{"id":643,"date":"2024-02-28T12:51:19","date_gmt":"2024-02-28T12:51:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/elizabeth-shove\/?page_id=643"},"modified":"2026-07-02T10:09:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T10:09:10","slug":"social-practice-theory-and-public-health-microbes-bodies-and-environments","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/elizabeth-shove\/projects\/social-practice-theory-and-public-health-microbes-bodies-and-environments\/","title":{"rendered":"Social practice theory and public health: microbes, bodies and environments"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reading rooms – open to all.\u00a0 Online. <\/strong><\/p>\n

The format is that everyone who wants to come registers with Cecily Maller (c.maller@rmit.ac.uk) and reads the chosen chapters in advance.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We have three reading rooms scheduled, focusing on Eviatar Zerubavel’s <\/strong>classic book, 1979, Patterns of Time in Hospital Life<\/strong>, University of Chicago Press. Available on the Internet Archive.<\/p>\n

17th September 2026, 9 am. Introduction and part 1.<\/p>\n

15th October 2026, 9am. Parts 2 and 3.<\/p>\n

16th November 2026, 9am. Parts 4 and 5.<\/p>\n

\n

Previous events<\/p>\n

We have worked through chapters of the book, Practice Theory and the Biosocial: Matter, Microbes and Milieu<\/a>, by Elizabeth Shove, Stan Blue and Mike Kelly, available from Berghahn.<\/p>\n

2nd July 2026, Part 3: introduction, chapter 5 and conclusion.
\n4th June 2026, Part 2: introduction, chapter 4 and chapter 3.
\n7th May 2026, Part 3: introduction, chapter 1 and chapter 2.<\/p>\n

Cecily Maller,<\/strong> RMIT, 9am. 31st March 2026, , ‘Microbes and social practices: material, performer, friend or foe?’<\/p>\n

Stanley Blue<\/strong>, Lancaster, 9am. 3rd March 2026,\u00a0 ‘Practice theory and the biosocial body’.<\/p>\n

Simon Cohn,<\/strong> LSHTM, 9am. 3rd February 2026, ‘Microbes at large in the hospital: challenging concepts of care, contact and contamination’<\/p>\n

Mike Kelly<\/strong>, University of Cambridge, 9.00 am UK time, 6th<\/sup>\u00a0November 2025.\u00a0 Epidemiology, Individualism and the Virus: A critical analysis of policy responses to COVID 19 in the UK.
\nRachel Wakefield Rann,<\/strong> University of Technology, Sydney. 9.00 am UK time, 11th<\/sup> December 2025 (reading to be decided, but likely to be a chapter, possibly the introduction, from Rachel’s new book, Life Indoors).
\nKarl Broome,<\/strong> Universitat Pomepu Fabra, Spain, 9.00 am UK time, 8th<\/sup>\u00a0January 2026, Practices, Spaces, and Species: Rethinking Human-Mosquito Interactions and Disease Transmission<\/p>\n

Conference
\nElizabeth Shove (Lancaster), Cecily Maller (RMIT), and Simon Cohn (LSHTM) organised a two day conference on this topic with support from the British Academy and Wellcome, held at Mary Ward House, in London on 11th and 12th June 2025.<\/p>\n

These pictures<\/a> show the line up of participants organised by birthday, the washing lines of ideas, and more informal chattering in the garden.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Audio recordings of most of the talks can be found here.<\/p>\n

Elizabeth Shove<\/a>
\nCecily Maller<\/a>
\nBeth Greenhough<\/a>
\nPaula Palanco Lopez<\/a>
\nStephen Hinchliffe<\/a>
\nMick Worboys<\/a>
\nKarl Broome<\/a>
\nMikko Jauho<\/a>
\nSimon Cohn<\/a>
\nMaurizio Meloni<\/a>
\nJamie Lorimer<\/a>
\nStanley Blue (apologies, this recording is not available)
\nAaron Bradshaw (apologies, this recording is not available but you can read the text of the talk<\/a> here)<\/p>\n

In preparation for an edited book related to this conference we organised a series of recorded conversations and online seminars.<\/p>\n

Recorded conversations
\n<\/strong>Stephen Hinchliffe<\/a>, a geographer from Exeter, on disease situations and more than human relations – in conversation with Simon Cohn and Elizabeth Shove<\/p>\n

Matthew Gandy<\/a>, a geographer from Cambridge, on urban infrastructure and disease – in conversation with Karl Broome and Elizabeth Shove<\/p>\n

Online seminars
\n<\/strong>The seminars focus on abstracts submitted for the book, using these as a springboard for further discussion of the ideas raised, and of points of difference and simiarity.\u00a0 By invitation only.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Practice theories and ideas about how diseases spread. 9 am. 19th February 2025. Elizabeth Shove and Karl Broome.<\/li>\n
  2. Practice theories and matters of microscopic materiality. 9am. 19th March 2025.
    \nMikko Jauho, Jamie Lorimer, George Cusworth, Beth Greenhough and Cecily Maller.<\/li>\n
  3. Practice theories, bodies and histories of ideas. 9am. 14th May 2025
    \nStan Blue, Simon Cohn and Maurizio Meloni.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Previous events in which invited participants and contributors have discussed papers that deal with related issues included:<\/p>\n

