This book sheds new light on the complex inter-relations that make up class, power, local history and space. It turns community thinking on its head by understanding community not as an object but as a relational process with sociality at its core. Based on fieldwork from one market town and the work of Hannah Arendt, it demonstrates how a new approach to social practices can illuminate our understanding of commonality and communal being. Whilst community has become both a much-derided and much-touted term, this thought-provoking work shows that it is at the heart of social process. It will appeal to researchers of sociology, social policy, politics, public health and geography, as well as those involved in public policy design and implementation.

Open-air markets are as old as the market towns they spawned, but in the modern world of 24-hour shopping, credit cards, superstores, sprawling malls, and one-stop shopping, do they still have a place in the contemporary social landscape? Are continental and farmers' markets the answer? What do shoppers, traders, and councils have to say about the places they shop in, work in, and control? Markets as Sites for Social Interaction is the first comprehensive account of English markets as a social space. It investigates markets throughout the country and comes to some surprising conclusions about the roles that they play in the world of modern Britain. It sets out the everyday cultural practices that inform and sustain markets as a crucial part of the social fabric. The report offers a series of suggestions for their rejuvenation; a glimpse of their potential in improving lives, from community employment to individual health; and concludes with a powerful endorsement of their continued rel