# Assistant conversation XL2UVG - Canonical URL: - Resource IRI: - Type: assistant conversation - Mode: quick ## Transcript ### 1. User is there anything in the literature related to this? ### 2. Assistant tool calls #### Tool call: `search_text` ```json { "document_kind": "literature", "query": "distinguishing charity free exchange swap" } ``` #### Tool call: `search_text` ```json { "document_kind": "literature", "query": "resellers secondhand tolerated boundary" } ``` #### Tool call: `search_text` ```json { "document_kind": "literature", "query": "waste disposal dumping free shop overflow" } ``` ### 3. Tool result: search_text Exact matches 1. Source: “Still good life”: On the value of reuse and distributive labor in “depleted” rural Maine (#3F4AVR), Brieanne Berry, Cindy Isenhour, p. 2 Context: #XM8XYE “Still good life”: On the value of reuse and distributive labor in “depleted” rural Maine #HZNXSR Background and literature review: Meaning, motive, and value in reuse Matching excerpt #DEFVUS: Signs of reuse are hard to miss in Maine. We define reuse exchanges, for the purposes of this project, as the redistribution of previously owned material goods, in their original form , from one agent to another through a transfer of ownership (sale, swap, barter, gift) or temporary use agreement (borrow, rental, lease, share, loan). 1 We also include consideration of the work required to prepare goods for reuse, including cleaning, restoration, and repair. In summer, it is difficult to drive more than a few miles in Maine without spotting a sign for a flea market, an antiques store, a yard sale, a home-based repair business, or a community swap. Throughout the year, Facebook groups, Craigslist, and charity stores combine with more than six hundred flea markets, antiques stores, scrapyards, vintage shops, and consignment boutiques to support a strong network of secondhand exchange. Observers have long noted Maine’s strong culture of reuse dating back to at least the nineteenth century ( New York Times 1894). Maine historians have also verified dense concentrations of antiques markets (Tuck and Fales 2000) and a supporting sense of self-sufficiency, frugality, and thrift throughout the state (Judd and Beach 2003). Spatial analysis of county-by-county economic data on formal sector reuse establishments and employment across the United States confirms that, relative to other states, Maine has a consistently strong reuse economy, even in periods of economic expansion (Isenhour et al. 2017; Berry, Bonnet, and Isenhour 2019). 2. Source: The Simple Bare Necessities- Scales and Paradoxes of Thrift on a London Public Housing Estate (#7RVN6J), Catherine Alexander, p. 14 Context: #NVBVQ9 The Simple Bare Necessities: Scales and Paradoxes of Thrift on a London Public Housing Estate #LNURD9 DECENCY AND RESPECTABILITY Matching excerpt #3EMK5A: Provisioning for children elicited a particular set of views of what was appropriate or decent. Maureen had started a small exchange system for children's toys, encouraging mothers to bring toys their children had grown out of and swap them for new ones. A young woman had also started her own exchange scheme with her friends. For the younger group, swapping toys became a social occasion, but most also tried to save up to splash out on at least one big, new toy for each of their children each year. The rising cost of these as the children hankered after electronic games worried the mothers, anxious to do the best for their children lest they be mocked by friends. Clothes were a different matter. Discussing a couple of local charity shops, the same young women all said emphatically that they would never dress their children in secondhand clothes. One added slowly that if she was really stuck for money and needed something she might think about it for herself, "but never for my kids. I get the best I can for them." Having to wear secondhand clothes or "hand-me-downs" from older siblings and cousins reminded her of her own childhood and being acutely aware of how little money there had been to keep the family going. Again, while some siblings might swap clothes, there was often a boundary drawn around immediate family—sometimes extending to close friends—beyond which clothes were not exchanged for reasons varying from disgust at an unhygienic practice to social embarrassment. 3. Source: Paradoxes of openness and distinction in the sharing economy (#AG36RW), Connor Fitzmaurice, Emilie Dubois Poteat, Juliet B. Schor, Lindsey B. Carfagna, Will Attwood-Charles, p. 14 Context: #9ESTWX Paradoxes of openness and distinction in the sharing economy #KZ8GW4 5. Discussion: distinction, matching and the functioning of circuits Matching excerpt #RNZ6DT: time bank and food swap, the high level of distinguishing practices makes matches difficult to achieve. These sites suffered from low trading levels, as noted above. Both sites are easily accessible in the sense that they advertise to a general public, are free, and have relatively low barriers to participation. Once people join, however, failure to display sufficient distinction undermines the willingness of others to trade with them, and matches across that cultural divide are not frequent enough to create a high volume of trades. In both cases, new participants often failed to carry through with trades, while others saw a fall in their trading activity after promising starts. In the time bank, we had difficulty finding members who had completed the five trades necessary for inclusion in the study. Lack of trading was even more pronounced at the food swap. It barely functioned for a time on account of an inability to retain sufficient numbers of new members. At one point, attendance fell to five or six people and as a result, swaps were occasionally canceled for lack of participation. In these cases, we believe trading is made more difficult by the enforcement of a uniform metric of exchange—in the time bank, everyone's time is equal, and in the food swap, members' offerings are roughly equal on a per item basis. Inequalities cannot be ameliorated by adjusting the trading ratio. Social inequality in the form of cultural capital creates mismatches in how people understand these transactions or what they hope to gain from them. In these cases, the structure of Bourdieusian cultural capital undermines good matching. 4. Source: Paradoxes of openness and distinction in the sharing economy (#AG36RW), Connor Fitzmaurice, Emilie Dubois Poteat, Juliet B. Schor, Lindsey B. Carfagna, Will Attwood-Charles, p. 9 Context: #9ESTWX Paradoxes of openness and distinction in the sharing economy #5SDGN3 4. The cases #H28ZW5 4.3. "Taking Back the Pantry" or claiming foodie distinction Matching excerpt #G25GLQ: The policing of the circuit’s boundaries was particularly clear at one December swap, a charity cookie exchange that drew more than 90 participants—nearly all of them first timers. One regular pointed out that someone had made Betty Crocker cookies and admitted it on their information sheet. “I know it’s for charity,” one swapper remarked, “but they clearly don’t understand what a swap means for us.” 5. Source: Paradoxes of openness and distinction in the sharing economy (#AG36RW), Connor Fitzmaurice, Emilie Dubois Poteat, Juliet B. Schor, Lindsey B. Carfagna, Will Attwood-Charles, p. 8 Context: #9ESTWX Paradoxes of openness and distinction in the sharing economy #5SDGN3 4. The cases #H28ZW5 4.3. "Taking Back the Pantry" or claiming foodie distinction Matching excerpt #4FN98S: The distinguishing practices we observed were often subtle. The swap is a friendly environment, although conversations typically remain surface level. Casual questions about the food, where participants are from, and what they do for a living dominate the chatter. However, participants express clear preferences when engaging in exchanges, offering their items based on perceptions of worth. Since the objects of exchange are cultural goods and charged with high semiotic content, such propositions for exchanges are reflections of judgments of taste (Bourdieu, 1984). Given that such judgments occur within relationships of exchange, it is appropriate to consider how divergent definitions of what counts as real homemade food delineate boundaries of inclusion and exclusion. 