The professional prestige of veterinary medicine. Reflections on the reputation of a profession and its ambivalence

Publikationen als Autor:in / Herausgeber:in der Vetmeduni

Karg, Johanna Sophie; Dürnberger, Christian

Abstrakt

The attractiveness of a profession is influenced by its social prestige. Although it is worthwhile for all professions to reflect on their reputation, the literature contains few contributions on the reputation of veterinary medicine. The present article reflects on the prestige of veterinary professions based on research on occupational prestige. After a definition of the term, we identify characteristics of professions commonly associated with high social standing and those of activities generally considered to have low prestige. In the latter case, sociology also speaks of 'dirty work'. There are ambivalences with regard to veterinary medicine. The analysis clearly shows why 'veterinarian' is generally considered a highly prestigious profession, although veterinary fields of activity also have elements of 'dirty work', especially in areas that can evoke discomfort and disgust or that are increasingly discussed as morally questionable. As an example, we consider veterinary work in the slaughterhouse. Members of a highly respected profession are working in a field that is increasingly stigmatized or deliberately ignored. This example illustrates that future empirical prestige research should differentiate more strongly between veterinary fields of activity. Our article shows that an examination of the social standing of veterinary professions is essential if we want to understand why certain areas are in high demand while others suffer from a lack of young talent. Anyone thinking about the future of veterinary medicine must also think about its prestige.

Dokumententyp

Originalarbeit

Open Access Type

Diamond

DOI

10.5680/wtm000045

URL

https://www.wtm.at/smart_users/uni/user94/explorer/43/wtm000045.pdf