First published in 1984, Social Texts and Context illustrates the ways in which familiar psychological concepts – femininity, the environment, groups, the self – are constructed in discourse. Novels by Thomas Hardy, Barbara Cartland, Doris Lessing, C. P. Snow, Charles Dickens and Robert Musil are examined, and the theoretical approaches of Roland Barthes, Rom Harre, Jonathan Culler, Henri Tajfel, Irving Janis and Paul Willis are discussed. Development in literary theory – such as semiology and deconstruction and in theories of social action – such as ethogenics and discourse analysis – make it difficult to treat literary and psychological texts as a neutral medium of communication. Instead, texts should be seen in terms of their fundamental constructive role in the organization of social life. As the authors demonstrate, contemporary life in both its personal and professional spheres is hedged around by discourse, conversations, newspaper articles, novels, scientific reports. This book will be of interest to students of literature and psychology.

All the papers in this volume were presented at a conference on Transportation and Urban Life, held in Munich during the third week of September, 1975. The conference was sponsored by the Special Programme Panels on Systems Science and Human Factors of the Science Committee of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation. The distinguishing characteristic of the conference and of this volume lies in the combination of systems science and human factors contributions in the field of urban transportation. The initiative for attempting such a synthesis came from the sponsors. It is increasingly realised that the complexity of contemporary problems which applied scientists are being asked to solve is such that the coordinated efforts of several disciplines are needed to solve them. The brief which we formulated for the conference and distribu ted in our international call for papers was as follows: "The conference is intended to highlight significant psycho logical, SOCiological and economic aspects of transportation and urban life and to present new techniques which can be applied to these aspects and their interfaces." Papers were invited in four topic areas: Communities (transportation problems in relation to social needs, residential planning, industry and c0l1lITlerce); Cities and large urban areas (the econOlnic environment, material fl l, resources); Regional development and transportation (administration and management at the project and multiprogramme level); and Quality of life and transportation (noise, visual intrusion, severance, air pollution)."