HERMES ON TWO WHEELS by Kevin Wehr ( 9780761847939 ) - Books & Audio Books at Pickabook.co.uk

Item Details

Title:

HERMES ON TWO WHEELS
THE SOCIOLOGY OF BICYCLE MESSENGERS

By:

Kevin Wehr

Format:

Paperback

List price:

£38.00

Our price:

£34.20

Discount:

10% off

You save:

£3.80

ISBN 10:

0761847936

ISBN 13:

9780761847939

Availability:

Usually dispatched within 1-3 weeks.

Delivery rates

Stock:

Currently 0 available

Publisher:

UNIVERSITY PRESS OF AMERICA

Pub. date:

28 September, 2009

Pages:

142

Synopsis:

Hermes on Two Wheels shows the dynamic world of the bicycle messenger through a sociological lens, based on a five-year participant observation study. Beginning with the experiences of messengers themselves and moving to describe the structural settings of those experiences, the research shows how messengers work within a political-economic system that devalues semi-skilled labor and strips people of emotional fulfillment. The voluntary risk-taking of messengers becomes a means of achieving such emotional fulfillment as well as making a living, while their stylistic expressions pay dividends in cultural scrip rather than money. Through their work, messengers help to reproduce and maintain the structures of society while also constructing a vibrant, rebellious, politicized subculture that has come to represent the new urban hipster, an image continually under threat of co-optation.

Publication:

Imprint:

University Press of America

Prizes:

Winner of 4.

Returns:

Returnable

Some other items by this author:

AMERICA'S FIGHT OVER WATER