‘More,bigger,better’ household appliances: Contesting normativity in practices through emotions

Abstract

With electricity-using appliances as the starting point, we seek to uncover the normative authority in the performance of practices among households in Western Switzerland. Through complementary methods, we explore normativity in practices that involve communicating and entertaining, cleaning and tidying up, and storing food and preparing meals. Combined with this approach is an understanding of emotions in practice, which are used as a heuristic device for uncovering how people performing practices feel that they are either aligned with how things ought or should be done, or conversely reveal any tensions in relation to the explicit or implicit normative authority. We see these points of tension as opportunities for change in designing experiments in a bounded space and time where practices can be performed differently – towards disconnecting, washing less, or sharing meal preparation and storage, for example. We conclude with discussions on the importance of enacting ‘deviant’ practices as performances and staging positive emotions, towards finding coherent ways to challenge the normative authority tied up with practices that rely on ‘more, bigger, better’ household appliances.

Keywords

Emotions household energy normativity social practice theories Switzerland

Introduction

In Switzerland, the efficiency of appliances has increased over time, but so has the number and volume of appliances per household. This translates into a trend we term ‘more, bigger, better’, with ‘better’ assigned to efficiency measures normalized as more desirable. This trend is problematic in relation to overall energy usage, as the case of refrigeration demonstrates. In the late-20th century, the Swiss standard refrigerator had a 200 L capacity and consumed 120 kWh per year. Today, double-door refrigerators are increasingly popular in Swiss households, regardless of social class, with a 550 L capacity and consuming approximately 350 kWh per year, close to triple the amount of energy for the same service – cooling food and beverages – albeit, in larger volumes. The number of freezers has doubled among Swiss households between 2000 and 2015; and other energy-intensive appliances, such as washers and dryers, have also experienced exponential growth (Prognos, 2016).

In what way have ‘more, bigger, better’ appliances become normalized over time? How did it become standard to have several screens per family member, rather than the single salon television set? How did the voluminous American-style refrigerator become a regular fixture in Swiss kitchens? And what are the consequences of the normalization of energy efficiency as a desirable end-goal when it comes to household energy usage? The aim of this article is to engage with social practice approaches towards understanding the normative authority in the performance of practices tied up with electricity-using devices and how this might reveal opportunities for reducing energy usage. This article builds on the literature on social practice approaches towards understanding normalization processes in relation to energy usage in the home (Gram-Hanssen, 2011; Shove, 2003; Shove and Walker, 2014), as well as appliance-specific studies on the normalization of freezers (Hand and Shove, 2007; Shove and Southerton, 2000), air-conditioning units (Sahakian, 2014; Wilhite, 2008), televisions (Aro, 2017) and washing machines (Jack, 2018; Watson, 2015), to cite but a few examples.

Drawing from the notion of normativity in practices, as conceptualized by Joseph Rouse (2007a, 2007b), we focus on how linguistic practice and normative authority can be understood in the mutual accountability of inter-related practices. In such a conception, there are no stable meanings, rules or norms that underlie the various activities that make up everyday life, but rather a normative authority that results from how practices are performed. It is the performance of and coherence between practices which sheds light on normalization processes. For Rouse (2007a), a primary area of theoretical concern and empirical investigation is in understanding how patterns of social practices are ‘sustained, transmitted and imposed upon subsequent performances’ (p. 507). Their mutual accountability suggests some degree of coherence or harmony in how inter-related practices play out, yet tensions can also be surmised. We posit that studying emotions in practice can help reveal such tensions, thus acting as a heuristic device for uncovering how the normative authority of certain energy-intensive practices can be reinforced or contested. By integrating the work of Monique Scheer (2012) on emotions in practice, we suggest a methodological approach for studying emotions, embodied and understandable only in the performance of practices. In turn, uncovering emotions in practice – or feelings around how things ought or should be, or should not be, feelings around what is desirable or not, good or bad – can potentially reveal (and possibly contest) normative authority in practices.

We first introduce a conceptual framework for understanding normativity in practices in relation to emotions, to discuss the methodological implications of such an approach. We then introduce our empirical findings and discuss trends towards ‘more, bigger, better’ appliances among different socio-economic groups in Western Switzerland.

