Editorials by Helen Holmes
Journal of Consumer Ethics (forthcoming), 2017
Geography, University of Manchester, UK Sociology and the Sustainable Consumption Institute, Univ... more Geography, University of Manchester, UK Sociology and the Sustainable Consumption Institute, University of Manchester, UK Why gender and ethical consumption? With this introductory paper we make the case for a new research agenda centred on 'Gender and Ethical Consumption'. To date, a host of exciting research, cutting across humanities and social and environmental sciences, investigates and interrogates the gendered nature of consumption. The debates therein are wellversed and widely cited -from Rachel Carson's (1962) 'Silent Spring' to Mary Douglas
Papers by Helen Holmes
Families, Relationships and Societies, 2021
In 2012, David Morgan gave a talk titled ‘Neighbours, neighbouring and acquaintanceship: some fur... more In 2012, David Morgan gave a talk titled ‘Neighbours, neighbouring and acquaintanceship: some further thoughts’ at the University of Turku, Finland. In this article we engage in dialogue with Morgan’s talk, as well as his 2009 book Acquaintances, in particular the observations he made about the simultaneous closeness and distance that characterises neighbouring relationships. We suggest that using the metaphors of elasticity and stickiness instead allows us to explore neighbouring relationships as more than inhabiting a space between intimates and strangers (Morgan, 2009), but as textured and messy everyday relationalities. We consider also how the ‘stickiness’ of this relationship as well as the significance of its ‘elasticity’ are likely to have been heightened during COVID-19 lockdowns, which have altered the usual configurations of intimate and stranger relationships. In doing so, our aim is to contribute further to Morgan’s theorising of the nature of neighbouring as a specific...
Geographies of Making, Craft and Creativity, 2018
This toolkit has emerged from a four year EPSRC funded interdisciplinary project called ‘Solar En... more This toolkit has emerged from a four year EPSRC funded interdisciplinary project called ‘Solar Energy for Future Societies’ between Sheffield and Durham universities. The project involved an interdisciplinary team from Physics, Geography, Architecture and Engineering, exploring issues of energy futures with residents of a local town. This toolkit brings together all of the various ways in which we think interdisciplinarity occurred within our project, and the means through which we encouraged it.
Sustainable Consumption and Production, Volume II, 2020
Minstrels are found in all parts of the world. They perform similar functions in their various so... more Minstrels are found in all parts of the world. They perform similar functions in their various societies. They are the custodian of the people's history, entertainers, educationists, advisers and reconstructionists. The secret behind their success in their roles in the society lies in their ability to impress the audience during their performance. Performance plays an indispensable role in full actualization of the story being told as a full aesthetic experience. In this paper, the writer x-rays the roles of both performance and the context of the play in reconstruction of the society especially in Upper Iweka area of Onitsha town.
Cultural Sociology, 2020
This article explores material loss and develops a new conceptual agenda. Synthesising and develo... more This article explores material loss and develops a new conceptual agenda. Synthesising and developing debates on the sociology of consumption and material culture in combination with those of the sociology of nothing, it argues that material loss is crucial to understanding people’s everyday relationships to the material world and to practices of consumption. notions of absence, nothingness and loss are becoming increasingly intriguing phenomena for sociologists interested in the everyday. However, whilst their theoretical connotations are being discussed more and more, empirical investigation into these phenomena remains somewhat (ironically) absent. This article draws on a recent project exploring lost property, based on qualitative interviews with lost property offices, households and museums. Developing previous work on material affinities and material culture, the authors argue that lost property reveals the enduring relationships people have with objects which are no longer in...
Resources, Conservation and Recycling, 2021
The use of plastics, and even the existence of this versatile material, has been increasingly dem... more The use of plastics, and even the existence of this versatile material, has been increasingly demonised in the UK. Public campaigns exist to expand use of recyclable cups and to eliminate plastic straws. Retailers supplying 80% of the market are now members of the UK Plastics Pact, with goals to ensure that products are designed to be recycled, that recycling takes place, and that more recyclate is used in new products. Public awareness has not translated into action, as domestic collection rates for discarded plastics remain pitifully low. We started with a systems-wide vision that these rates can only be increased if all household plastic recycling is made easy and consistent christened 'One Bin to Rule Them All'-and used this premise as a starting point to examine the implications of a fully mixed plastics waste stream entering the supply chain. An agenda for future research was developed through 25 interviews with senior industrial and commercial management and a cross-sector workshop. We determined that if improved household collection rates are to translate into significantly improved recycling rates, rapid progress is required in four areas: standardisation (materials, kerbside collections, waste sorting), infrastructure investment, development of cross-supply chain business models and creation of higher value recyclate. Creating a harmonised national solution to plastic waste sorting is critically dependent on maintaining value in discarded plastics. This in turn reduces plastic leakage into the environment. Enabling this value-based scenario in the UK would form a best-practice model for other regions.
