A professional is a member of a profession or any person who works in a specified professional activity. The term also describes the standards of education and training that prepare members of the profession with the particular knowledge and skills necessary to perform their specific role within that profession. In addition, most professionals are subject to strict codes of conduct, enshrining rigorous ethical and moral obligations . Professional standards of practice and ethics for a particular field are typically agreed upon and maintained through widely recognized professional associations , such as the IEEE . Some definitions of "professional" limit this term to those professions that serve some important aspect of public interest and the general good of society.
32-419: Yuppie , short for " young urban professional " or " young upwardly-mobile professional ", is a term coined in the early 1980s for a young professional person working in a city . The term is first attested in 1980, when it was used as a fairly neutral demographic label, but by the mid-to-late 1980s, when a "yuppie backlash" developed due to concerns over issues such as gentrification , some writers began using
64-640: A Weekly Standard article that Benjamin Franklin – due to his extreme wealth, cosmopolitanism, and adventurous social life – is "Our Founding Yuppie". A recent article in Details proclaimed "The Return of the Yuppie", stating that "the yuppie of 1986 and the yuppie of 2006 are so similar as to be indistinguishable" and that "the yup" is "a shape-shifter... he finds ways to reenter the American psyche." Despite
96-627: A body of knowledge , actual behavior in terms of actions and decisions, and expectations held by societal stakeholders. The etymology and historical meaning of the term professional is from Middle English, from profes , adjective, having professed one's vows, from Anglo-French, from Late Latin professus , from Latin, past participle of profitēri to profess, confess, from pro- before + fatēri to acknowledge; in other senses, from Latin professus , past participle. Thus, as people became more and more specialized in their trade, they began to 'profess' their skill to others, and 'vow' to perform their trade to
128-495: A market researcher in Chicago, responded, " Stereotyping always winds up being derogatory. It doesn't matter whether you are trying to advertise to farmers, Hispanics or Yuppies, no one likes to be neatly lumped into some group." In 1990, rock artist Tom Petty used the term in the song " Yer So Bad ", in the line "My sister got lucky, married a yuppie". The word lost most of its political connotations and, particularly after
160-502: A "yuppie candidate" for President of the United States. The term was then used to describe a political demographic group of socially liberal but fiscally conservative voters favoring his candidacy. Newsweek magazine declared 1984 "The Year of the Yuppie", characterizing the salary range, occupations, and politics of "yuppies" as "demographically hazy". The alternative acronym yumpie , for young upwardly mobile professional ,
192-498: A formal education. In his 2000 book, Disciplined Minds : A Critical Look at Salaried Professionals and the Soul-Battering System that Shapes Their Lives , Jeff Schmidt observes that qualified professionals are less creative and diverse in their opinions and habits than non-professionals, which he attributes to the subtle indoctrination and filtering which accompanies the process of professional training. His evidence
224-476: A hospital before the issuance of a diploma, and professional participation in some licensing scheme for physicians. Indeed, the issue of education was considered so important by the AMA that one of its first acts was the establishment of a Committee on Medical Education..." As technology progressed throughout the twentieth century, the successful professionalization of a given field was increasingly made possible through
256-406: A key element of what constitutes any profession. Others have argued that strict codes of conduct and the professional associations that maintain them are merely a consequence of 'successful' professionalization, rather than an intrinsic element of the definition of professional (ism); this implies that a profession arises from the alignment between a shared purpose (connected to a 'greater good'),
288-598: A result of the rise of this inner-city population cohort. The term gained currency in the United States in March 1983 when syndicated newspaper columnist Bob Greene published a story about a business networking group founded in 1982 by the former radical leader Jerry Rubin , formerly of the Youth International Party (whose members were called " yippies "); Greene said he had heard people at
320-544: A trade (i.e. the successful professionalization of a trade) had to be achieved via other means such as licensing practices, of which might begin as an informal process established by voluntary professional associations, but then eventually become law due to lobbying efforts. Paralleling or soon after the fall of guilds, professional associations began to form in Britain and the US. In the US, several interested parties sought to emulate