Normativity in practices: Concepts and methods

Uncovering the concepts: Normativity and emotions in practice

This article draws from Rouse (2007a, 2007b) and his work on normativity in relation to social practices, defining normativity broadly as ‘the whole range of phenomena for which it is appropriate to apply normative concepts, such as correct or incorrect, just or unjust, appropriate or inappropriate, right or wrong, and the like’ (Rouse, 2007b: 48). Rouse (2007b) is careful to distinguish his approach from one where practices would be governed by rules or other forms of regularity:

[...] a practice is maintained by interactions among its constitutive performances that express their mutual accountability. On this normative conception of practices, a performance belongs to a practice if it is appropriate to hold it accountable as a correct or incorrect performance of that practice. Such holding to account is itself integral to the practice and can likewise be done correctly or incorrectly. (p. 48)

Three handles are proposed for apprehending social practices. First, normativity in practices relies on interactions and performances that are mutually accountable. The focus is on ‘publicly accessible performances rather than private mental events or states’ (Rouse, 2007a: 504), which is consistent with much of the literature on social practices. Yet regularity of meanings or behaviours are irrelevant in uncovering normativity, for Rouse (2007b), it is the complex interactions between practices that are one facet of normativity:

One performance responds to another, for example, by correcting it, drawing inferences from it, translating it, rewarding or punishing its performer, trying to do the same thing in different circumstances, mimicking it, circumventing its effects, and so on. (p. 49)

Second, while the temporal configuration of everyday life is not treated explicitly by Rouse (2007b), presumably it is not rhythms or sequencing of practices that deserve attention as much as coherence between different performances of interacting practices in relation to ‘something at issue and at stake in their outcome’ (p. 50). Normativity in practices is goal oriented, in this description, although there is ‘no agreed-upon formulation of what the issues and stakes are’ (p. 50) or how that goal should play out. Both of these angles are consistent with Schatzki et al. (2001), and the acknowledgement of practices as involving interactions, as well as interpretations – which determine order and are themselves ordered.

Third, there is no ‘sovereign standpoint’ from which normativity in practices can be understood. The performance of practice is accountable to an issue at stake, which is goal oriented but not pre-defined. Rouse’s (2007a) description of how meanings emerge emphasizes again the role of performance:

The claim is that human performances and activities are themselves meaningful, rather than having meaning imposed upon or infused within them by animating beliefs, desires, and intentions. Indeed, the stronger suggestion is that rules, norms and concepts get their meaning, and their normative authority and force, from their embodiment in publicly accessible activity. (p. 504)

Rouse discusses extensively the role of language and tacit knowledge in practices, underlining the emphasis placed on (observable) skills and dispositions in practice theories, which do not sit easily with the role of language in social life. The question of the place of language and discursive practices reveals the range of different understandings of what is meant by language, with the debate centred on differentiating between tacit and explicit meaning, and how certain aspects of social life need not be articulated to be understood. Schatzki et al. (2001) point to the limits of representational accounts, whereby meaning and language would be ‘telescoped into representations of mental contents, which themselves acquire the property of being about something by virtue of how people use and react to them’ (p. 21). Rather than consider language as pragmatics or semantics, dis-jointed from practices and expressed by the mind, Rouse (2007a) builds on Brandom (1994) and his work on linguistic meanings in relation to social practices, among others, to argue for the notion of language as discursive and performative, in that the sayings of everyday life can be integrated with ‘a conception of material or bodily practice theory’ (p. 523), which he nonetheless concedes as a challenge in practice-theoretical conceptions:

Instead of treating language as an autonomous domain or representation, the best practice theories consider language a pervasive and irreducible aspect of human ways of life. Rather than talk about ‘language’ as a distinctive kind of entity, skill, or structure such theories emphasize the semantically articulated normativity of all human activities and institutions. (p. 504)

Through studying performances, which include discursive performances, the normative authority in interactions among practices can be revealed.