6. Source: Paradoxes of openness and distinction in the sharing economy (#AG36RW), Connor Fitzmaurice, Emilie Dubois Poteat, Juliet B. Schor, Lindsey B. Carfagna, Will Attwood-Charles, p. 1 Context: #9ESTWX Paradoxes of openness and distinction in the sharing economy #6H2K4D 1. Introduction Matching excerpt #359DVE: Our findings suggest a phenomenon that we call the paradox of openness and distinction. Virtually all exchange sites and digital platforms within the sharing economy explicitly advocate for open access and equality of opportunity, if not fairness and even economic egalitarianism. We find this discourse among our respondents as well as the sites’ own mission statements and self-descriptions. However, at the same time, we find considerable evidence of distinguishing practices. These displays of class power in turn undermine the successful formation and reproduction of circuits. For certain types of circuits—particularly those with less market-driven principles of exchange—high levels of inequality and displays of distinction make it hard to establish robust circuits by inhibiting the formation of matches. In the circuits that are characterized by more distinguishing practices we observe a lower volume of trading. In fact, the two most “relational” sites (the time bank and the food swap) fail to produce the types of matches that generate robust trading economies. To understand why this might be the case, we turn now to a discussion of the relational and structural (Bourdieuian) perspectives. 7. Source: Paradoxes of openness and distinction in the sharing economy (#AG36RW), Connor Fitzmaurice, Emilie Dubois Poteat, Juliet B. Schor, Lindsey B. Carfagna, Will Attwood-Charles, p. 0 Context: #9ESTWX Paradoxes of openness and distinction in the sharing economy #PMADPN ABSTRACT Matching excerpt #SJKVSD: This paper studies four sites from the sharing economy to analyze how class and other forms of inequality operate within this type of economic arrangement. On the basis of interviews and participant observation at a time bank, a food swap, a makerspace and an open-access education site we find considerable evidence of distinguishing practices and the deployment of cultural capital, as understood by Bourdieusian theory. We augment Bourdieu with concepts from relational economic sociology, particularly Zelizer's "circuits of commerce" and "good matches," to show how inequality is reproduced within micro-level interactions. We find that the prevalence of distinguishing practices can undermine the relations of exchange and create difficulty completing trades. This results in an inconsistency, which we call the "paradox of openness and distinction," between actual practice and the sharing economy's widely articulated goals of openness and equity. 8. Source: Anthropology and the Economy of Sharing (#UX42KU), Thomas Widlok, p. 165 Context: #N5EK2K ANTHROPOLOGY AND THE ECONOMY OF SHARING #TJP89S INTRODUCING THE SHARING ECONOMY #86NAMJ When “sharing” is renting (out) #W6ZP9K When “sharing” means having and insisting on keeping Matching excerpt #PLSF7L: With regard to music swaps and similar schemes it is also important to note that although they may look superficially like gift exchange or sharing, there is much less social commitment involved. Those who offer things and services on swap sites can do so at their own whim and those who use the platforms decide how much and for how long they get involved. A quick exit option is available as there are often no long-term contracts. Competition between different platforms allows quick movement to where the best deal is to be expected. Game theorists are always worried about free-riders (see Chapter 2) but to some extent these schemes are exclusive populations of free-riders who as a collective, and with the appropriate technology, seek to exploit those who have initially produced the music. Many forms of downloading from the internet are akin to what ethnographers have described for cattle raids. Approximate matches 1. Source: Household Recycling and Consumption Work (#4LST57), Kathryn Wheeler, Miriam Glucksmann, p. 28 Context: #3BMVZP Picking a Way through Rubbish #3AX9RU Changing practices of reuse and recycling Score: 0.514 Related excerpt #S5UQYZ: economy with respect to charity shops and informal ways of trading in car boot sales. These are usually based on principles of exchange normally absent from first-hand purchase and sale, including negotiations over the utility and transformation of goods. 2. Source: Gift or commodity: what changes hands in the U.S. garage sale? (#4UEQN8), Gretchen M. Herrmann, p. 12 Context: #QF9LBR gift or commodity: what changes hands in the U.S. garage sale? #9PBVWF "it's just giving" Score: 0.507 Related excerpt #A4WF9P: Giving in the garage sale is often unpretentious and unmediated. One older woman said of her generosity to others, "It's not charity , it's just giving ." In organized charity, the giver is generally of a higher social class than the receiver (Collins 1988; Ostrander 1984; Stein 1989); thus, charitable institutions (re)create and reinforce markers of social stratification. Collins (1988:43-44) observes that charity is readily converted into status, particularly by the middle- and upper-class "ladies bountiful." The giver gains easy symbolic capital since the recipients, who are poor, cannot reciprocate. Although most shoppers purchase goods from those of equal 3. Source: Gift or commodity: what changes hands in the U.S. garage sale? (#4UEQN8), Gretchen M. Herrmann, p. 1 Context: #QF9LBR gift or commodity: what changes hands in the U.S. garage sale? Score: 0.496 Related excerpt #DEEH9G: meanings that are unique to specific exchanges, often rendering items inalienable, even within the context of overtly commodified exchange. 4 I also argue for the theoretical utility of maintaining the gift-commodity distinction in the context of Western culture, where it serves to outline the contours of this hybrid form of exchange. 4. Source: Gift or commodity: what changes hands in the U.S. garage sale? (#4UEQN8), Gretchen M. Herrmann, p. 11 Context: #QF9LBR gift or commodity: what changes hands in the U.S. garage sale? #6GFCQW giveaway prices Score: 0.478 Related excerpt #RR95WW: The payment of some money allows garage sale transactors latitude to negotiate the degree to which they want to exchange goods as gifts or commodities. Many would be uncomfortable with a totally unmediated giving relationship with strangers, and some monetary exchange makes the degree of gift or commodity exchange voluntary. In this way, the giving can more closely approximate the ideology of the pure or perfect gift as unconstraining (Carrier 1990a). In 1994 a social worker who had just lost her job spoke of how she found herself giving many things away at her sale. A single mother, who had only $40, came to her sale and asked about furniture, since she had virtually none at home. The seller had a couch, an armchair, and a lamp, all in good condition, which she offered to the shopper free of charge. Yet the shopper insisted on paying her $40. In this way she could retain a sense of dignity and avoid feeling indebted in a gift relationship in which she could not reciprocate, although her "purchase" was in fact a heavily subsidized gift—a point that the seller duly noted. 