352-486: Is based on human capital created by education and enhanced by strategies of closure, that is, the exclusion of the unqualified." Specifically, it is the management of human capital, and not just specialized skill which Perkin argues is a mark of the professional classes, at one point going so far as to compare it to a modern form of feudalism. Although professional training appears to be ideologically neutral, it may be biased towards those with higher class backgrounds and
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#1732780994156384-494: Is both qualitative and quantitative, including professional examinations, industry statistics and personal accounts of trainees and professionals. A key theoretical dispute arises from the observation that established professions (e.g. lawyers, medical doctors, accountants, architects, civil engineers, surveyors) are subject to strict codes of conduct. Some have thus argued that these codes of conduct, agreed upon and maintained through widely recognized professional associations, are
416-402: Is generally associated with skilled labour, or trades such as carpenter , electrician , mason , painter , plumber and other similar occupations. In his study The Rise of Professional Society historian Harold Perkin characterizes professional society; "Where pre-industrial society was based on passive property in land and industrial society on actively managed capital, professional society
448-464: The 1987 stock market crash , gained the negative socio-economic connotations that it sports today. On April 8, 1991, Time magazine proclaimed the death of the "yuppie" in a mock obituary . In 1989, MTV hosted the Foreclosure on a Yuppie contest to celebrate the end of the 1980s. The term experienced a resurgence in usage during the 2000s and 2010s. In October 2000, David Brooks remarked in
480-751: The global financial crisis of the late 2000s, in 2010, right-wing political commentator Victor Davis Hanson wrote in National Review very critically of "yuppies". However, following the Crash of 20 and the ongoing COVID recession they are believed to be gone once more. "Yuppie" was in common use in Britain from the early 1980s onward (the premiership of Margaret Thatcher ) and by 1987 had spawned subsidiary terms used in newspapers such as "yuppiedom", "yuppification", "yuppify" and "yuppie-bashing". A September 2010 article in The Standard described
512-470: The 20th century whereas in British English it started in the 1930s and grew fastest in the 1960s and 1970s. The notion of a professional can be traced to medieval European guilds, most of which died off by the middle of the nineteenth century, except the scholars guild or university. With most guilds formally abolished outside of the realm of academia, establishing exclusivity and standards in
544-549: The American Medical Association (AMA). According to Miller et al., "Lazzaroni opposed reforms for no apparent reason other than that scientists outside of their tight-knit group proposed them.". In his seminal work The Transformation of American Medicine (1982) Paul Starr argues that a significant motivation in the development of the AMA was to gain authority over unlicensed practitioners to minimize competition among medical practitioners, thereby enhancing
576-579: The Middle Ages flourished when guilds were abolished and that there is much evidence to support the notion that individuals prefer a wide variety of products of varying quality and price to be granted protections which they did not ask for, and which artificially constrain consumer options. Concerning modern forms of professional specialization, does specialization that accompanies technological advances naturally result in exclusivity, or have our licensing systems and laws been artificially engineered to limit
608-433: The country, and the facility with which the degree is obtained, have exerted a most pernicious influence" on the profession. With the object of alleviating this situation, recommendations were carried out calling for a specified minimum preliminary education as a prerequisite for admission to a medical college, a lengthening of the period of study for graduation from a medical school, including compulsory clinical instruction at
640-438: The densest sections of the city. Dan Rottenberg (1980) The first printed appearance of the word was in a May 1980 Chicago magazine article by Dan Rottenberg . Rottenberg reported in 2015 that he did not invent the term, he had heard other people using it, and at the time he understood it as a rather neutral demographic term. Nonetheless, his article did note the issues of socioeconomic displacement which might occur as
672-406: The earning power and prestige of medical professionals. The licensing process Starr argues, was unnecessarily prolonged and the costs were artificially enhanced with the specific aim of deterring potential practitioners from entering the field. In his book, The Early Development of Medical Licensing Laws in the United States, 1875–1900 , Ronald Hamowy wrote: "The American Medical Association (AMA)
