of participants' names and outline how issues of anonymisation and pseudonymisation can be thought through using sociological the…
Surnames in Adoption: (Re)creating Identities of Belonging
Names are increasingly recognised in sociology as important routes for understanding family relationships, as well as familial and individual identities. In this article, we use qualitative ‘name story’ data to examine the meanings of surnames for adults who were adopted as a child and for adults who have adopted a child. Our findings suggest that adult adoptees and adopters can feel differently about surnames and how these connect them—or otherw…
Names in adoption law and policy: Representations of Family, Rights and Identities
Names have heightened importance in adoption, affecting the identities of individuals who are adopted and adoptive family making. In this article, we use critical discourse analysis to gauge how names, and especially children’s forenames, are addressed in the specificities of legal and policy texts governing and guiding the milieu of people affected by adoption in England. We argue that the inclusions, omissions and opacity of content on names we…
Names and naming in adoption: Birth heritage and family‐making
In this article, we consider the significance and practices of names and naming in adoption to develop understanding of the issue amongst scholars, policymakers, adoption practitioners, and adoption communities. Research on the topic of names and adoption is scarce and focused mostly on international and domestic adoptions in the United States. We draw on the research literature to critically explore names and naming in adoption through two recur…
Gender and Qualitative Research (1996)
Masculinity in prison, Keith Carter coping with pit closure in the 1990s - women's perspectives, Bella Dicks from honorary chap to mother - combining work in the professions with motherhood, Janet Stephens childish things - men, ageing and violence, Julie Owen chance to choice - two generations of reproductive decision making, Evelyn P. Parsons in the company of other women - a case study of menopause support groups, Trish Harding focus groups, y…
Key Concepts in Gender Studies
The new edition of Key Concepts in Gender Studies is a lively and engaging introduction to this dynamic field. Thoroughly revised throughout, the second edition benefits from the addition of nine new concepts including Gender Social Movements, Intersectionality and Mainstreaming. Each of the entries: • begins with a concise definition • outlines the history of each term and the debates surrounding it • includes illustrations of how the concept ha…
Names and “Doing Gender”: How Forenames and Surnames Contribute to Gender Identities, Difference, and Inequalities
Names, as proper nouns, are clearly important for the identification of individuals in everyday life. In the present article, I argue that forenames and surnames need also to be recognized as "doing" words, important in the categorization of sex at birth and in the ongoing management of gender conduct appropriate to sex category. Using evidence on personal naming practices in the United States and United Kingdom, I examine what happens at crisis …
Names, Bodies and Identities
In this article, I argue that the emerging field of the sociology of naming should recognize the fundamental importance of bodies in the range of social practices through which individuals come to have, and to be identified by, names. I introduce the concept of ‘embodied named identity’ to describe the outcome of identificatory practices of naming fundamentally orientated around and rooted in the body. I argue that the concept addresses the negle…
Thatcher's Grandchildren?
Thatcher's Grandchildren explores sociological and political issues about childhood that have that have become increasingly significant in the twenty first century within a political landscape framed
Thatcher's Grandchildren?: Politics and Childhood in the Twenty-First Century
Small, but Very Determined: A Novel Theorization of Children's Consumption of Clothing
Childhood and consumption are each firmly established as substantive topics in sociology, yet the relationship between them remains narrowly considered. In this paper I attempt to deepen sociological understanding of one aspect of children's consumption (their clothing) through reimagining the structure and agency problematic via a novel theorization centred on the concept of determinativity. I do this by engaging in a critical evaluation and ada…
No logo? Children's consumption of fashion
In this article data are presented on children's appraisal of clothing retailers and brands, and how this interacts with their identity and social contexts. In exploration of some of the meanings and processes surrounding children's consumption of branded or labelled clothing, two case studies of child consumers are profiled: one who actively consumed designer-label clothing, and another for whom it held limited significance. It is argued that ch…
What Not to Wear? Girls, Clothing and ‘Showing’ the Body
Consumption practices of children in contemporary Western societies are implicated in the reconstruction of childhood, according to both popular debate and to those academic perspectives stressing the individualisation of identities within the life course of late modern consumer societies. Yet, little is known about the meanings children themselves give to their own consumption. Drawing from an ethnographic study of children aged 6–11 years and t…
Body Work: Childhood, gender and school health education in England, 1870-1977
This article focuses on a neglected topic in the historical sociology of childhood, namely health education, and explores a neglected theme, namely the gendered character of (re)constructions of childhood. Drawing on primary sources, the article argues that while health education for children played an important role in a broader set of British national, political strategies to ensure the health and fitness of `the Nation' during the 20th century…
Young People in Transition: Becoming Citizens?