22 5. Source: The gift of waste: The diversity of gift practices among dumpster divers (#7VNTAB), Olli Pyyhtinen, Turo-Kimmo Lehtonen, p. 10 Context: #MBGECJ The gift of waste: The diversity of gift practices among dumpster divers #XPJHAL Materials and methods #CW8R4E Free giving Score: 0.483 Related excerpt #EPRLKJ: The third form of gift that we encounter among dumpster divers is giving without expectation of return. While the free gift is valorized by every Western moral and religious tradition, anthropological and sociological approaches to the gift are especially suspicious of the existence of free giving and typically consider the gift in terms of reciprocity instead 6. Source: Paradoxes of openness and distinction in the sharing economy (#AG36RW), Connor Fitzmaurice, Emilie Dubois Poteat, Juliet B. Schor, Lindsey B. Carfagna, Will Attwood-Charles, p. 8 Context: #9ESTWX Paradoxes of openness and distinction in the sharing economy #5SDGN3 4. The cases #H28ZW5 4.3. "Taking Back the Pantry" or claiming foodie distinction Score: 0.5 Related excerpt #4FN98S: The distinguishing practices we observed were often subtle. The swap is a friendly environment, although conversations typically remain surface level. Casual questions about the food, where participants are from, and what they do for a living dominate the chatter. However, participants express clear preferences when engaging in exchanges, offering their items based on perceptions of worth. Since the objects of exchange are cultural goods and charged with high semiotic content, such propositions for exchanges are reflections of judgments of taste (Bourdieu, 1984). Given that such judgments occur within relationships of exchange, it is appropriate to consider how divergent definitions of what counts as real homemade food delineate boundaries of inclusion and exclusion. 7. Source: The Gift, the Indian Gift and the Indian Gift (#Q24SW5), Jonathan Parry, p. 16 Context: #QSCQ6W THE GIFT, THE INDIAN GIFT AND THE 'INDIAN GIFT'* #M5XECH The ideology of the 'pure gift' Score: 0.501 Related excerpt #5D2KT3: It is of course the case that the common fate of such 'free' gifts is to become a purchase price of salvation, resulting in the kind of actuarial calculation represented by the Merit Books of the pious Buddhist (e.g. Spiro 1970), or the arithmetical relationship between alms-offerings and the elimination of sin established by Cyprian (Westermarck 1906: 555). But this same ideology may react against such reckoning in the name of an ideal of purely disinterested action. 8. Source: The Gift, the Indian Gift and the Indian Gift (#Q24SW5), Jonathan Parry, p. 6 Context: #QSCQ6W THE GIFT, THE INDIAN GIFT AND THE 'INDIAN GIFT'* #YA3R8G Mauss's gift Score: 0.499 Related excerpt #PYCUTN: The interested exchange and the disinterested gift thus emerge as two sides of the same coin. Given a profound dislike of the first, mistrust of the second is only logical. The unreciprocated gift debases the recipient, and the charity of the 'rich almoner' is condemned (1966: 63; 1973: 258)—presumably because it denies obligation and replaces the reciprocal interdependence on which society is founded with an asymmetrical dependence. The remedy for our modern ills is 9. Source: The Gift, the Indian Gift and the Indian Gift (#Q24SW5), Jonathan Parry, p. 17 Context: #QSCQ6W THE GIFT, THE INDIAN GIFT AND THE 'INDIAN GIFT'* #M5XECH The ideology of the 'pure gift' Score: 0.494 Related excerpt #9DDLCH: encourage the creation of a separate sphere which is immune from the requirements of such a demanding precept. The ideology of the pure gift may thus itself promote and entrench the ideological elaboration of a domain in which self-interest rules supreme. It is not I think coincidental that the ideology of the 'pure gift' is accorded such prominence among groups—such as the Jews and Jains—which have a particularly close historical association with market trade, for the two spheres define each other—sometimes less, but with us today as sharply as ever. With renewed ideological stress on the autonomy of the market go renewed pleas for philanthropy to assume the responsibilities it denies. It was possibly through such speculations that Mauss arrived at his now perhaps not so quaint-sounding moral conclusion—that the combination of interest and disinterest in exchange is preferable to their separation. 10. Source: Anthropology and the Economy of Sharing (#UX42KU), Thomas Widlok, p. 33 Context: #N5EK2K ANTHROPOLOGY AND THE ECONOMY OF SHARING #ELZDXK THIS IS NOT A GIFT #XH3Z3M Ceci n'est pas un don #DFCCJH BOX 1 NO GIFT INTENDED: SHARING GAME MEAT IN A HADZA HUNTING CAMP ﷐ Score: 0.487 Related excerpt #CTFNLP: A number of important features may be appropriated from exchange theory when developing a theory of sharing. The foremost virtue of gift theory is that it has shown a consistent outline of a mode of exchange that is distinct from commodity exchange. Mauss and others have shown that the concepts of commercial ### 4. Tool result: search_text Exact matches 1. Source: “Still good life”: On the value of reuse and distributive labor in “depleted” rural Maine (#3F4AVR), Brieanne Berry, Cindy Isenhour, p. 5 Context: #XM8XYE “Still good life”: On the value of reuse and distributive labor in “depleted” rural Maine #HZNXSR Background and literature review: Meaning, motive, and value in reuse Matching excerpt #Y8X3QK: A great deal of the existing literature thus suggests that the distributive labor at play in secondhand economies is a “crucial social activity that is constitutive of the social and not only the economic order” (Ferguson 2015, 90–91). Secondhand distribution is perhaps primarily a process “tightly woven into other desires—for sociality, intimacy and relations of care” (Miller 2018, 90). 2. Source: The Perception of the Environment: Essays on Livelihood, Dwelling and Skill (#3LSRBZ), Tim Ingold, p. 207 Context: #6PPCBM Part II #76LAV7 Dwelling #KGP8HK How animals and people make themselves at home in the world #WEVTAX THE HOUSE AS ORGANISM #QEZF95 LANDSCAPE Matching excerpt #CRV48G: become a boundary, or the indicator of a boundary, in relation to the activities of the people (or animals) for whom it is recognised or experienced as such. 3. Source: The Simple Bare Necessities- Scales and Paradoxes of Thrift on a London Public Housing Estate (#7RVN6J), Catherine Alexander, p. 14 Context: #NVBVQ9 The Simple Bare Necessities: Scales and Paradoxes of Thrift on a London Public Housing Estate #LNURD9 DECENCY AND RESPECTABILITY Matching excerpt #3EMK5A: Provisioning for children elicited a particular set of views of what was appropriate or decent. Maureen had started a small exchange system for children's toys, encouraging mothers to bring toys their children had grown out of and swap them for new ones. A young woman had also started her own exchange scheme with her friends. For the younger group, swapping toys became a social occasion, but most also tried to save up to splash out on at least one big, new toy for each of their children each year. The rising cost of these as the children hankered after electronic games worried the mothers, anxious to do the best for their children lest they be mocked by friends. Clothes were a different matter. Discussing a couple of local charity shops, the same young women all said emphatically that they would never dress their children in secondhand clothes. One added slowly that if she was really stuck for money and needed something she might think about it for herself, "but never for my kids. I get the best I can for them." Having to wear secondhand clothes or "hand-me-downs" from older siblings and cousins reminded her of her own childhood and being acutely aware of how little money there had been to keep the family going. Again, while some siblings might swap clothes, there was often a boundary drawn around immediate family—sometimes extending to close friends—beyond which clothes were not exchanged for reasons varying from disgust at an unhygienic practice to social embarrassment. 