    27th March 2024, 9am. Catherine Will<\/strong>, (2016) On difference and doubt as tools for critical engagement with public health. Critical Public Health, 27 (3). pp. 293-302.
    \n24th April 2024, 9am. Steve Hinchliffe<\/strong> (2022) Postcolonial Global Health, Post-Colony Microbes and Antimicrobial Resistance,Theory, culture & society 2022 Vol. 39 Issue 3 Pages 145-168
    \n29th May 2024, 9am. Beth Greenhough et al.<\/strong>(2018) Unsettling antibiosis: how might interdisciplinary researchers generate a feeling for the microbiome and to what effect?Palgrave communications\u00a0 Vol. 4 Issue 1 Pages 149.
    \n26 June 2024, 9am. Jamie Lorimer<\/strong>, (2016) Gut Buddies: Multispecies Studies and the Microbiome, Environmental Humanities Vol. 8 Issue 1 Pages 57-76
    \n24th July 2024, 9am. Cecily Maller and Maurizio Meloni<\/strong> (2024) Revitalizing Air: More-than-Human Relations in Urban Health Beyond the Modern-Premodern Binary, GeoHumanities.
    \n25th September 2024, 9am. Elizabeth Shove, Stan Blue and Mike Kelly<\/strong>, (2024), Categorising and cohabiting: practices as the site of biosocial becoming, Social Theory & Health<\/p>\n

    23rd October 2024,<\/strong> 9am. Introduction to The Nexus of Practices:<\/strong> Connections, Constellations, Practitioners, edited by Allison Hui, Ted Schatzki and Elizabeth Shove.\u00a0 2017. Routldege.<\/p>\n

    20th November 2024<\/strong>, 9am. Ted Schatzki, ‘Keeping Track of Large Phenomena’ 2016, Geographische Zeitschrift\u00a0 Vol. 104 Issue 1 Pages 4-24, https:\/\/www.ingentaconnect.com\/content\/fsv\/gz\/2016\/00000104\/00000001\/art00002<\/p>\n

    11th December 2024<\/strong>, 9am. Stanley Blue and Nicola Spurling, 2017, ‘Qualities of connective tissue in hospital life: how complexes of practices change’ in The Nexus of Practices, edited by A. Hui, T. Schatzki and E. Shove<\/p>\n

    A starter pack of a few other readings relating to practice theory<\/strong><\/p>\n

    Blue, S., E. Shove, C. Carmona and M. P. Kelly (2014). “Theories of practice and public health: understanding (un)healthy practices.” Critical Public Health: 1-15.<\/p>\n

    Gherardi, S. (2017). Sociomateriality in posthuman practice theory. The Nexus of Practices: Connections, Constellations, Practitioners. A. Hui, T. R. Schatzki and E. Shove. Abingdon, Oxon, Routledge: 38-67.<\/p>\n

    Hui, A., T. R. Schatzki and E. Shove (2017). Introduction to: The Nexus of Practices: Connections, Constellations, Practitioners. Abingdon, Oxon, Routledge.<\/p>\n

    Landecker, H. (2016). “Antibiotic Resistance and the Biology of History.”\u00a0Body & society 22(4): 19-52.<\/p>\n

    Maller, C. (2017). Epigenetics, theories of social practice and lifestyle disease. The nexus of practices: connections, constellations, practitioners. A. Hui, T. R. Schatzki and E. Shove. Abingdon, Oxon, Routledge: 68-80.<\/p>\n

    Reckwitz, A. (2002). “Toward a Theory of Social Practices: A Development in Culturalist Theorizing.” European Journal of Social Theory 5(2): 243-263.<\/p>\n

    Shove, E. and M. Pantzar (2005). “Consumers, producers and practices: understanding the invention and reinvention of Nordic walking.” Journal of Consumer Culture 5(1): 43-64.<\/p>\n

    Shove, E. (2010) ‘Beyond the ABC: climate change policy and theories of social change’ Environment and Planning A 2010 Vol. 42 Issue 6 Pages 1273-1285
    \nNot officially rooted in practice theory, but this is a strong critique of the focus on individual behaviour.\u00a0 <\/em>This article was responded to (negatively) by Lorraine Whitmarsh and colleagues. L. Whitmarsh, S. O’Neill and I. Lorenzoni, 2011, ‘Climate change or social change? Debate within, amongst, and beyond disciplines’ Environment and Planning A 2011 Vol. 43 Issue 2 Pages 258-261
    \nto which there is a response;
    \nShove, E. 2011, ‘On the difference between chalk and cheese?a response to Whitmarsh et al’s comments on “Beyond the ABC: climate change policy and theories of social change”‘ Environment and Planning A 2011 Vol. 43 Issue 2 Pages 262-264.<\/p>\n

    Warin, M., V. Moore, M. Davies and S. Ulijaszek (2016). “Epigenetics and Obesity: The Reproduction of Habitus through Intracellular and Social Environments.” Body & society 22(4): 53-78.<\/p>\n

    .. more suggestions welcome.<\/p>\n

    Grant reference: BAC25\\250108<\/p>\n

    \"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Reading rooms – open to all.\u00a0 Online. The format is that everyone who wants to come registers with Cecily Maller (c.maller@rmit.ac.uk) and reads the chosen chapters in advance.\u00a0\u00a0 We have three reading rooms scheduled, focusing on Eviatar Zerubavel’s classic book, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":133,"featured_media":648,"parent":6,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-643","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/elizabeth-shove\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/643","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/elizabeth-shove\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/elizabeth-shove\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/elizabeth-shove\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/133"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/elizabeth-shove\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=643"}],"version-history":[{"count":56,"href":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/elizabeth-shove\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/643\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":867,"href":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/elizabeth-shove\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/643\/revisions\/867"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/elizabeth-shove\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/6"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/elizabeth-shove\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/648"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.lancs.ac.uk\/elizabeth-shove\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}