The essays in this collection represent a major contribution to our understanding of youth and transitions to key areas of adult citizenship, including employment, independent living arrangements and
School sex education: Policy and practice in England 1870 to 2000
This article draws on a range of primary and secondary sources to provide an account of the development in England of sex education in schools between 1870 and 2000. It pays particular attention to the decades prior to and just after the Second World War (1939–45) about which relatively little is known. Focusing on official guidance to schools provided by central government, and reports of the nature and extent of practices in school sex educatio…
Fifty Key Concepts in Gender Studies
The author's introduction gives an account of gender studies - what it is and how it originated. Their selection of topics is authoritative and the 50 entries reflect the complex, multi-faceted nature of the field in an accessible dictionary format
Fifty key concepts in gender studies
The authors' introduction gives an account of gender studies - what it is and how it originated. Their selection of topics is authoritative and the 50 entries reflect the complex, multi-faceted nature of the field in an accessible dictionary format
Sex in Health Education: Official Guidance for Schools in England, 1928-1977
This article examines official policy discourses on sex within the health education curriculum of schools during the period 1928-77. The article begins with an account of the origins of sex education in schools, and of why, in the early twentieth century, its inclusion in the health education curriculum was problematical. In the main section, the article examines the content of consecutive editions of the government published "handbooks of health…
Rethinking Adulthood: Families, Transitions, and Social Change
Books Reviewed
Mannheim's Sociology of Generations: An Undervalued Legacy
ABS'I'RAC'I' Mannheim's 1923 essay 'The Problem of Generations' has often been described as the seminal theoretical treatment of generations as a sociological phenomenon. Yet in practice scant attention has been paid to the sociology of generations by British sociologists. This is despite the notion of generation being widespread in everyday language as a way of understanding differences between age groups and as a means of locating individuals a…
Names and “Doing Gender”: How Forenames and Surnames Contribute to Gender Identities, Difference, and Inequalities
Names, as proper nouns, are clearly important for the identification of individuals in everyday life. In the present article, I argue that forenames and surnames need also to be recognized as "doing" words, important in the categorization of sex at birth and in the ongoing management of gender conduct appropriate to sex category. Using evidence on personal naming practices in the United States and United Kingdom, I examine what happens at crisis …
Names, Bodies and Identities
In this article, I argue that the emerging field of the sociology of naming should recognize the fundamental importance of bodies in the range of social practices through which individuals come to have, and to be identified by, names. I introduce the concept of ‘embodied named identity’ to describe the outcome of identificatory practices of naming fundamentally orientated around and rooted in the body. I argue that the concept addresses the negle…
Domestic Divisions of Labour in the Twentieth Century: Change Slow A-Coming
Rosalind Barnett and Caryl Rivers, She Works, He Works. How Two-Income Families Are Happy, Healthy and Thriving, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1998, paper £9.95, xii+260 pp.Francine Deutsch, Halving It All. How Equally Shared Parenting Works, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1999, paper £15.50, 327 pp.Richard Layte, Divided Time. Gender, Paid Employment and Domestic Labour, Aldershot: Ashgate, 1999, xiv+190 pp.These three…
Thatcher's Children: Politics, Childhood And Society In The 1980s And 1990s
Thatcher's children? - the study of politics of childhood in the neo-liberal era testing, testing - politics, childhood and British education 1979- 1995 the politics of the Children's Act happy families - the politics of child abuse young thugs go for it - the politics of the young offender Gillick and after - children and sex the children's rights movement child poverty tabloid constructions of childhood - the case of James Bulger's murder child…
Body Work: Childhood, gender and school health education in England, 1870-1977
This article focuses on a neglected topic in the historical sociology of childhood, namely health education, and explores a neglected theme, namely the gendered character of (re)constructions of childhood. Drawing on primary sources, the article argues that while health education for children played an important role in a broader set of British national, political strategies to ensure the health and fitness of `the Nation' during the 20th century…
Names and naming in adoption: Birth heritage and family‐making
In this article, we consider the significance and practices of names and naming in adoption to develop understanding of the issue amongst scholars, policymakers, adoption practitioners, and adoption communities. Research on the topic of names and adoption is scarce and focused mostly on international and domestic adoptions in the United States. We draw on the research literature to critically explore names and naming in adoption through two recur…
Sex in Health Education: Official Guidance for Schools in England, 1928-1977
This article examines official policy discourses on sex within the health education curriculum of schools during the period 1928-77. The article begins with an account of the origins of sex education in schools, and of why, in the early twentieth century, its inclusion in the health education curriculum was problematical. In the main section, the article examines the content of consecutive editions of the government published "handbooks of health…
Contrary to Gillick: British children and sexual rights since 1985
No Abstract
No logo? Children's consumption of fashion
In this article data are presented on children's appraisal of clothing retailers and brands, and how this interacts with their identity and social contexts. In exploration of some of the meanings and processes surrounding children's consumption of branded or labelled clothing, two case studies of child consumers are profiled: one who actively consumed designer-label clothing, and another for whom it held limited significance. It is argued that ch…
Rethinking Adulthood: Families, Transitions, and Social Change
Names in adoption law and policy: Representations of Family, Rights and Identities