4. Source: The Assembling of Circular Consumption: A sociomaterial practice approach (#Y3CFPX), Christian Fuentes, Elina Närvänen, Nina Mesiranta, p. 3 Context: #D6XSXA Theories of practice and the assembling of circular consumption Matching excerpt #85DEUD: To practice a more circular mode of shopping, such as buying secondhand clothes, will then require a different set of competencies (e.g., determining where one can buy secondhand clothes and evaluating the quality of used clothes), meanings (e.g., secondhand as nostalgic, retro, sustainable, or a necessity), and materialities (e.g., stores and their organisations, the material of clothes, and apps and digital platforms that enable the exchange of secondhand items). In other words, for a more circular mode of consumption to be performed, several specific elements need 5. Source: The Assembling of Circular Consumption: A sociomaterial practice approach (#Y3CFPX), Christian Fuentes, Elina Närvänen, Nina Mesiranta, p. 7 Context: #NZ44LX Narratives of circular consumption: Assembling, reducing, reusing, and recycling arrangements #JJF6M7 Reusing – The story of how the sweater changed owners Matching excerpt #2DETUS: What we see here is the assembling of a different type of circular consumption, one configured to promote the reuse of clothing. As in the previous example, the formation of circular consumption is a complex activity involving the development of competencies, the interconnection of materialities, and the fostering of new meanings and goals. To begin with, regardless of whether the exchange of material resources (i.e., the sweater) from one user to another takes place offline or online, there is a need to have a platform for it (e.g., a physical gathering or an online platform). Assessing the appearance and fit of clothes is difficult to do, especially online, which makes the work done by secondhand experts crucial. The digital platform provides free training for expert consumers on issues such as how to price items, provide garment measurements, and take attractive photos. Therefore, material objects, such as measurements and photos, facilitate the practice of reuse. In addition, organising clothing swap events requires competencies, such as planning, marketing, and logistics (Camacho-Otero et al., 2020). The organisation of consumer-to-consumer markets involves considerable consumer work. More specifically, reselling goods also requires work from consumers to turn their devalued goods into valuable secondhand products by, for example, washing, sorting, pricing, packaging, and sending fashion items to be resold. Connected with this, consumers involved in reselling need to learn to reconfigure the meanings of secondhand consumption, counteracting its stigmatisation, which has often been seen as a low-status form of consumption. These consumers need to learn to re-appreciate both secondhand consumption in general and their used products. Thus, the formation of circular consumption, in this case, also involves cultivating new norms around secondhand consumption, as well as developing the ability to express and promote these shifting norms to others. That is, 6. Source: My Life with Things: The Consumer Diaries (#Y3KME8), Elizabeth Chin, p. 151 Context: #XJ352H Contents #6YPJY9 The Entries #UUMZA5 C A P I T A L I S M M A K E S M E S I C K Matching excerpt #LVLS9T: It was not until the very late 1800s, with the invention of the sewing machine, that mass-produced ready-to-wear became widely available. Clothing was frequently "made over" to reflect changing styles and fashions. Moreover, only the well-to-do wore new clothing. Until the turn of the twentieth century it was the healthy trade in secondhand clothing that allowed servants, clerks, and others of lower social strata to purchase items that were well made and relatively stylish. 42 The rise in inexpensive, mass-produced clothing made new clothes available to nearly everyone, although ironically the quality of these clothes was arguably poorer than that of the secondhand goods purchased previously. It was not until the late 1800s, then, that purchasing secondhand clothes became stigmatized, and it became de rigueur for everyone of every social class to possess new clothing. 7. Source: Patchworks of Care - ETHICS AND PRACTICE OF CARE IN THE ORGANIC FOOD MOVEMENT IN LATVIA (#ZC3PHV), Agnese Bankovska, p. 130 Context: #6L8925 Chapter 5 #HJFHR5 Local contexts of care through organic food #FHGM65 The great promise of certification Matching excerpt #7VC42Q: visiting and working on it for several years. Ieva and Jurģis, on the other hand, were 'transformed newcomers' as Jurģis' parents gardened in kolhozes in Soviet times as well as selling flowers and plants from their garden, one of the legally tolerated 'business' activities in Soviet Latvia, which secured its practitioners some economic capital. Ieva came from a non-farming family and was educated in philosophy. Approximate matches 1. Source: Gift or commodity: what changes hands in the U.S. garage sale? (#4UEQN8), Gretchen M. Herrmann, p. 9 Context: #QF9LBR gift or commodity: what changes hands in the U.S. garage sale? #HFLAJ6 possessions and the spirit of the gift Score: 0.46 Related excerpt #7P8QKH: for secondhand goods such as rummage sales or flea markets precisely because, in the former, they encounter the original owners of what they have bought and so can claim to be taking away something of the previous owners with their purchases. 2. Source: Incidental sustainability? Notes from a thrift store in Germany (#4Y4DVC), Petra Kuppinger, p. 13 Context: #AYGQVA Incidental sustainability? Notes from a thrift store in Germany #MP3WA2 The thrift store Score: 0.53 Related excerpt #3DFK3B: One group of customers, the administration's least favorite, are traders who often arrive at opening time (administrator: 'I know many of them') and are always on the look-out for brand-name clothes and items that are worth more on the commercial second-hand market than the standard Fairkauf prices; hence the store's attempt to identify higher value items and to price them accordingly (see Hermann and Soiffer 1984: 410). There are 'buyers' who scout for larger traders or vintage stores and make frequent rounds of charitable stores for these enterprises, and smaller traders who resell items individually (mostly clothes) on eBay, other resale platforms, or flea markets. They reinsert things from this non-capitalist site into the capitalist market. They 'abuse' the labor of Fairkauf, which irks the store's administrators. 3. Source: Blurring the boundaries: Prosumption, circularity and online sustainable consumption through Freecycle (#59QUM6), Sally Eden, p. 16 Context: #5V87AY Blurring the boundaries: Prosumption, circularity and online sustainable consumption through Freecycle #R4FPWC Implosion 3: Mainstream/alternative and the sustainability and ethics of divestment Score: 0.482 Related excerpt #VLN3BZ: Re-selling by charitable causes is another exception that is permitted on Freecycle, for example, '[Named] School PTA are holding a Jumble Sale this coming Saturday... and would love any of the following items to sell: Adult and children's clothing Books Toys and Games DVD's Bric-a-Brac'. By implication, people could have already considered or actively tried divesting their items through these marketed channels but only as a last resort turned to Freecycle, when items proved unworthy of re-selling: 4. Source: Second-Hand Cultures and Economies of Reuse, Repair, Sharing, and Care (#B5KMLA), Petra Kuppinger, p. 22 Context: #BTPYSB Second-Hand Cultures and Economies of Reuse, Repair, Sharing, and Care #2LDVPH Introduction: Second-Hand Cultures and Economies of Reuse, Repair, Sharing, and Care #UHERVL RECENT ECONOMIES OF REUSE, REPAIR, SHARING, AND CARE IN THE GLOBAL NORTH Score: 0.487 Related excerpt #USRY9W: The sourcing of used goods is an increasingly competitive process where savvy traders comb markets for hidden gems and make sizeable profits which creates “complex, but highly localized and seemingly infinite chains of second-hand commodity circulation and re-use” (Gregson and Crewe 2003, 131). Traders seek “to buy (from the ‘unknowing’) to sell (to the ‘knowing’) in ways that are clearly about capturing competitive advantage and profit” (ibid.). In the process, valuable objects are removed from disadvantaged, often rural, communities to profitable urban markets (Isenhour and Berry, 2020). Second-hand markets become complex circuits that require considerable “commodity and geographical knowledge about disposal and sourcing” (Gregson and Crewe 2003, 141) and reflect dominant capitalist market dynamics and patterns of exploitation and exclusion. 