Interpersonal Relations in a French Alpine Community

• Main Author: Hutson, S.
• Published: University of Sussex 1972
• Subjects: 305
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.460208

This thesis is concerned with inter personal relationships - a subject with which villagers themselves are preoccupied. In chapter I, 1 suggest that Valloire is a society of multiplex roles, particularistic beh?viour and close knit networks. One objective of the thesis is to discover what actual patterns of behaviour are connected with these theoretical patterns of linkage. Such a study must take account of sweeping changes in the last fifty years - out-migration, the run down of farming and the expansion of tourism. In chapters III - VII, I set out the roles connected with kinship, age, sex, origin and status. In chapters VIII - XI, 1 am concerned with their acting out in specific situations. 1 first examine villagers' own feelings of wariness which enter into almost all interaction and are common to peasant societies. 1 consider the apparent contradiction between this hostility and felt solidarity, and look at the role of gossip. In chapter III, 1 find kinship to be of primary importance in relationships as it implies a sharing in identity and information, social and economic solidarity and, in times of change, forms the main link between generations and between villagers and migrants. In chapter IV, I look particularly at the split between the young and the old and the characteristics and role of the young mens' (jeunes) group. In chapter V, 1 look at the segregation and different social networks of men and women, the danger of women as gossipers and their active role in modernisation. In chapter VI, I consider the effect of spatial proximity on behaviour, relationships between neighbours, villagers and outsiders. In chapter VI~, 1 look at prestige in a community of equals and the contradiction this implies. I examine ranking criteria - both material and moral. In considering recent differences in wealth and lifestyle, 1 contrast the actions of the traditional rich and the evolues. In considering the way villagers behave on public ceremonies, when village solidarity is expressed, I look at the segregat ion of roles, the problems of community action, the limitation of power manipulation and prestige seeking. Chapter IX focuses on the attempts of one wife to set up a choir group where few voluntary associations exist. The account is used to illustrate certain characteristics of village society and also the actions of an "entrepreneur" in the field of social relations. In chapter X, 1 analyse the three types of economic exchange found in the village - help, rendre service and impersonal exchange. 1 consider their :----~----------.---- -_ .. _---_._--------------------/ , I characteristics, the conditions under which they are appropriate and the relationships they involve. 1 look at the effect of recent changes in exchange on social relations. In chapter XI, 1 contrast the success of modernisation in the pri&ate sphere - family shops and hotels - with the apathy of the public sector - communal plans for a ski resort. ~n presenting the ways in which people reconvert tteir resources, 1 examine the role of the ent repreneur in change. In conclusion, 1 suggest that much of the wariness and danger dominating social relations arises from the intensity of personal knowledge and interaction characteristic of face-to-face societies. 1 examine the duality of wariness and solidarity and link this with ambiguity in speech and behaviour. 1 suggest that cross-cutting ties lead to relative uniformity in behaviour and a stress on individual personality. 1 consider the relevance ,of the theory of "dyadic contract". Finally, 1 sum up the two way interaction between inter personal relations and ch~nging economic and political demands.