Rachel Bowlby has written several books about the history and theory of shopping, including Back to the Shops: The High Street in History and the Future. We had the chance to ask her some questions ahead of her appearance at the We Invented the Weekend Festival on Saturday 15 June.

Q: Historically, shopping has often been done in groups, with people participating in the activity with both friends and family. Today, internet shopping is an increasingly individual activity, with people browsing and purchasing alone. In this context, has the decline of the high street and the rise of internet shopping decelerated, or accelerated, consumer culture?

A: There are lots of questions here! To begin with, it could be said group shopping is a modern phenomenon, related to trips into the town centre or, more recently, the weekly shop at the supermarket. The core shopping encounter was one on one, a seller and a buyer across the counter, or at the market, or on the doorstep (the pedlar).

“What’s distinctive about internet shopping is that there’s no salesperson there – it’s not one on one so much as just one. That solitary situation began with self-service: just the shopper and the shelves, you pick out your items yourself.”

Q: Are there any historical parallels to today’s changing retail experiences that might inform the future of high street shopping?

A: One example is home delivery, which we associate with big chains but which was rediscovered during the Covid lockdowns as not necessarily large-scale or distant when local shops, small shops, started to do home deliveries, ordered online.  In other words, the tech and the the small scale aren’t mutually exclusive. And until the 1950s and 1960s – until supermarkets came in – that was standard for food shopping, all over the country. The local butcher or baker or greengrocer delivered to your door.

Q: What innovations in retail do you see as most promising for the future of shopping? How can these innovations address current challenges faced by the high street?

A: The rapid development recently of online platforms for second-hand buying and selling of clothes is a really exciting development.

“It’s a practical challenge to the culture of fast fashion which also transfers the initiative to consumers (who become sellers as well)…it’s a return to a one-on-one type of exchange.”

Q: Is ethical consumption possible? What might ethical consumption look like, and how might current examples serve as models for wider adoption amongst the public?

A: There has been a huge shift in perceptions of shopping over the past ten years or so. It can be seen in the way that every company now presents its environmental credentials, to show how it’s encouraging good consuming (recycling) or good production practice, from farming practices to the sourcing of materials to employee working conditions. That’s a sign of how norms have shifted. The other side of this is that everyone – we are all consumers – is much more aware of these issues.

Q: Many people today derive satisfaction from cultivating relationships with certain brands that ‘define’ their personhood. In this sense, can consumption be empowering to the individual? And, if so, should consumption be empowering?

A: This is another vast topic. Instead of empowering, it can just as much be said that brand loyalty is infantilising, encouraging us to troop along faithfully as the supporters of this brand rather than that one. A slogan like ‘The power to lower prices’ (a current Tesco slogan) is manifestly patronising. It’s obviously not customers who have that power!

The question of consumption being empowering or not has an interesting history in terms of gender.

“Back when ‘the consumer’ was imagined as a woman – a housewife – she was the opposite of empowered. She was passive, manipulated, brainwashed  (those were standard words in arguments against advertising in the middle 20^th century).”

Then the image shifted, just when men started to be seen as shoppers too. The new consumer was no longer an idiot but a model of rational behaviour, someone with rights and choices. This was the ‘rational’ consumer, weighing the options and calculating the best option: the reader of Which?  magazine, say, or the user of comparison websites.

Q: How can consumers be encouraged to take more responsibility for their shopping habits in terms of sustainability and supporting local businesses? What educational or incentive programs could be effective?

A: By learning about the history! Which can be done in all sorts of ways. Reading about it.  And also talking to people with different experiences (different generations, especially). Everyone has theories about, and knowledge of, the history of shopping, because we all shop (or avoid shopping): we can’t not have a relationship to it.

Thank you to Rachel for taking the time to answer our questions. Rachel was interviewed by Isabella Parkes on behalf of Manchester Lit & Phil.

Professor Rachel Bowlby will be a guest panellist at the We Think Big talk, ‘We’re Still Shopping?!’, at the We Invented the Weekend festival, on Saturday 15 June 2024. Visit the festival’s website for more information.