5. Source: Second-Hand Cultures and Economies of Reuse, Repair, Sharing, and Care (#B5KMLA), Petra Kuppinger, p. 21 Context: #BTPYSB Second-Hand Cultures and Economies of Reuse, Repair, Sharing, and Care #2LDVPH Introduction: Second-Hand Cultures and Economies of Reuse, Repair, Sharing, and Care #UHERVL RECENT ECONOMIES OF REUSE, REPAIR, SHARING, AND CARE IN THE GLOBAL NORTH Score: 0.479 Related excerpt #F4ESJG: Second-hand markets offer goods at cheaper rates but also reflect, “the very same motivations that shape consumer culture more generally” (Gregson and Crewe 2003, 11). They also harbor “potential for consumer activism and empowerment” ( ibid. ) as participants play an “active role” (Machado et al. 2019, 319) and subvert dominant consumption patterns, when they prolong the lifespan of goods and avoid buying new things. Second-hand markets and related projects further “offer the potential to better educate individuals in the value of sustainability” and trigger “deeper engagement” with such issues (Murphy 2017, 170; Schmid 2019, 238). Gregson and Crewe point to the “birth of value” (2003, 2) in second-hand exchanges that departs from dominant economic practices, when “people create the conditions for value to emerge in the context of transactions” ( ibid. ). Sellers and buyers are agents and producers of value rather than passive consumers. They produce “commodity biographies” ( ibid. , 6; Appadurai 1986) and infuse meaning into moments and spaces of exchange. Selling and buying second-hand goods involves more time and labor than mainstream transactions, as sellers might repair items and customers search markets for desired goods. 6. Source: Second-Hand Cultures and Economies of Reuse, Repair, Sharing, and Care (#B5KMLA), Petra Kuppinger, p. 21 Context: #BTPYSB Second-Hand Cultures and Economies of Reuse, Repair, Sharing, and Care #2LDVPH Introduction: Second-Hand Cultures and Economies of Reuse, Repair, Sharing, and Care #UHERVL RECENT ECONOMIES OF REUSE, REPAIR, SHARING, AND CARE IN THE GLOBAL NORTH Score: 0.46 Related excerpt #PMD3FL: Gregson and Crewe (2003) analyze the rapid proliferation of charity shops (charitable thrift stores) and other sites of second-hand exchanges (car-boot sales; auctions, retro/vintage shops, antique fairs, classifieds) in the UK since the 1970s. Some car-boot sales developed into fun fairs with food and bouncy houses as affordable family entertainment ( ibid. , 32). Urban charity shops professionalized and now line shopping miles, marking their arrival in the middle of society. Retro/vintage shops dot gentrifying and cool quarters ( ibid. , 39), indicating complex links of first and second-hand circuits and the commodification of useful/fashionable discards ( ibid. , 62; Isenhour and Berry 2020, 305). Here second-hand shopping becomes a sign of distinction and confers cultural capital/recognition to shoppers (Steward 2020). Gregson and Crewe understand much of the second-hand economy as sites of resistance and mindful and affordable consumption (1998, 40), but in the context of some retro/vintage shops, they point to limits. Such stores “produce second-hand worlds that are continually articulated with and understood in relation to spaces 7. Source: Online Clothing Resale: A Practice Theory Approach to Evaluate Sustainable Consumption Gains (#D8EAVV), Cosette M. Joyner Armstrong, Hyejune Park, p. 1 Context: #9FFH5V Online Clothing Resale: A Practice Theory Approach to Evaluate Sustainable Consumption Gains #RXYF6H INTRODUCTION Score: 0.465 Related excerpt #6HG5UA: current collaborative clothing consumption platforms conjure skepticism about the capacity to meaningfully advance consumer behavior toward sustainable ends, as platforms are seemingly positioned similarly to fast fashion [3]. Park and Joyner Armstrong [4] propose two primary categories of online collaborative consumption in the clothing industry; those that provide only utility, without ownership (e.g., renting) [5], and the redistribution of second-hand goods [1]. This study focuses on the latter: the procurement of still-valuable second-hand clothing and the redistribution of under-utilized garments to new owners via online clothing resale (OCR) platforms (While some OCR platforms may carry goods that are “like new” and still tagged, which might not have been worn, they are not the same as “new”, since they have been owned previously. The term “second-hand” in this study follows its dictionary meaning: not new and has been owned by someone else). 8. Source: Growing in Motion: The Circulation of Used Things on Second-hand Markets (#MBXQXR), Anna Bohlin, Staffan Appelgren, p. 6 Context: #3U9XEW Growing in Motion: The Circulation of Used Things on Second-hand Markets1 #MP4B8Q Keeping Things Moving Score: 0.486 Related excerpt #35GMFW: From having been associated with poverty and low status, the trade with second-hand goods, as distinct from authorised and institutionalised market for antiques, has recently undergone fundamental changes around the world (Norris 2010, 2012; Franklin 2011; Fredriksson 2013). In the Global North, objects are increasingly marketed and consumed as 'things with a past' in the expanding sector of retro shops, flea markets and upmarket vintage boutiques. The rapid growth of information technology has enabled Internet-based trade and auction sites, as well as instant formation of groups, networks and communities through various forms of social media, creating 'a boundless marketplace for connecting pre-owned or secondary goods from where they are not wanted to somewhere or someone where they are' (Botsman & Rogers 2010: 27). 10 Such technological infrastructure has created an increasing number of surfaces between people and things, and have facilitated and sped up the setting in motion of objects through different contexts and constellations. In addition, a growing range of other, more traditional spaces 9. Source: Growing in Motion: The Circulation of Used Things on Second-hand Markets (#MBXQXR), Anna Bohlin, Staffan Appelgren, p. 10 Context: #3U9XEW Growing in Motion: The Circulation of Used Things on Second-hand Markets1 #63E22Y The Narrative Sociality of Second-hand Practices Score: 0.473 Related excerpt #EDY9JV: We also noticed how within the Swedish context, many retailers foreground the qualities and properties of used and second-hand things described above as part of marketing and sale strategies. Previous literature has focused on how certain categories of retailers have emulated the commerce of mainstream shops by mystifying or downplaying the fact that much of what is for sale is the rejected and discarded stuff from other people or institutions. Typically, in such shops, a few contemporary-looking items are on display in the shop windows, while traces and reminders of previous owners and phases of use are carefully hidden or removed (Crewe, Gregson & Brooks 2003; Gregson & Crewe 2003:77, Straw 2010: 199). However, rather than downplaying the circuits and trajectories of the things for sale second hand, certain Swedish traders and retailers, from private entrepreneurs to non-profit organisations, draw attention to precisely the 'second-handedness' of the objects – where they come from, whom previous owners might have been, where they might end up in the future. 