What can you do with Sociology/Psychology/Cultural Studies/Social Anthropology post-grad qualification

[onebatmother]

Apart from pat self on back?

I am thinking of retraining but no idea about jobs. Those are the things I'm considering studying - what REAL ACTUAL JOBS might I get with a postgrad MA/PHD in them?

I mean ones that pay money. Any money. But must be money.

Thanks dearies.

"I never steal from the stationary cupboard"

Oh God, can I plead baby brain when the baby is 22mo? . It's the public sector - they bleed you dry!

Now there's a business idea with minimum effort: Allotments.

Buy a piece of delapitated land. Make it brown. Divide brown bits up. Rent out to people who will make the brown bits look nice and green. Hold a barbeque with tombola once a year.

Winner.

Onebat - You are doing capitalism all wrong. You absolutely don't have to give up all moral sense. How can it be a lovely company if you think it has no moral sense. It sounds to me as though you are just doing a job that you are absolutely not cut-out to do. But LOL that it should all be the fault of capitalism.

I'm not sure it's a money making idea Peas, I pay £27 a year !

I've not expressed it well Swedes.

From top to bottom, each individual is terribly kind, and v keen on flexible working practices.

The overall aims of the company include 'brand protection.' Which is ultimately crucial to capitalism.

And simultaneously is something I wouldn't choose to be involved with. What say you?

My bottom line is genuinely adolescent though, and you'll loathe me.

I know capitalism has to exist and you've seen me argue so.

But I don't want to be personally involved with the actual persuading of poor people to buy things that they don't need.

irrational, yeees. But I've tried, and it makes me want to .. you know.

I think you have always done creative jobs and forgotten or failed to notice that there is an essential commercial side to the company.

No, I agree with OBM on this one - there's something egregious about a lot of advertising and marketing. Make stuff, sell it at a profit - fair enough. Pour vast resources into telling marketing half-truths and undermining people's self-belief so that they will feel they ought to buy something for which they have no need or use - bollocks to that.

Is it really specifically aimed at persuading the poor to buy things they don't need?

i got a job as an advertising account executive with a big company [god knows how] straight out of university. Left it to the last minute not to take it, think I know where you're coming from onebat. Though I then chose to go ahead and do something rather indulgent rather than politically useful...

Swedes how's the story board coming along? Doesn't this mean we're, er, predicting the outcome of our exercise? Is this how we do documentaries? [clueless] Can I lend you some crayons?

mostly I think it is people who can't afford stuff that advertising is aimed at.

No, prob. not. That's not my objection anyway (so I'll let OBM deal with that one ) - I just object to the whole sickening New! Improved! With Wings! merry-go-round.

Well I agree that is a horrible thing but it's down to human nature not capitalism.

Surely it is possible to make a distinction betwen capitalism and consumerism, isn't it? I'm not sure how the dist would be made exactly, but we were a capitalist society long before we became a consumerist one. The latter depends so heavily on multiplying (imaginary) needs and selling brands before objects. It ivolves us defining ourselves in relation to our consumption and allowing consumption to pollute all areas of life. Obv. capitalism tends towards consumerism, but they aren't the same.

I find consumerism morally objectionable in ways that capitalism is not. I would hate to work with brand protection and the multiplication of illusory needs, but I don't mind working in my own fairly woolly capitalist niche.

It's a combination of the two, isn't it? Humans probably have an innate desire to have new shiny crazy things, but the motor of capitalism (which is a beast that must be fed) has pushed the whole process into overdrive.

I was looking at toothpaste in Sainsbos yesterday - there must be, literally, about 30 different kinds, and that's not including the children's ones. Does anybody really think this is necessary or desirable?

Well you're right, Swedes, about the essential commercial component to all I've done already - this is precisely what I've been castigating myself with. My programmes' ultimate function was to get viewers by being interesting - and thus to raise the profile of the channel, to sell more advertising, which would generate more commissions for the production company I was working for. All that is true.

But although I've alwasy been aware of that, it still is different to ACTUALLY selling stuff.

Lenin, I can't really say online. It's a little bit like what I linked onebat to earlier, but not based London.

Like this policywonk

Hopefully it is already breeding cynicism.

Yes, good point about capitalism/consumerism. They are close relatives though.

Maybe consumerism is something born out of branding, as you say, and big corporations. Massive global corps need to keep coming up with 'new' things to buy - their business model doesn't work if they just make one thing, or one of each kind of thing. The shareholders expect growth, not stasis.