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#1732780994156704-478: The highest known standard. With a reputation to uphold, trusted workers of a society who have a specific trade are considered professionals. Ironically, the usage of the word 'profess' declined from the late 1800s to the 1950s, just as the term 'professional' was gaining popularity from 1900 to 2010. Notably, in American English the rise in popularity of the term 'professional' started at the beginning of
736-500: The idea of specialization. As was the case with guilds who claimed to establish exclusivity in a trade in the name of serving the public good, there are often subtle dichotomies present in the idea of professionalizing a field, whether in the name of serving some notion of the public good or as a result of specialization. For example, while defenders of guilds have argued that they allowed markets to function by ensuring quality standards, Sheilagh Ogilvie had instead argued that markets of
768-533: The items on a typical Hong Kong resident's "yuppie wish list" based on a survey of 28- to 35-year-olds. About 58% wanted to own their own home, 40% wanted to professionally invest , and 28% wanted to become a boss. A September 2010 article in The New York Times defined as a hallmark of Russian "yuppie life" the adoption of yoga and other elements of Indian culture such as their clothes , food , and furniture. Professional In some cultures,
800-664: The model of apprenticeship that European guilds of the Middle Ages had honed to achieve their ends of establishing exclusivity in trades as well as the English concept of a gentleman which had come to be associated with higher income and craftsmanship. Examples are the Lazzaroni who lobbied to create the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and professional associations who lobbied to create
832-669: The networking group (which met at Studio 54 to soft classical music) joke that Rubin had "gone from being a yippie to being a yuppie". The headline of Greene's story was "From Yippie to Yuppie". East Bay Express humorist Alice Kahn elaborated on the concept in a satirical piece published in June 1983, further popularizing the term. The proliferation of the word was affected by the publication of The Yuppie Handbook in January 1983 (a tongue-in-cheek take on The Official Preppy Handbook ), followed by Senator Gary Hart 's 1984 candidacy as
864-724: The number of individuals who reach the point of specialization? In certain cases, the want to specialize can adversely and negatively affect an industry. In his seminal work From Poor Law to Welfare State: A History of Social Welfare in America (1994) Walter Trattner argues that social workers began to emphasize individualized casework at the expense of alternative methods which utilize holistic approaches to address social issues. In many cases, granting degrees through universities serves as one major component of licensing practices. Still, numerous legal stipulations and, in some cases, even informal social norms act in this capacity. Nevertheless,
896-433: The term is used as shorthand to describe a particular social stratum of well-educated workers who enjoy considerable work autonomy and who are commonly engaged in creative and intellectually challenging work. In narrow usage, not all expertise is considered a profession. Occupations such as skilled construction and maintenance work are more generally thought of as trades or crafts . The completion of an apprenticeship
928-452: The term pejoratively. Something is occurring in Chicago ... Some 20,000 new dwelling units have been built within two miles of the Loop over the past ten years to accommodate the rising tide of "Yuppies"—young urban professionals rebelling against the stodgy suburban lifestyles of their parents. The Yuppies seek neither comfort nor security, but stimulation, and they can find that only in
960-527: The university system constitutes one of the last remaining widely spread guild (or quasi-guild) and continues to serve as an indispensable means for the professionalization of fields of work. While it is true that most guilds disappeared by the middle of the nineteenth century, the scholars guild persisted due to its peripheral standing in an industrialized economy. In the words of Elliot Krause, "The university and scholars' guilds held onto their power over membership, training, and workplace because early capitalism
992-488: Was also current in the 1980s but failed to catch on. In a 1985 issue of The Wall Street Journal , Theressa Kersten at SRI International described a "yuppie backlash" by people who fit the demographic profile yet express resentment of the label: "You're talking about a class of people who put off having families so they can make payments on the SAABs ... To be a Yuppie is to be a loathsome undesirable creature". Leo Shapiro,
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1024-456: Was established as a permanent national organization at Philadelphia in 1847 at a convention attended by some 230 delegates representing more than forty medical societies and twenty-eight schools. From its inception, one of its primary aims was upgrading medical education and a concomitant reduction in the number of physicians. Its committee on raising medical standards reported at its first meeting that "the large number of Medical Colleges throughout
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