10. Source: Growing in Motion: The Circulation of Used Things on Second-hand Markets (#MBXQXR), Anna Bohlin, Staffan Appelgren, p. 2 Context: #3U9XEW Growing in Motion: The Circulation of Used Things on Second-hand Markets1 #TY8WTD Introduction Score: 0.469 Related excerpt #DD27MQ: ‘Second-hand’ is here used as a broad label loosely referring to all kinds of used objects exchanged within commercial contexts. This group of objects can be divided into subcategories, in terms of functionality, time period or aesthetics, for example vintage (Cassidy & Bennet 2012; Fischer this issue), retro (Jenss 2004; Reynolds 2011; Baker 2013) and kitsch (Binkley 2000), each requiring their own theoretical and analytical approaches (see McRobbie 1988; cf. Handberg, this issue, for a discussion of both retro and kitsch in the context of Montreal). Similarly, the contexts and venues for commercial exchange of such objects, and the ways that they are reused, recycled and upcycled also constitute several distinct fields of research (see Gregson & Crewe 2003 for an overview). For the purpose of the argument presented here, however, they are treated as instances of the circulation of material culture that raises a set of common questions, explored below. ### 5. Tool result: search_text Exact matches 1. Source: Elusive Consumption (#2EDLQU), Helene Brembeck, Karin M. Ekström, p. 31 Context: #2YF5Q4 Part I Grasping the Topic #RKYURH Morals and Metaphors: The Meaning of Consumption #95723B Why Worry Matching excerpt #KSU5SJ: least of which is the general attitude in most western societies that the end products of consumption should be removed from sight by invisible means, and disposed of by specialists. Thus, the entire sector of the economy that deals with objects after someone has discarded or rejected them is symbolically separated from the parts of the economy that deal with 'virgin' materials. The activities of 'waste management' take place largely out of public sight, except when there is some danger of 'overflow' or 'leakage'. It makes great metaphorical sense that the United States Government is pursuing a long-term policy of dumping its most dangerous radioactive waste into deep holes in the ground, even if most scientific panels have questioned both the urgency and the logic of the process. 2. Source: Household Recycling and Consumption Work (#4LST57), Kathryn Wheeler, Miriam Glucksmann, p. 180 Context: #RKL76Z Living Off Tips: Waste and Recycling in Brazil and India #Q45AD2 Brazil1 Matching excerpt #266832: Waste management has become a pressing issue in Brazil, as urban population expansion over recent decades placed increasing pressure on the pre-existing infrastructures for disposal. In addition, rising standards of living for a minority and changes in consumption have resulted in an increasing volume of solid waste which outstripped population growth in the 10 years to 2013 (Consonni, 2013). Household waste collection and disposal is a statutory municipal responsibility and is carried out for 95 percent of the population (PNSB, 2008) But collection is rare in favelas , Brazil's shantytowns, due to illegal settlement, lack of provision and the logistical difficulty of collection where there are no roads, resulting in widespread dumping of household waste and fly-tipping along roadsides and riverbanks. 2 3. Source: Household Recycling and Consumption Work (#4LST57), Kathryn Wheeler, Miriam Glucksmann, p. 192 Context: #RKL76Z Living Off Tips: Waste and Recycling in Brazil and India #R2LNJU Narratives of waste disposal #3TYMM7 Amit: Siliguri and Delhi Matching excerpt #2GR4JH: In 2005, I came to Delhi and stayed with my cousins in an unauthorised colony (which is not planned, and thus according to government rules not authorised), with mostly lower-middle-class inhabitants. Everyone there threw their household waste in a nearby open drain which was almost completely blocked up with rubbish. There was no segregation of waste and almost every kind of waste was dumped in the drain. There are around 22 big open drains in Delhi and most are used as for dumping. In the slums and jhuggi jhopdi (unauthorised) clusters you will find waste everywhere. No arrangements are made by municipal authorities, and waste disposal is 'managed' by the slum dwellers themselves. 4. Source: Household Recycling and Consumption Work (#4LST57), Kathryn Wheeler, Miriam Glucksmann, p. 193 Context: #RKL76Z Living Off Tips: Waste and Recycling in Brazil and India #R2LNJU Narratives of waste disposal #DL4H8Z Tara: Pune Matching excerpt #A8XNRB: These accounts highlight many distinctive characteristics of waste disposal in India. To start with, it is clear that the formal municipal collection and disposal of domestic waste does not extend to recycling. So these two comprise separate streams, organised independently of each other and on a completely different basis. Until very recently there has been minimal interaction or overlap between the two. Moreover, formal collection is highly restricted in terms of coverage: there is no provision for people living in so-called 'unauthorised' housing settlements, in the slums or on the streets in the expanding mega-cities or in rural areas and smaller towns. In other words, there is no provision of waste collection for very large sections of the population, including both the urban and rural poor, who end up dumping it either on open ground or in drains and rivers. Even amongst the better-off, many urban residents continue to pay for their waste to be collected either by private companies, as in the case of Rie's parents, or by hiring someone 5. Source: Household Recycling and Consumption Work (#4LST57), Kathryn Wheeler, Miriam Glucksmann, p. 203 Context: #RKL76Z Living Off Tips: Waste and Recycling in Brazil and India #N2VHT2 Consumers and socio-economic formations of recycling labour in India Matching excerpt #SJFTMQ: Recycling in India does not rely on the work of consumers. Although middle-class or wealthier households supply feedstock, this has traditionally been the limit of consumers' contribution to recycling. In the absence of regulations about waste disposal, household practices vary considerably: some just dumping everything, while others sort and sell recyclables, often to particular collectors with whom they have an established relationship. If domestic servants take charge of their employers' 6. Source: The Ethics of Waste: How We Relate to Rubbish (#83R4U2), Gay Hawkins, p. 3 Context: #Y4M56L Contents #X7G59W Preface Matching excerpt #XRZMTV: Commodity cultures show how waste as a practice of excess can be free of negative connotations. The invitation to shop, shop, shop suppresses any mention of waste. The desire to possess and accumulate things is completely disconnected from the issue of how commodities are produced and where they end up once we decide they're valueless. Constant consumption is framed as an expression of personal freedom and choice. But the other side of it is the freedom to waste, to discard things that are still perfectly useful. 