Success and Survival on Wall Street

Charles W. Smith is professor and chair of sociology at Queens College, CUNY. The Mind of the Market, his earlier work, was an Alternative Selection of the Book of the Month Club and Fortune Book Club. Market Values in American Higher Education, Smith’s next work, is due out in the Spring of 2000.

• Part 1 The Ambiguity of the MarketPart 2 The True BelieversPart 3 Selling the MarketPart 4 Cynicism, Faith and FoolishnessPart 5 Putting it All TogetherPart 6 Some Practical Advice for the Individual InvestorPart 7 A Theoretical and Methodological NotePart 8 A Selected Glossary of Stock Market Terminology

In his deeply ironic analysis, Charles Smith shows us that the highly specialized milieux of securities markets resemble life in general; mysterious in some ways, unpredictable in other ways, intimately dependent on socially created stories in every regard, yet centered on mundane transactions of sale and purchase. What's more, Smith relates the market's operation to the everyday activities of its uncertain, often worried participants.