TALES OF THE UNEXPECTED - EXPLORING CAR BOOT SALES AS MARGINAL SPACESOF CONTEMPORARY CONSUMPTION

Marginal and/or resistant consumption practices have been neglected in current geographical debates on consumption and retailing. This has r esulted in partial and skewed theorizations of exchange within contemp orary consumption. Consumption spaces such as car boot sales represent sites in which the conventions of the marketplace are suspended or ab andoned, and replaced by forms of sourcing, commodity circulation, tra nsaction codes, pricing mechanisms and value quite different from thos e which typify more conventional retail malls and department stores. D rawing on the anthropological literature on traditional and peasant ma rkets, we argue that exchange within the car boot sale is socially, cu lturally and geographically embedded and we emphasize the intrinsic im portance of fun and sociality to such activities. Marginal spaces such as the car boot sale offer both some important clues into the potenti al for rethinking marketplace dynamics, notably with respect to our un derstandings of value, and some intriguing possibilities for consumer politics.