Absent from Rouse’s work, to our knowledge, is the role of emotions in practices; if performers can be rewarded or punished (between them), if performances can be held to account (by them), there may very well be emotions tied up with the normative authority and force that emerge from practices, experienced by the performers. This leads us to an understanding of emotions as practice, in both its discursive and bodily dimensions. The question which guided much of our work was to understand whether a methodological approach focused on emotions could help reveal something about the normative authority in practices. As an extension to this reflection, we also sought to understand how contesting or reinforcing normative authority, both implicitly and explicitly, could create opportunities for change. We recognize here our own normative bias towards reducing overall energy usage as a desired state.

The sociology of emotions is a growing field of enquiry, regaining ground from the dominance of social-psychology treatments of the past decades. This is not to say that sociologists have historically neglected emotions: Durkheim contended that emotions should not be reduced to individual feelings, but rather result from social processes including moral pressure and control exercised by the group. Elias (2016 [1969]) effectively described how emotions, such as shame or anxiety, were instrumentalized towards instilling hygiene and cleanliness standards in Europe and over time, as embodied in conduct. Bourdieu (1979) signalled emotions as part of habitus, a concept that englobes dispositions in a dynamic rapport with social structure, both structured and structuring. Schatzki (1996) includes emotions as tied up with teleoaffective structures, involving ends, tasks and moods. Illouz (2009) sees emotions as an essential mechanism for explaining how consumer needs and desires connect to systems of production.

In relation to consumption and social practice theories, Weenink and Spaargaren (2016) claim that agency in practices resides in emotions, and studying emotions thus helps to explain why human agents engage with and care about certain ways of doing, over others. Welch (2017) has suggested that configurations across multiple practices reveal teleoaffective formations or a certain ordering around general understandings which include beliefs and emotions. A more recent contribution reveals the positive and negative affective states of people working in the calf-cow industry (Bassi et al., 2019), suggesting similarly to Weenink and Spaargaren that emotions have agentive power over practices. Rather than situate emotions outside of practices, we follow Scheer (2012) on emotions as embodied in practices.

For Scheer, emotions can take on four forms: they are the expression of an emotive or a type of performance in declaring an emotive; building on Reddy (1997), there is a performative aspect to emotional expression, whereby naming an emotive is also part of the experience of that emotion. An example would be someone stating that they are happy, frustrated or sad, while experiencing their emotive state. Second, emotions in practice are a form of exchange between people who must decode the expression; to sense that someone is ill at ease, for example, or excited, can come from observing the performance of a practice. Third, emotions in practice can be mobilized, a form of ‘getting in the mood’ as she puts it:

These practices are very often distributed, that is, carried out together with other people, artifacts, aesthetic arrangements, and technologies. This will often mean that we implement such means on our own by seeking out certain spaces, music, photographs, or other personal memorabilia to manage our moods. (Scheer, 2012: 209)

Emotions can also be regulated – or a form of normative expression, where emotions are not ‘“hard-wired” or otherwise independent of societal expectations’ (Scheer, 2012: 216), but rather linked to group expectations and learned habits. An earlier reference to this notion was termed ‘feeling rules’ (Hochschild, 1979), and which Scheer illustrates as follows: ‘The acquisition of the sensibility, or emotional style, of a group proceeds via tacit socialization as well as explicit instruction: boys are specifically told not to cry, girls to swallow their anger’ (p. 216). Performances around pro-environmental behaviour, like riding a bike or recycling, can also be enacted in such a way that they display strong positive feelings or lead to normative stances as to the social desirability of such actions. We found that higher socio-economic groups had a certain control over their emotive expressions, leading to smooth phrases that were not always easy to interpret (see Sahakian, 2017). Emotions in practice – and observed in the performance of practices, including (non)emotive statements in discourse – relate to feelings of how the practice ‘ought or should’ be carried out, which in turn tells us something about normativity.

For our study, the emotions we were interested in are those that reveal a ‘crack in the wall’ of normativity, or the state of being as things ought or should be; we posit that people may feel either aligned or dis-jointed from what they believe (explicitly or not, articulated or embodied) they ought or should do on one hand, and how they actually perform everyday practices on the other. If normativity in practices is achieved through the mutual accountability of their performances, then any tensions in and between performances serve to identify a weakness in how that practice might be sustained over time. We use emotions as a heuristic device for revealing such tensions, and identifying opportunities for change; we thus engaged in ‘staging emotions’ in that we make them explicit in our deliberations with households, and we also attempted to mobilize emotions by getting people ‘in a certain mood’, as we will now discuss in our methods section.