Names have heightened importance in adoption, affecting the identities of individuals who are adopted and adoptive family making. In this article, we use critical discourse analysis to gauge how names, and especially children’s forenames, are addressed in the specificities of legal and policy texts governing and guiding the milieu of people affected by adoption in England. We argue that the inclusions, omissions and opacity of content on names we…
Small, but Very Determined: A Novel Theorization of Children's Consumption of Clothing
Childhood and consumption are each firmly established as substantive topics in sociology, yet the relationship between them remains narrowly considered. In this paper I attempt to deepen sociological understanding of one aspect of children's consumption (their clothing) through reimagining the structure and agency problematic via a novel theorization centred on the concept of determinativity. I do this by engaging in a critical evaluation and ada…
Surnames in Adoption: (Re)creating Identities of Belonging
Names are increasingly recognised in sociology as important routes for understanding family relationships, as well as familial and individual identities. In this article, we use qualitative ‘name story’ data to examine the meanings of surnames for adults who were adopted as a child and for adults who have adopted a child. Our findings suggest that adult adoptees and adopters can feel differently about surnames and how these connect them—or otherw…
Gender Matters? Three Cohorts of Women Talking about Role Reversal
Cohort is an important predictor of gender-role attitudes, as a number of surveys have shown. In this article, I undertake a comparison between cohorts of women on the issue of role reversal, with a primary focus on the qualitative differences in what was said and by whom, rather than in how many said what. It is my argument that a qualitative analysis is revealing of the way in which cohort acts to influence the very language used to report 'agr…
The Gender Significance of Women in Power: British Women Talking about Margaret Thatcher
Evaluating a women's careers convention: Methods, results and implications
This paper reports an evaluation of a careers convention for women, designed to widen their occupational horizons. The convention was held in Wales in 1987, and evaluated the same year. Data are provided on how 500 schoolgirls reacted to the event and how they plan to spend their own futures. The findings are shown to be relevant to anyone attempting to improve careers education, challenge sex stereotyping in education, or run similar conventions…
Evaluating a women's careers convention: Methods, results and implications
This paper reports an evaluation of a careers convention for women, designed to widen their occupational horizons. The convention was held in Wales in 1987, and evaluated the same year. Data are provided on how 500 schoolgirls reacted to the event and how they plan to spend their own futures. The findings are shown to be relevant to anyone attempting to improve careers education, challenge sex stereotyping in education, or run similar conventions…
Mannheim's Sociology of Generations: An Undervalued Legacy
ABS'I'RAC'I' Mannheim's 1923 essay 'The Problem of Generations' has often been described as the seminal theoretical treatment of generations as a sociological phenomenon. Yet in practice scant attention has been paid to the sociology of generations by British sociologists. This is despite the notion of generation being widespread in everyday language as a way of understanding differences between age groups and as a means of locating individuals a…
The Gender Significance of Women in Power: British Women Talking about Margaret Thatcher
Thatcher's Children: Politics, Childhood And Society In The 1980s And 1990s
Thatcher's children? - the study of politics of childhood in the neo-liberal era testing, testing - politics, childhood and British education 1979- 1995 the politics of the Children's Act happy families - the politics of child abuse young thugs go for it - the politics of the young offender Gillick and after - children and sex the children's rights movement child poverty tabloid constructions of childhood - the case of James Bulger's murder child…
Transitions to and from the Labour Market: Younger and Older People and Employment
Contrary to Gillick: British children and sexual rights since 1985
No Abstract
Gender Matters? Three Cohorts of Women Talking about Role Reversal
Cohort is an important predictor of gender-role attitudes, as a number of surveys have shown. In this article, I undertake a comparison between cohorts of women on the issue of role reversal, with a primary focus on the qualitative differences in what was said and by whom, rather than in how many said what. It is my argument that a qualitative analysis is revealing of the way in which cohort acts to influence the very language used to report 'agr…
Books Reviewed
Domestic Divisions of Labour in the Twentieth Century: Change Slow A-Coming
Rosalind Barnett and Caryl Rivers, She Works, He Works. How Two-Income Families Are Happy, Healthy and Thriving, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1998, paper £9.95, xii+260 pp.Francine Deutsch, Halving It All. How Equally Shared Parenting Works, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1999, paper £15.50, 327 pp.Richard Layte, Divided Time. Gender, Paid Employment and Domestic Labour, Aldershot: Ashgate, 1999, xiv+190 pp.These three…
Rethinking Adulthood: Families, Transitions, and Social Change
Fifty Key Concepts in Gender Studies
The author's introduction gives an account of gender studies - what it is and how it originated. Their selection of topics is authoritative and the 50 entries reflect the complex, multi-faceted nature of the field in an accessible dictionary format
Fifty key concepts in gender studies
The authors' introduction gives an account of gender studies - what it is and how it originated. Their selection of topics is authoritative and the 50 entries reflect the complex, multi-faceted nature of the field in an accessible dictionary format
Sex in Health Education: Official Guidance for Schools in England, 1928-1977
This article examines official policy discourses on sex within the health education curriculum of schools during the period 1928-77. The article begins with an account of the origins of sex education in schools, and of why, in the early twentieth century, its inclusion in the health education curriculum was problematical. In the main section, the article examines the content of consecutive editions of the government published "handbooks of health…
Young People in Transition: Becoming Citizens?
