Alistair Fraser – författare

This book takes students on a guided tour of the gang phenomenon through history, as well as current representations of gangs in literature and media. It includes: - A detailed global overview of gang culture, covering, amongst others,  Glasgow, Chicago, Hong Kong, and Shanghai- A chapter on researching gangs which covers quantitative and qualitative methods- Extra chapter features such as key terms, chapter overviews, study questions and further reading suggestions.Alistair Fraser brings together gang-literature and critical perspectives in a refreshingly new way, exploring ‘gangs’ as a social group with a long and fascinating history.

As the youth gang phenomenon becomes an important and sensitive public issue, communities from Los Angeles to Rio, Cape Town to London are facing the reality of what such violent groups mean for their children and young people. Complex dangers and instabilities, as well as high levels of public fear and anger, fuel an amplification of anxious public and political rhetoric in relation to gangs, in which the stereotype of the American street-gang - a ruthless, hierarchical, street-based criminal organisation capable of corrupting youth and fracturing communities - looms large.Set against this backdrop, Urban Legends: Gang Identity in the Post-Industrial City tells a unique and powerful story of young people, gang identity, and social change in post-industrial Glasgow, challenging the perceptions of gangs as a novel, universal, or pathological phenomenon. Though territorial gangs have been reported in Glasgow for over a century, with striking continuities over this time, there are similarities with street-based groups elsewhere. Using this similarity as the foundation, the book goes on to argue that Glaswegian gangs have a specific historical trajectory that is particular to the city. Drawing on four years of varied ethnographic fieldwork in Langview, a deindustrialised working-class community, the book spotlights the everyday experiences and understandings of gangs for young people growing up in the area, reasoning that - for some - gang identification represents a root of identity and a route to masculinity, in a post-industrial city that has little space for them.

In recent years, the UK has seen the emergence of a new approach to violence reduction—the public health approach. This method prioritises early intervention and holistic support to prevent violence upstream. This movement, based in part on a perceived success story in Scotland, has led to the founding of more than twenty Violence Reduction Units in England and Wales, and more than £200m of funding to support evidence-based interventions.This book is based on a four-year, multi-method study of the public health approach to violence reduction in Scotland and England. Drawing on 190 interviews with leading professionals working in violence reduction, The Public Health Approach to Violence Reduction provides an empirical case study of the effects of the public health approach to violence reduction in the UK. It traces the evolution of the approach through different scales of policymaking and scrutinises the claims of its potential, using the Scottish model as a case study. The volume makes the case that the public health approach to violence reduction is not a single entity but an assorted set of principles, practices, and discourses that alter as they enter different contexts.Informed by insights from the young people directly affected, The Public Health Approach to Violence Reduction aims to anchor policy in everyday life, thereby creating a roadmap for future policy that is deeply rooted in community experience. This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read on Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.

What we eat – as well as how it is produced, processed, moved, sold, and used by our bodies seems to matter like never before. Global Foodscapes takes on this topicality and asks readers to think about how we are all involved in the making of an odd and, in many ways, troubling and contested food economy. It explores how food is conceived, traded, grown, reared, processed, sold, and consumed; investigates what goes wrong along the way; and assesses what diverse people around the world are doing to fix these faults.The text uses a carefully-crafted framework that explores the interaction of five forms of oppression and five means of resistance as they are worked out over five stages in the food economy. It draws on case studies from around the world that illuminate key issues about food in today's world; examines how oppression affects diverse people caught up in the food economy; and highlights how individuals, groups, and institutions such as governments, but also firms, are trying to improve how we interact with the food system.Global Foodscapes is a highly accessible and useful text for undergraduate students interested in the global food economy. The global range of case studies, examples, and reference points, as well as its original framework allows the text to speak to diverse audiences and generate debate about whether anything – and if so, what – needs to be done about the food system we depend upon so heavily. Additional materials such as suggested readings and discussion points help students consider the issues at hand and conduct initial and more detailed research on today's food economy.

What we eat – as well as how it is produced, processed, moved, sold, and used by our bodies seems to matter like never before. Global Foodscapes takes on this topicality and asks readers to think about how we are all involved in the making of an odd and, in many ways, troubling and contested food economy. It explores how food is conceived, traded, grown, reared, processed, sold, and consumed; investigates what goes wrong along the way; and assesses what diverse people around the world are doing to fix these faults.The text uses a carefully-crafted framework that explores the interaction of five forms of oppression and five means of resistance as they are worked out over five stages in the food economy. It draws on case studies from around the world that illuminate key issues about food in today's world; examines how oppression affects diverse people caught up in the food economy; and highlights how individuals, groups, and institutions such as governments, but also firms, are trying to improve how we interact with the food system.Global Foodscapes is a highly accessible and useful text for undergraduate students interested in the global food economy. The global range of case studies, examples, and reference points, as well as its original framework allows the text to speak to diverse audiences and generate debate about whether anything – and if so, what – needs to be done about the food system we depend upon so heavily. Additional materials such as suggested readings and discussion points help students consider the issues at hand and conduct initial and more detailed research on today's food economy.

Available open access digitally under CC-BY-NC-ND licence.Preventing Violence argues that we can move towards safer and better societies by advancing holistic public health approaches to violence prevention. It explores the serious limitations of contemporary public health approaches and proposes an alternative path forward. Based on data from a three-year, ESRC-funded project 'Public Health, Youth and Violence Reduction', it also examines in-depth the work of 20 Violence Reduction Units in England and Wales. The book makes clear recommendations for policy makers, practitioners and researchers working to prevent violence and improve the lives of children and young people.

This book takes students on a guided tour of the gang phenomenon through history, as well as current representations of gangs in literature and media. It includes: - A detailed global overview of gang culture, covering, amongst others,  Glasgow, Chicago, Hong Kong, and Shanghai- A chapter on researching gangs which covers quantitative and qualitative methods- Extra chapter features such as key terms, chapter overviews, study questions and further reading suggestions.Alistair Fraser brings together gang-literature and critical perspectives in a refreshingly new way, exploring ‘gangs’ as a social group with a long and fascinating history.

Digital technologies should be making life easier. And to a large degree they are, transforming everyday tasks of work, consumption, communication, travel and play. But they are also accelerating and fragmenting our lives affecting our well-being and exposing us to extensive data extraction and profiling that helps determine our life chances.Initially, the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown seemed to create new opportunities for people to practice ‘slow computing’, but it quickly became clear that it was as difficult, if not more so, than during normal times.Is it then possible to experience the joy and benefits of computing, but to do so in a way that asserts individual and collective autonomy over our time and data? Drawing on the ideas of the ‘slow movement’, Slow Computing sets out numerous practical and political means to take back control and counter the more pernicious effects of living digital lives.