Exploring the methods: Towards uncovering normative authority

To uncover the normative authority or force in practices that use energy in the home, we describe how practices interact, what issues are at stake in their performances and interactions, and what emotions are tied up therein. As a starting point, we identified appliances in the home which we found to be significant in terms of energy intensity – larger appliances, such as refrigerators, for example – but also in relation to trends towards increasing appliance acquisition – such as information communication technologies (ICTs). We thus focused on three consumption domains: communicating and entertaining, storing and preparing food, and cleaning up and tidying.

In-depth interviews and observations took place with 46 household members in Geneva (n = 22) and Lausanne (n = 24), two cities in Western Switzerland. The interview guide began with discussions on routines and habits in the home. We engaged with photo elicitation to prompt emotive responses to normative dimension of practices and to ‘get people in the mood’ to use Scheer’s language. For example, we used an image of a 1950s advertisement for a ‘modern’ kitchen to discuss norms around efficiency in relation to the (gendered) organization of domestic chores; in the ‘messy kitchen’ image, we use a humoristic mise-en-scène of a kitchen in disarray to discuss societal expectations around cleanliness and tidiness.¹ In-depth interviews lasted between 90 and 180 minutes, including walking visits of the home – which served to uncover appliances that had been stored away and oftentimes forgotten.

The sampling strategy accounted for diversity in household types by considering socio-economic factors as well as type of housing, and access or not to shared building laundry rooms. We interviewed 11 women with high-revenues and that self-identify as being part of the expatriate population in Geneva, and 11 men and women with lower revenues and education levels, up to the equivalent of high school. Thirty-four women and 12 men participated in the study. The interviews were transcribed, anonymized and coded using NVivo, with excerpts translated from French to English. Normativity in relation to practices and emotions was also coded, involving emotive expressions (strong positive or negative feelings, for example), but also statements that revealed shared understandings of ‘issues at stake’ in performing practices. Following the qualitative research phase and towards combining methods to shed light on similar themes, a quantitative survey (n = 708, representative for Western Switzerland) was designed through a practice-theoretical approach for identifying patterns in the performance of practices, such as different ways of doing laundry. The survey also served to attest as to whether people shared similar emotions – either positive or negative – in how performances are seen to be either aligned or not with an understanding of the normative authority in practice. For these questions, we took direct citations from the qualitative work and asked survey participants to what degree they would agree or disagree with statements, such as, ‘For me to feel good, I need a clean and tidy home’.²

The project aimed towards the normative goal of understanding what role everyday people might play in improving and reducing energy usage in the home. We were interested in not only how practices are stabilized but also how they can be changed or shifted to less energy intensity. We co-designed a series of experimental initiatives with community partners and the utility distributor in Geneva to explicitly challenge the normative authority of the consumption domains under study within a bounded space and time. Such forms of experimentation can become demonstration sites for social learning and social change (Sahakian and Wilhite, 2014). For the three experiments, we not only created opportunities for strong positive emotions but also accounted for emotions such as unease or anxiety.

All three methods engaged with emotions: for the in-depth interviews, we used visual methods for eliciting emotional reactions; in the survey, we attested as to whether emotive statements representing general feelings were upheld by a larger population; and for the experimental initiatives, we designed situations in which emotions were staged – through deliberating the emotional make-up tied up with different practices, in order to discuss the normative authority of practices, and through experimenting with initiatives aimed to deliver new emotions in practices. We thus aimed to explore whether staging emotions could help identify ‘cracks in the wall’, or feelings of not doing things as they ought or should be done among existing practices, and whether this could result in positive emotions such as relief and enjoyment, or more negative emotions such as frustration and anxiety.

Empirical research results and discussion

Organized by sets of practices, the results uncover the normative authority in practices through understanding how practices interact, what issues are at stake in their performances and interactions, and how emotions can reveal tensions in relation to normative authority. We conclude each section with an introduction to an initiative designed as a form of social learning for challenging normative authority in practices, towards demonstrating news ways of doing.

