This book examines the development of social science and social research in Victorian and Edwardian Britain. The organising concepts of social investigation in the nineteenth century are problematical, its intellectual context is unclear and its methodological base uncertain. This collection of essays by leading scholars sets out to identify the problems and pitfalls in our current approaches and indicate how we can solve the former and avoid the latter. The essays enable the reader to see the work of Charles Booth in terms of motivation, method and meaning; to relate his work and that of his many associates to the contemporary social, intellectual and political milieu, and to compare his work with that of other social investigators of the period - such as Mayhew, the Webbs and Rowntree. They indicate some of the ways in which these retrieved archival riches may be re-worked by modern scholars to achieve a deeper understanding of Victorian society. An introduction skillfully places Charles Booth within the context of social investigation as a whole and enables both student and teacher to employ their reading of the volume to further their study of Victorian social science and society.

A collection of documents and of excerpts from books, with brief comments. Pp. 91-94 contain documents showing evidence of antisemitic sentiments in London's East End vaunted against Jewish landlords. Ch. 8 (pp. 247-312), "The Jewish Question", deals with antisemitism and anti-alienism in Britain in the late 19th-early 20th centuries. Pp. 261-271 present excerpts from Arnold White's antisemitic book "The Modern Jew". Pp. 281-297 deal with the anti-Jewish disturbances in Limerick (Ireland) in 1904, in Tredegar (Wales) in 1911, in Leeds and in Bethnal Green (London) in 1917, and with press reactions to them. Pp. 347-349 give an example of antisemitism in the British Army in 1919 in Palestine.