The essays in this collection represent a major contribution to our understanding of youth and transitions to key areas of adult citizenship, including employment, independent living arrangements and
School sex education: Policy and practice in England 1870 to 2000
This article draws on a range of primary and secondary sources to provide an account of the development in England of sex education in schools between 1870 and 2000. It pays particular attention to the decades prior to and just after the Second World War (1939–45) about which relatively little is known. Focusing on official guidance to schools provided by central government, and reports of the nature and extent of practices in school sex educatio…
Body Work: Childhood, gender and school health education in England, 1870-1977
This article focuses on a neglected topic in the historical sociology of childhood, namely health education, and explores a neglected theme, namely the gendered character of (re)constructions of childhood. Drawing on primary sources, the article argues that while health education for children played an important role in a broader set of British national, political strategies to ensure the health and fitness of `the Nation' during the 20th century…
What Not to Wear? Girls, Clothing and ‘Showing’ the Body
Consumption practices of children in contemporary Western societies are implicated in the reconstruction of childhood, according to both popular debate and to those academic perspectives stressing the individualisation of identities within the life course of late modern consumer societies. Yet, little is known about the meanings children themselves give to their own consumption. Drawing from an ethnographic study of children aged 6–11 years and t…
No logo? Children's consumption of fashion
In this article data are presented on children's appraisal of clothing retailers and brands, and how this interacts with their identity and social contexts. In exploration of some of the meanings and processes surrounding children's consumption of branded or labelled clothing, two case studies of child consumers are profiled: one who actively consumed designer-label clothing, and another for whom it held limited significance. It is argued that ch…
Small, but Very Determined: A Novel Theorization of Children's Consumption of Clothing
Childhood and consumption are each firmly established as substantive topics in sociology, yet the relationship between them remains narrowly considered. In this paper I attempt to deepen sociological understanding of one aspect of children's consumption (their clothing) through reimagining the structure and agency problematic via a novel theorization centred on the concept of determinativity. I do this by engaging in a critical evaluation and ada…
Thatcher's Grandchildren?
Thatcher's Grandchildren explores sociological and political issues about childhood that have that have become increasingly significant in the twenty first century within a political landscape framed
Thatcher's Grandchildren?: Politics and Childhood in the Twenty-First Century
Names, Bodies and Identities
In this article, I argue that the emerging field of the sociology of naming should recognize the fundamental importance of bodies in the range of social practices through which individuals come to have, and to be identified by, names. I introduce the concept of ‘embodied named identity’ to describe the outcome of identificatory practices of naming fundamentally orientated around and rooted in the body. I argue that the concept addresses the negle…
Key Concepts in Gender Studies
The new edition of Key Concepts in Gender Studies is a lively and engaging introduction to this dynamic field. Thoroughly revised throughout, the second edition benefits from the addition of nine new concepts including Gender Social Movements, Intersectionality and Mainstreaming. Each of the entries: • begins with a concise definition • outlines the history of each term and the debates surrounding it • includes illustrations of how the concept ha…
Names and “Doing Gender”: How Forenames and Surnames Contribute to Gender Identities, Difference, and Inequalities
Names, as proper nouns, are clearly important for the identification of individuals in everyday life. In the present article, I argue that forenames and surnames need also to be recognized as "doing" words, important in the categorization of sex at birth and in the ongoing management of gender conduct appropriate to sex category. Using evidence on personal naming practices in the United States and United Kingdom, I examine what happens at crisis …
Gender and Qualitative Research (1996)
Masculinity in prison, Keith Carter coping with pit closure in the 1990s - women's perspectives, Bella Dicks from honorary chap to mother - combining work in the professions with motherhood, Janet Stephens childish things - men, ageing and violence, Julie Owen chance to choice - two generations of reproductive decision making, Evelyn P. Parsons in the company of other women - a case study of menopause support groups, Trish Harding focus groups, y…
Sociology (27 works) · Psychology (20 works) · Political science (18 works) · Gender Studies (13 works) · Gender Studies (10 works) · Law (10 works) · Names, Identity, and Discrimination Research (9 works) · Social science (9 works) · Aesthetics (7 works) · Law (7 works)