University of Birmingham Student (Alumni) Papers: Papers of Paul Willis

Research and teaching papers of Paul Willis, together with papers relating to the wider work of the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies. Papers primarily date from the period 1969-1976, but there is also a small amount of material dating from the mid 1980s which relates to Willis' role as youth policy advisor for Wolverhampton Borough Council. Willis' best-known works are those he completed while at the Centre, 'Learning to Labour' (1977), a study of the transition of working class youth from school to the workplace, and 'Profane Culture' (1978), an investigation into youth subcultures. Both became classics and were critical in the Centre's attempts at establishing for itself a national and international reputation.

Research material consists of papers directly relevant to these books, including an early draft of the intoduction to 'Profane Culture' and a typescript copy of 'Non-participation in elite culture: a case study of young people and their participation in the culture which surrounds popular music', the study upon which it was based. There is also some more general material relating to work of the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies which influence Willis. This includes notes and handouts for Theory seminar, 1973; notes and handouts for Direction seminar 1970; papers for Monday morning seminar 1970-1971; notes for Tony Parker seminar; loose papers relating to Structuralism seminar, 1969; and papers relating to the general direction of the Centre, 1970. In addition, there is some material relating to Willis' work outside the Centre, including papers concerning lectures and talks he gave, teaching papers for a course in Complementary Studies he taught at Aston University in the mid 1970s, and and research material related to Willis' work for Wolverhampton Borough Council in the 1980s

Paul Willis was educated at Wolverhampton Grammar School and was awarded a BA and MA in English Literature from Peterhouse College, Cambridge in 1966. He gained a Diploma in Advanced Business Studies at Manchester Business School in 1967 and an MSc in Industrial Relations at the London School of Economics in 1968. He joined the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies that year to study for a PhD 'Popular music and youth culture groups in Birmingham' which he was awarded in 1972. During his time as a student at the Centre he was a part-time lecturer in Commuications at Aston University, and on completion of his PhD he became a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies, convening research groups and seminars, and teaching sections of courses. He was also visiting professor at the University of California at Santa Barbara in 1979 and Ontario Institute for Studies in Education in Ontario in 1980. He left the Centre in 1981 to work as a policy advisor and to direct research for Wolverhampton Borough Council, published as 'The Social Conditions of Young People in Wolverhampton in 1984' and 'The Youth Review'. During the period 1980 to 1984 he was founder member of a co-operative in Coventry `Collective Design' providing alternative design services and ideas, and from 1988 to 1992 he directed a major research programme and policy advice for the Gulbenkian Foundation. He was a part-time adviser at the University of Wolverhampton between 1987 and 1992, and was appointed Reader in Media and Cultural Studies there in 1992, becoming Head of Media and Cultural Studies in 1999. He was visiting professor at the University of Vaxjo in Sweden between 1997 and 2002, and in 2003 was appointed Professor of Social/Cultural Ethnography at Keele University. In 2010 he was appointed Professor in the Sociology Department at Princeton University. In 2000 he founded the journal Ethnography.

His research has focussed on the mainly, but not exclusively, ethnographic study of lived cultural forms in a wide variety of contexts, examining how practices of 'informal cultural production' help to produce and construct cultural worlds 'from below'. He is best known for his ethnographic studies of working class youth culture including 'Learning to Labour' (1977), 'Profane Culture' (1978) and 'The Ethnographic Imagination' (2000)

Recent research has explored conceptual and methodological ways of connecting or re-connecting a concern with identity/culture to economic structure, with particular reference to `shop floor culture`.

Open, access to all registered researchers

Presented by Paul Willis per Kieran Connell, August 2013

Please see https://calmview.bham.ac.uk/Record.aspx?src=CalmView.Catalog&id=XUSS91&pos=1 for more information

Catalogued by Kieran Connell, October 2013, as part of AHRC funded project 'The Birmingham Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies: connected collaboration, connected communities and connected impact. Description prepared in compliance with General International Standard Archival Description, ISAD(G), second edition, 2000; and National Council on Archives Rules for the Construction of Personal, Place and Corporate Names, 1997

Permission to make any published use of any material from the collection must be sought in advance in writing from the Director, Cadbury Research Library: Special Collections (email: special-collections@contacts.bham.ac.uk). Identification of copyright holders of unpublished material is often difficult. The Cadbury Research Library: Special Collections will assist where possible with identifying copyright owners, but responsibility for ensuring copyright clearance rests with the user of the material.

Special Collections holds research papers of other former members of staff of the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies as well as a small departmental archive of the Centre. Please contact Special Collections for further information