Q: How were you first introduced to poetry? Did a particular poet inspire you?

A: It must have been 1995, studying Seamus Heaney at Secondary School. I remember my English Teacher Mrs Gaffney asking me to read out loud to the class his poem Mid-Term Break. I mumbled through it, embarrassed, my voice half-breaking at the time, but those ending lines did something to me emotionally that a piece of writing had never done before. The feeling and connection seemed to take over my whole body, that experience has never left me. Both ‘Death of a Naturalist’ and ‘North’ by Heaney remain some of my favourite collections of poetry.

As a teenager I became more than a little obsessed with Bob Dylan. Dylan references Paul Verlaine and Arthur Rimbaud in his song ‘You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go’. I was so curious when I heard this that I headed out to buy my first ever book of poems, ‘A Season in Hell’ by Rimbaud. It certainly illuminated those early days living on a Bolton Council Estate. It was inspiring and overwhelming to me that he had written those poems when he was maybe only fifteen or sixteen years old.

Q: When you arrive at a new idea, do you ever find that poetry, in its pithy precision, can be a difficult way of communicating your thoughts? Why did you choose the poetic format?

A: Almost never. Poetry has become something of a verdict for me. I believe I lost the power of choice a long time ago. Of course, there are times when writing the work, that it is more difficult to come to terms with the theme and find the resolve. But that is the beauty of the journey, I never really know where the poem is going to take me, and I embrace this. I have tried to paint and sing but both of those moments are best left unsolved.

“I believe the oldest known poetic text dates back almost 3000 years, and for me poetry is more relevant than ever, as the most immediate expression of someone’s truth.”

Q: Much of your work looks to broadening literature’s reach and reappropriating it as a form of expression for the people, by the people. Why do you feel this is important?

A: I’m honoured to be able to connect with so many amazing young people every year when delivering poetry workshops, and I believe through sharing our experiences and writing poems we create a map of empathy.

“I see first-hand how poetry creates a sense of community, improves wellbeing, and offers young people the opportunity to find their own voice in what is a very challenging world.”

I’m proud to deliver sessions in collaboration with The Working Class Movement Library – their rare and beautiful archive inspires unique creativity, and importantly has the power to raise their class consciousness. It’s a privilege to be a part of this poetic journey and see young people become empowered by language.

Q: The Northern landscape, belonging and identity, are themes that run throughout your work. Can you explain why this is a pulse of intrigue for you?

A. I suppose these are just the things and places that happened to me, all I can do is respond poetically. Anything written in the landscape of memory is written here, and I’m not sure if my poems have a destination other than a sense of belonging.

“The ruins of Ladyshore Colliery on the banks of the River Irwell close to my childhood home continue to be a rich mine of spiritual and poetic connection for me. I find a real sense of otherness and elsewhere as I wander the site and it has offered the beginnings to many poems.”

My Nan, Margaret, is a recurring presence in my work. Her love, humour, and sadly her passing through dementia, are themes explored in my latest collection, ‘Burial of The Cameo’. I write about many things, but she is often the anchor. When I open the dialogue with her memory, I feel I can write with such honesty and vulnerability, that the poetic landscape seems to become vast and limitless. As Borges said, “Being with you and not being with you is the only way I have to measure time.”

Q: And lastly, as a mentor, if you were to hand down a book of poems to a pupil, which Greater Manchester poet would you chose and why?

There are so many wonderful Greater Manchester poets to choose from, but I would have to say Clare Pollard. Her first collection of poetry the ‘Heavy-Petting Zoo’ was written whilst she was still at school, and her most recent book ‘The Untameables’ is such a beautiful thing. Claire is an astonishing poet and writer, and like myself, a native of Bolton.

Thank you to Oliver for taking the time to answer our questions. Oliver was interviewed by our Trustee, Charlotte Lanigan.

Oliver James Lomax will be performing some of his poems on Manchester Lit & Phil’s Poetry Boat Cruise at the We Invented the Weekend festival, 15-16 June 2024. Visit the festival’s website for more information.