Social Perspectives on UnemploymentAuthor(s): Hugh MatthewsSource: Area, Vol. 16, No. 3 (Sep., 1984), p. 257Published by: The Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers)Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20002080 .

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Health in the tropics 257

The conference was organised around seven main themes: geomedical research and disease ecology; disease diffusion, illness behaviour and chronic diseases; development and disease; spatial patterns of undernutrition and malnutrition; the geography of traditional medicine; health care geography-planning and policies; and spatial inequalities in health care. An exhibition of published material on medical geography and a series of films on disease ecology and health care in Africa were also held during the conference.

A final discussion session collated a number of recommendations from the IGU working group. These concerned increasing the accessibility of health care facilities, the reduction of rural-urban imbalances in health and health care, the need for community-based research, the desirability

of continuing theoretical research in medical geography, and the geographical study of different policy options available to health care planners, especially in the Third World. One of the most important recommendations was that the health problems of very fast-growing cities in the tropics be recognised, and this will form a theme of a meeting of the working group planned for 1986. Finally, the importance of wide dissemination of the results of medical geography research in a range of professional literature was emphasised.

David R Phillips University of Exeter

Social perspectives on unemployment

Report on the annual undergraduate conference organised by the Social Geography Study Group, hosted by Coventry (Lanchester) Polytechnic

Andrew Gillespie (Newcastle) got the morning session off to a lively start with a paper on 'Unemployment trends in the current recession'. Focusing upon regional variation he high lighted the problems of long-term male unemployment and considered the efficacy of current regional policy. Chris Hamnett (Open University) then spoke about job loss and the housing

market. He argued that a new geography of social disadvantage is emerging, in which the less skilled and unemployed are increasingly coming to be trapped in inner-city council housing

within declining inner-city economies, with little hope of escape to less depressed job markets elsewhere.

In the afternoon Sylvia Walby (Sociology, Lancaster) gave an interesting paper on women's unemployment, tracing its historical and spatial variations. Pointing out that the restructuring of gender relations has taken place in the context of both patriarchal and capitalist struggles, she concluded that the current pattern of gender rates of unemployment must be seen as the result of the accumulation of rounds of restructuring of gender relations. Finally, Malcolm Cross (SSRC Ethnic Research Unit, Aston) discussed a number of issues relating to black youth and unemployment. Examining both direct and indirect causes for high unemployment rates, he looked critically at current policies and traditional explanations and argued the need for more sensitive and effective solutions.

It is very pleasing to see the Institute supporting meetings of this kind and the success of this one-day conference, which attracted an audience of over 130 students representing 15 institutions, suggests that there will be plenty of demand for future meetings.

Hugh Matthews Coventry (Lanchester) Polytechnic

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