disP - The Planning Review, 2018
This article argues that the interdisciplinary research collaboration can neglect the wider value... more This article argues that the interdisciplinary research collaboration can neglect the wider value created by such collaborations. Championing the role of a knowledge integration and reflection facilitator, the article contends that of working, rather than focusing solely on knowledge outputs and impacts. Drawing on embedded research conducted in relation to a project on local energy futures involving physicists, architects project management; and research methods. Such spillovers signal that what travels in interdisciplinary working is much more than formal knowledge and point to potential long term legacy effects from interdisciplinary working, back in disciplines.
Sociology, 2018
This article explores how mundane objects are passed on through kinship networks and how these pr... more This article explores how mundane objects are passed on through kinship networks and how these practices become part of the ‘doing’ of family and kinship. Using Mason’s concept of affinities, I illuminate four strands of material affinities, each of which illustrates how passed on objects can reproduce, imagine and memorialise kin connections both biological and social, and in and through time. Crucially, I argue that it is everyday objects in use which reveal how materiality and kinship are woven together. By starting from the object rather than the subject material affinities are brought to life, illustrating how materials are inscribed with kinship both physically and imaginatively, but in turn inscribe kinship practices, operating as central characters in family narratives. The article stems from research exploring everyday contemporary thrift and involved one-to-one interviews and a Mass Observation Directive on the subject of ‘Being thrifty’.
Sociology, 2019
Professor Michael Banton died in May 2018 aged 91. His long career involved a decade at the Unive... more Professor Michael Banton died in May 2018 aged 91. His long career involved a decade at the University of Edinburgh in the Department of Social Anthropology before spending the rest of his career at the University of Bristol. In Bristol he was Professor of Sociology (1965–1992) and subsequently Emeritus Professor, during which time he remained deeply engaged in scholarly research and publication (see Obituaries). It seems
Time & Society, 2015
This article explores the experiences of temporality. It argues that experience of time is a key ... more This article explores the experiences of temporality. It argues that experience of time is a key and undervalued feature of practice; a feature that furthers understandings of how practice becomes normalised. Practice theory advocates that experiences of time are experiences of practice. This article does not wish to refute this claim, rather it aims to extend it by exploring the complexities of the relationship between practice and temporality. Drawing upon an empirical study of a hair salon and women’s hair appointment practices, this article unpicks the drivers of shared practice from the physical to the normative, to the notion that experiences of time spent engaging in practices drives their performance. Introducing the concept of self-time, it makes three main arguments. Firstly, that exploring and prioritising experiences of time (how time spent doing a practice feels) illuminates further elements of collective practice. Practices may not be what they seem and seemingly obvio...
Emotion, Space and Society, 2021
Geoforum
New spaces, ordinary practices: circulating and sharing within diverse economies of provisioning ... more New spaces, ordinary practices: circulating and sharing within diverse economies of provisioning This article draws upon two distinct UK case studies to explore how alternative modes of provisioning employ ordinary practices of sharing and circularity. Speaking to debates about alterity, diverse economies (Gibson-Graham, 2008) and emerging literature on the circular and shared economy, these two small and informal based models, one food based, the other clothing, are put forward as examples of the vast array of contemporary 'alternative' forms of consumption and provisioning taking place across the UK. The article illuminates how diverse economies are 'made material' through their materials and practices. In doing so I make three key arguments: firstly, and overall, that studying materiality is one way to illuminate these new and emerging spaces of provisioning, highlighting their practices, intimacies and ambiguities. Secondly, this material focus illustrates how the practices of provisioning-in particular, sharing and circulating-are not new, but are instead organised in original and novel ways; and this has wider implications for contemporary debates on circular and shared economy. Thirdly, that the materials of provisioning can be both beneficial and troublesome to provisioning organisations' practices of circulating and sharing and the extent to which they tackle issues of social exclusion, financial hardship and sustainable resource use.
Uploads
Editorials by Helen Holmes
Papers by Helen Holmes