Cultural and educational aspects of John Urry’s sociology of traffic
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.16926/Abstract
The article „Cultural and Educational Aspects of John Urry’s Sociology of Road Traffic”, written
by Robert Janik and Łukasz Wróbel, explores the social determinants of mobility. It focuses upon
the movement of people and goods and the connections with the changes in worldviews accom-
panying the development of means of transport. These considerations are based upon the con-
cepts of John Urry, a British sociologist, who passed away in 2016, and whose undoubted contri-
bution consisted in drawing attention to the social aspects of road traffic. The article provides
a historical overview of the development of mobility over the centuries, including changes in travel
patterns, the role of infrastructure in logistical operations, and discusses Urry’s approach to the
phenomenon of traffic in urban space, which shares common features with Georg Simmel’s con-
cept, including the relationship between the „big city” and the perception of environmental sig-
nals through the human senses. The authors of the article noted that the topic of the car plays
a significant role in Urry’s reflections; it holds symbolic significance and is associated with free-
dom, which allows one to travel at any time and in any direction desired. This freedom, however,
is limited by the need to comply with traffic regulations. The article highlights the environmental
harm caused by certain practices in the movement of people and goods as well as the growing importance of the road safety.
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