Discard studies : wasting, systems, and power / Max Liboiron and Josh Lepawsky.
2022
TD793
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Details
Title
Discard studies : wasting, systems, and power / Max Liboiron and Josh Lepawsky.
Author
Liboiron, Max, 1980- author.
ISBN
9780262369503 (electronic bk.)
0262369508 (electronic bk.)
9780262543651
0262369508 (electronic bk.)
9780262543651
Published
Cambridge : The MIT Press, [2022]
Language
English
Description
1 online resource (216 pages).
Call Number
TD793
Dewey Decimal Classification
628.4
Summary
An argument that social, political, and economic systems maintain power by discarding certain people, places, and things. Discard studies is an emerging field that looks at waste and wasting broadly construed. Rather than focusing on waste and trash as the primary objects of study, discard studies looks at wider systems of waste and wasting to explore how some materials, practices, regions, and people are valued or devalued, becoming dominant or disposable. In this book, Max Liboiron and Josh Lepawsky argue that social, political, and economic systems maintain power by discarding certain people, places, and things. They show how the theories and methods of discard studies can be applied in a variety of cases, many of which do not involve waste, trash, or pollution. Liboiron and Lepawsky consider the partiality of knowledge and offer a theory of scale, exploring the myth that most waste is municipal solid waste produced by consumers; discuss peripheries, centers, and power, using content moderation as an example of how dominant systems find ways to discard; and use theories of difference to show that universalism, stereotypes, and inclusion all have politics of discard and even purification--as exemplified in "inclusive" efforts to broaden the Black Lives Matter movement. Finally, they develop a theory of change by considering "wasting well," outlining techniques, methods, and propositions for a justice-oriented discard studies that keeps power in view.
Source of Description
OCLC-licensed vendor bibliographic record.
Added Author
Lepawsky, Josh, 1972- author.
Series
The MIT Press
Record Appears in
Online Resources > Ebooks
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