Module GEOG3777: EVERYDAY ECONOMIES

Department: Geography

GEOG3777: EVERYDAY ECONOMIES

Prerequisites

• Any Level 2 Geography Module

Corequisites

• None

Excluded Combination of Modules

• None

Aims

• To encourage critical reflection on the relationship of consumption and consumers to contemporary economies
• To reflect on a range of concepts and theoretical approaches suitable to understanding economies through the everyday
• To develop a grounded understanding of everyday economies through field research

Content

• Work on economies, whilst increasingly heterodox, is still in a zone which has economies in a box, separate from other areas of cultural, social and political life. This is increasingly untenable on a number of levels. Economies increasingly depend on consumption acts to keep them going, witness recession, austerity. Without consumers buying things economies fail to hold together. At same time, the relation of consumption to economies has deepened – through the rise of virtual/digital economies and the emergence of the ‘prosumer’. Consumers don't just stabilise markets by purchasing manufactured goods; rather, they produce them, and are critical to production in certain areas, for example through the recovery of materials from waste via recycling, and in energy markets (e.g. through the take up of solar technologies). There is, therefore, a strong imperative to think hard about the role of consumers in marketisation. This is not just a matter of the prosumer. It is also important to consider how, with the rise of the digital economy and the increased uptake of digital devices, goods flow directly from distribution warehouses to consumers. Not only does this demonstrate the centrality of consumers to the reordering of economic life; it by-passes the infrastructure and investment that has characterised retail capital for generations (high streets, shopping centres, malls). The effects, combined with recession, are increasingly discernible in the retail landscape. Further, the rise of digital technologies has allowed consumers to produce markets from used consumer goods. eBay, Gumtree and p2p exchange sites are just some of the instances of such markets.
• This module will consider these transformations and examine their implications, conceptually, empirically and geographically, through a research project conducted by students and focused on the NE region. At its heart, the module asks, and hopefully answers, a set of research questions. To what extent are these changes genuinely transformative? Can consumers and households be thought of as an economic engine? To what extent do we need to start thinking in terms of everyday economies?

Learning Outcomes

• On successful completion of this module, students will be able to:
• Critically evaluate the relationship of consumption and consumers to contemporary economies
• Critically reflect on a range of concepts and theoretical approaches to understanding economies through the everyday

• On successful completion of this module, students will be able to:
• Evaluate and apply key concepts and approaches to contemporary problems and issues
• Demonstrate an understanding of how field research informs conceptual development

• On successful completion of this module, students will be able to:
• Demonstrate a variety of oral communication skills, including working effectively in a team, designing a collaborative research project and formal presentation in a conference setting using visual aids
• Demonstrate a capacity to reflect on the relationships between field research and argumentation based on literature
• Demonstrate an ability to synthesise information and to develop competences regarding argumentation in relation to contemporary issues and problems

Modes of Teaching, Learning and Assessment and how these contribute to the learning outcomes of the module

• Lecture content will introduce key trends, developments and concepts. Lectures will be ‘open format’ to encourage discussion, and will involve group activity
• Workshops dedicated to research project design and analysis
• A group research project, on an approved topic from a list generated by the module convenor, to be conducted in the North East region. This is supported by the workshops
• A class conference. This will report the findings from the research projects

Teaching Methods and Learning Hours

Summative Assessment

Formative Assessment:

Short research proposal; group project presentations

■ Attendance at all activities marked with this symbol will be monitored. Students who fail to attend these activities, or to complete the summative or formative assessment specified above, will be subject to the procedures defined in the University's General Regulation V, and may be required to leave the University