Has material civilization spun out of control, becoming too fast for our own well-being and that of the planet? This book confronts these anxieties and examines the changing rhythms and temporal organization of everyday life. How do people handle hurriedness, burn-out and stress? Are slower forms of consumption viable?This volume brings together international experts from geography, sociology, history, anthropology and philosophy. In case studies covering the United States, Asia, and Europe, contributors follow routines and rhythms, their emotional and political dynamics, and show how they are anchored in material culture and everyday practice. Running themes of the book are questions of coordination and disruption; cycles and seasons; and the interplay between power and freedom, and between material and natural forces. The result is a volume that brings studies of practice, temporality and material culture together to open up a new intellectual agenda.

Elizabeth Shove is Professor of Sociology at Lancaster University.

Frank Trentmann is Professor of History at Birkbeck College, University of London.

Richard Wilk is Professor of Anthropology and Gender Studies at Indiana University.

List of Tables and Figures	p. vii
List of Contributors	p. ix
Acknowledgements	p. xiii
Introduction	p. 1
Time, Space and Practice
Everyday Practice and the Production and Consumption of Time	p. 17
Time space and the Organization of Social Life	p. 35
Re-ordering Temporal Rhythms: Coordinating Daily Practices in the UK in 1937 and 2000	p. 49
Pace and Scale: Temporal Order and Disruption
Disruption is Normal: Blackouts, Breakdowns and the Elasticity of Everyday Life	p. 67
My Soul for a Seat: Commuting and the Routines of Mobility	p. 85
Routines - Made and Unmade	p. 99
Rhythms, Patterns and Temporal Cycles of Consumption
Calendars and Clocks: Cycles of Horticultural Commerce in Nineteenth-Century America	p. 115
Fads, Fashions and 'Real' Innovations: Novelties and Social Change	p. 129
The Edge of Agency. Routines, Habits and Volition	p. 143
The Temporalities of Stuff
Buying Time	p. 157
Seasonal and Commercial Rhythms of Domestic Consumption: A Japanese Case Study	p. 171
Special and Ordinary Times: Tea in Motion	p. 189
Making Time: Reciprocal Object Relations and the Self-legitimizing Time of Wooden Boating	p. 203
The Ethics of Routine: Consciousness, Tedium and Value	p. 217
Index	p. 231
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.

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