Leisure, Citizenship and Working-Class Men in Britain, 1850-1940

Working-class culture has often been depicted by historians as an atomised and fragmented entity lacking any significant cultural contestation.

Drawing on a wealth of primary and secondary source material, this book powerfully challenges these recent assumptions and places social class centre stage once more.

Arguing that there was a remarkable continuity in male working-class culture between 1850 and 1945, Beaven contends that despite changing socio-economic contexts, male working-class culture continued to draw on a tradition of active participation and cultural contestation that was both class- and gender-exclusive, and that the issue of male leisure was intimately linked with contemporary debates on mass society and morality.

This lively and readable book uses fascinating accounts from those who participated in and observed contemporary popular leisure making it of interest to students and teachers of social history, popular culture, urban history, historical geography, historical sociology and cultural studies.