7. Source: From the Cult of Waste to the Trash Heap of History: The Politics of Waste in Socialist and Postsocialist Hungary (#BJ6B3C), Zsuzsa Gille, p. 154 Context: #94RWTV Contents #89XYDR REFORM AND REDUCE (1975-1984) Matching excerpt #JXGDXW: In the efficiency waste regime that became dominant in Hungary in the mid-seventies, the social relations of waste production from the metallic waste regime persisted. The representation and the politics of waste, however, were radically transformed. Wastes now were not slated to be collected and reused under any conditions, but rather were primarily to be reduced, because in this way production costs could be decreased. Instead of conceptualizing waste as use value, the efficiency model took a pragmatic approach: it subordinated the reuse or recycling of waste to cost-benefit analysis. This, and the concomitant professionalization of waste issues, legitimated waste dumping, a taboo in the fifties and sixties. But the metallic waste model, even though now a residual representation, still obstructed permanent waste disposal and promoted the establishment of temporary sites. While the establishment of these temporary disposal sites was now based on scientific considerations, this in itself was not a guarantee either for public control over siting or for environmentally safe operation of the sites. As the state of the economy worsened, the hopes to ever reuse the thus-stored wastes melted away, and the temporary dumps metamorphosed into long-term wastelands and environmental disaster areas. 8. Source: From the Cult of Waste to the Trash Heap of History: The Politics of Waste in Socialist and Postsocialist Hungary (#BJ6B3C), Zsuzsa Gille, p. 144 Context: #94RWTV Contents #A2HM2M Six The Limits of Efficiency #732BM5 Dumping as the Consequence of the Efficiency Model Matching excerpt #Z6CD2S: Let us see how monetization and professionalization affected the solution BCW found for its long-standing waste problem. As more and more companies found themselves in need of a legitimate dump site, and as the new reform attitude indirectly legitimated disposal, BCW's chances for finding a site increased. By this time, some stories were reported on in the media as well, and they brought the necessity of safe dumping into the forefront. The case of one slaughterhouse is indeed indicative of a situation in which central authorities were already becoming sufficiently sensitive to the environmental and public health consequences of illegal waste dumping to stop the practice, but in which the technological conditions to deal with these wastes were still lacking. 9. Source: From the Cult of Waste to the Trash Heap of History: The Politics of Waste in Socialist and Postsocialist Hungary (#BJ6B3C), Zsuzsa Gille, p. 21 Context: #94RWTV Contents #SGJPFZ one Was State Socialism Wasteful? #KQVDED The Case Study Matching excerpt #L2QUJD: I will identify three waste regimes in Hungary during the years between the advent of socialism in 1948 and 2004, the year when the country definitively became capitalist by joining its former political nemesis, the European Union. The metallic waste regime prevailed from 1948 to 1974, and its key characteristic was an identification of waste with metal scrap, leading to a cult of waste that hailed all garbage and by-products as “free” materials to be mobilized for the fulfillment of the plan. It is in this period that the state implemented a vast infrastructure that registered, collected, redistributed, and reused both production and consumer wastes. From the second half of the seventies, waste was primarily seen as inefficiency; policy attention shifted from reuse to reduction; and waste dumping started to be legalized. Finally, by 1985, the regime fully in operation was the chemical waste regime, which treated by-products as inherently useless and toxic and thus as something to be disposed of or incinerated. From 1989, through a curious synergy between the chemical waste regime and marketization, the waste recycling infrastructure was demolished, effecting the first appearance in Hungary of a throwaway culture. The narrative here is rather that of a loss or regression rather than that of a teleological progression toward freedom and affluence. Approximate matches 1. Source: Household Recycling and Consumption Work (#4LST57), Kathryn Wheeler, Miriam Glucksmann, p. 182 Context: #RKL76Z Living Off Tips: Waste and Recycling in Brazil and India #26YLBU Waste and recycling: Provision and policy Score: 0.554 Related excerpt #RT6SAN: dumps ( Vazadouro or Lixão de céu aberto ), 3 although these are now widely recognised, particularly in the South and Southeast, as inadequate and unsanitary (PNSB, 2008). Brazil has had some of the largest uncontrolled open-air dumps in the world including the now closed Jardim Gramacho in Rio de Janeiro, documented in the film Wasteland (2010, directed by Lucy Walker). The land in these dumps is not treated before use, and disintegration of the organic and inorganic waste creates a liquid leachate (slurry) which penetrates and contaminates the earth and groundwater. The waste attracts insects and rats, creating high risk of contamination for those who work unofficially on the dumps (Brookfield, 2013). Waste pickers not only collect solid waste in these areas, but poverty and hunger sometimes drive them also to eat food found in the dump (Millar, 2011, 2012). 2. Source: Household Recycling and Consumption Work (#4LST57), Kathryn Wheeler, Miriam Glucksmann, p. 193 Context: #RKL76Z Living Off Tips: Waste and Recycling in Brazil and India #R2LNJU Narratives of waste disposal #DL4H8Z Tara: Pune Score: 0.524 Related excerpt #7FH39S: waste, and the family's cleaner tipped all of it into a large circular bin in the road. It was normal to see waste pickers selecting anything out of it they could to salvage and sell on or reuse. Every few days the municipal authorities emptied the bin and dumped its contents onto a tip where further waste pickers also sifted through the contents for plastic, metal or other recyclable materials. After 2000 and new regulations prescribed by the national government and adopted by the Pune Municipal Corporation, these arrangements changed. A new requirement was introduced for households to separate waste into two streams. They were now asked to deposit dry and wet waste in two separate bins of their own (rather than the public bin) and these are collected daily. The wet waste probably goes for composting, while the dry is sent to landfill where it is still further picked over. 3. Source: Household Recycling and Consumption Work (#4LST57), Kathryn Wheeler, Miriam Glucksmann, p. 180 Context: #RKL76Z Living Off Tips: Waste and Recycling in Brazil and India #Q45AD2 Brazil1 Score: 0.507 Related excerpt #266832: Waste management has become a pressing issue in Brazil, as urban population expansion over recent decades placed increasing pressure on the pre-existing infrastructures for disposal. In addition, rising standards of living for a minority and changes in consumption have resulted in an increasing volume of solid waste which outstripped population growth in the 10 years to 2013 (Consonni, 2013). Household waste collection and disposal is a statutory municipal responsibility and is carried out for 95 percent of the population (PNSB, 2008) But collection is rare in favelas , Brazil's shantytowns, due to illegal settlement, lack of provision and the logistical difficulty of collection where there are no roads, resulting in widespread dumping of household waste and fly-tipping along roadsides and riverbanks. 2 4. Source: From the Cult of Waste to the Trash Heap of History: The Politics of Waste in Socialist and Postsocialist Hungary (#BJ6B3C), Zsuzsa Gille, p. 111 Context: #94RWTV Contents #EDGY2Q fourThe Primitive Accumulation of Waste in Metallic Socialism #J3NGW8 The Imperative of Waste Reuse Score: 0.54 Related excerpt #HSKU7M: The Budapest Chemical Works must not have been alone in seeing its reuse hopes fail and in having its requests for facilitating safe dumping turned down by state authorities. By the sixties, unreusable wastes were piling up on factory premises across the country in such quantities that enterprises were being forced to find illegal ways to get rid of them. Local government officials now started complaining about illegal dumps appearing, both next to dumps managed by councils (local governments) and on territories of closed dumps that had been declared full and were being recultivated. In 1961, a talk given at a conference on the problems of waste treatment in the capital claimed that “the trustworthy deposit of various industrial wastes is unsolved in our country” and complained that the practice of illegal dumping 5. Source: From the Cult of Waste to the Trash Heap of History: The Politics of Waste in Socialist and Postsocialist Hungary (#BJ6B3C), Zsuzsa Gille, p. 81 Context: #94RWTV Contents #9DK6VJ three Metallic Socialism #2NY97J The Politicization of Waste: Disciplining Cooperatives and Private Shops Score: 0.53 Related excerpt #P3VFJ7: the overflowing supplies of particular waste materials, but was looked at with suspicion when it competed with the state enterprises for wastes in high demand. 6. Source: From the Cult of Waste to the Trash Heap of History: The Politics of Waste in Socialist and Postsocialist Hungary (#BJ6B3C), Zsuzsa Gille, p. 34 Context: #94RWTV Contents #F7CFTW two Toward a Social Theory of Waste #HR3WZZ Waste Has an Immanent Spatiality Score: 0.526 Related excerpt #9PCHV7: dump, the recycling center, or the incinerator. A more final (though, from a longue-durée perspective, only transitional) destination is of course our air, soil, and water. 7. Source: From the Cult of Waste to the Trash Heap of History: The Politics of Waste in Socialist and Postsocialist Hungary (#BJ6B3C), Zsuzsa Gille, p. 34 Context: #94RWTV Contents #F7CFTW two Toward a Social Theory of Waste #HR3WZZ Waste Has an Immanent Spatiality Score: 0.526 Related excerpt #DT29R4: For this reason, places for waste are usually marginal spaces—marginal to whatever mainstream activity is taking place in a particular location. In the United States, for example, trash bins are left on the curb for pickup; dumpsters are placed at the back of a restaurant; and dumps, recycling centers, and incinerators are located on the outskirts of town. But just how separated or shunned waste is spatially has much to do with the dominant cultural evaluation of waste. So far, I have only mentioned cases in which waste is identified as the negative side of certain paired opposites. That certainly tends to be the case in market economies in the West. Socialist economies, on the contrary, saw waste as a benevolent deus ex machina , “a gift of nature” to be used in fulfilling quotas in their efforts to establish communism. For them, scrap and by-products were fertile and useful materials, and the state saw one its key economic tasks as registering, collecting, redistributing, and organizing the reuse and recycling of wastes (Gille 1997). From news accounts and a few scholarly studies we know that this positive valuation also dominates among poor countries. In such cases, 8. Source: From the Cult of Waste to the Trash Heap of History: The Politics of Waste in Socialist and Postsocialist Hungary (#BJ6B3C), Zsuzsa Gille, p. 19 Context: #94RWTV Contents #SGJPFZ one Was State Socialism Wasteful? #KQVDED The Case Study Score: 0.523 Related excerpt #RPQTWP: While in the United States, and in most Western countries, waste production was off-limits to public scrutiny, and the generated wastes were only arrested once outside of production, in Hungary, and in other state socialist countries, waste disposal was the taboo item. 9. Source: From the Cult of Waste to the Trash Heap of History: The Politics of Waste in Socialist and Postsocialist Hungary (#BJ6B3C), Zsuzsa Gille, p. 141 Context: #94RWTV Contents #A2HM2M Six The Limits of Efficiency #732BM5 Dumping as the Consequence of the Efficiency Model Score: 0.518 Related excerpt #G942AL: The professionalization of waste issues and the monetization of the concept of waste had further unintended consequences. As the waste that BCW could neither decrease nor reuse was piling up, a professional approach to the problem emerged to supplant the officially prioritized one. Its solution was dumping. 10. Source: From the Cult of Waste to the Trash Heap of History: The Politics of Waste in Socialist and Postsocialist Hungary (#BJ6B3C), Zsuzsa Gille, p. 151 Context: #94RWTV Contents #A2HM2M Six The Limits of Efficiency #JN2FCB The Effect of Professionalization on Waste Distribution #GB7EFT The Limitations of Dumping Score: 0.514 Related excerpt #LFFXVH: wastes, and even the definition of hazardous wastes, was unregulated. The absence of coherent regulation allowed the investors, builders, and officials to water down the original technical prescriptions for the dump's design and operation. As a result, the dump had a lot of problems from the beginning, such as missing structural and infrastructural features and the absence of fences and constant supervision, creating a public health hazard. ### 6. Assistant Yes — there's a productive cluster of literature on exactly this kind of boundary work. Here are the strongest hooks for each of your three distinctions: **The general "paradox of openness and distinction"** Fitzmaurice et al. on sharing-economy sites is almost tailor-made for this paragraph: open-access, free-to-join exchanges nonetheless work through constant distinguishing practices that police circuit boundaries (#359DVE, #SJKVSD). Their food swap case even has a moment where regulars dismiss a charity cookie exchange — "I know it's for charity, but they clearly don't understand what a swap means for us" (#G25GLQ) — which mirrors brīvbode's "we are not a charity!" almost word for word. **Distinguishing from charity (while still serving people in need)** - Herrmann on the U.S. garage sale: "It's not charity, it's just giving" (#A4WF9P) — argues the gift/sale ambiguity is precisely what lets people avoid the status hierarchy charity imposes. Could be an excellent direct counterpart for brīvbode workers' refusal of the charity label. - Parry on Mauss and the "pure gift" (#PYCUTN, #5D2KT3): charity is mistrusted because it creates "asymmetrical dependence" instead of reciprocal interdependence — useful for theorizing *why* brīvbode resists the label, not just that it does. **Distinguishing from resale (while tolerating resellers)** - Kuppinger's German thrift store ethnography is the closest empirical parallel: traders/resellers are "the administration's least favorite" customers who "abuse the labor of Fairkauf" by reinserting non-capitalist goods into the capitalist market (#3DFK3B). - Eden on Freecycle (#VLN3BZ) describes how reselling is policed except when the reseller is a charitable cause — another version of the exception-making you're describing. - Kuppinger's intro chapter on second-hand cultures more broadly (#USRY9W) frames savvy traders as part of "complex circuits" that "reflect dominant capitalist market dynamics and patterns of exploitation" — useful if you want to position brīvbode against this. **Distinguishing from waste removal (while depending on heavy takers)** - Gille's *Cult of Waste* is your richest resource here. Her "waste regimes" framework (#L2QUJD) and her point that waste's spatial-cultural marginality depends on "dominant cultural evaluation" (#DT29R4) help theorize why brīvbode has to *actively* keep itself from sliding into "place where waste goes." - Hawkins on "the freedom to waste" (#XRZMTV) — useful for the flip side, why people *want* brīvbode to absorb their overflow. - The "overflow/leakage" passage in Brembeck & Ekström (#KSU5SJ) literally uses your word. **One synthesizing move** You could frame all three distinctions as instances of Fitzmaurice et al.'s paradox: brīvbode's egalitarian, open-access mission is sustained precisely *through* boundary work that excludes neighboring categories (charity, resale, dumping). That gives the paragraph one clean theoretical anchor instead of three scattered ones — and lets you keep the ethnographic richness of the exceptions (the heavy takers, the tolerated resellers, the people who do need free access).