Practices related to communicating and entertaining

ICTs are bundled up with almost all dimensions of everyday life. Whether you want to make a payment, plan a trip, be informed, capture a moment, communicate with others or listen to music, the smart phone and other such devices now makes this a possibility – at any time, and in most places in Switzerland, thanks to wireless connectivity. Even the least energy-intensive activities of sleeping or meditating can now be monitored through remote applications. When it comes to communicating and entertaining, the issues at stake are not fixed but rather emerged as rather unstable in our qualitative research: for some people, such devices are understood to be time savers, while for others they are a waste of time; for most people, ICT connectivity allows for greater freedom; while for others, constant connectivity is experienced as unpleasant, difficult to manage and a constraint that prevents them from achieving work–life balance. For all, ICT devices are seen as non-problematic in relation to energy usage.

What is excessive versus normal usage of such devices remains to be defined, particularly when it comes to children’s education, but also in relation to spaces and times where and when usage is seen as permissible. Turning now to the survey data, how people experience connectivity differs not so much by socio-economic group, but by profession and household composition. Generally, single people of all ages in the survey welcome greater connectivity: 85% of singles agree that being constantly connected facilitates their everyday life, as compared to 46% of people living in a household with children. Only 25% of single people feel that being reachable at all times is problematic, as opposed to 43% of households with children. Among all respondents, 58% of men declared that they needed to be reachable at all time by their work, while this was the case for only 29% of working women.

One of the key findings in relation to ICTs was the intense feelings people expressed in associating usage of such devices with addictive behaviour. Respondents repeatedly described Internet connectivity as a drug, with people exploring different ways of forcing themselves – or other household members, particularly children – to disconnect. As one mother of two children put it,

It was really a subject of tension in this household (the teenager’s ICT usage) until the day when he told us: I’m not able to handle this! He realized that it was making him unhappy. And, he really could not deal. It’s really drug, it’s incredible! (Francine, Lausanne area, 28 January 2016)

A majority (69%) agreed that there should be restrictions in how computers and smart phone are used, in relation to times of day, or places – when people might be ‘held to account’ for not being connected. For some, connectivity should end in the evening, at the dinner table or during social occasions when people are gathered in the same space. For others, the phone is precisely part of the social occasion – in photographing the moment or sharing music. There are tensions in relation to connectivity, however: where 87% of respondents stated that they do not think smart phones should be used in restaurants, 84% of parents agreed that they should be available at all times for their children. The non-desirability of smart phone usage in restaurants is circumvented by the issues at stake in ‘being a good parent’, which means being reachable by your children at any time (and vice versa). For many of the respondents, disconnecting is a luxury – to be unreachable, particularly from work, is a desirable state that few people can afford.

There seems to be no upper limit to the acquisition of such devices: there is no sense of what is a ‘normal amount’ of computers to have per household, what is a ‘normal’ screen size, for example, or when is a ‘normal age’ for screen time or phone acquisition for children. Given the fast-changing pace of technological innovations in ICTs, intergenerational learning for transmitting normative authority over time is lacking. A common aspect of ICT usage is that the acquisition of such devices is increasing, as is the individualisation of usage: each household member having their own personal computer, phone and even television, for example. For families with more than one child, acquisition comes earlier for the younger children. As one woman explained,

And just now, for Aline’s 14th birthday, she asked for an iPhone and I ended up saying OK, an iPhone, because everyone in her class has one, so ... And Catherine (the older sister) tells me: But mom, this is not fair, I only got my iPhone when I was 17 years old! And I said, darling, times are changing! (Sonia, Lausanne area, 17 December 2015)

What is considered normal appliance acquisition can differ even within the same household. A mother who participated in our qualitative study lives in a three-bedroom apartment with her two adolescent sons: the small refrigerator and television set in the living room seem to indicate a low interest in ‘more, bigger, better’ trends. However, each adolescent has a flat-screen television in their separate bedrooms; in one, electrical appliances abound: an electric piano, gaming console, microwave and mini refrigerator, which is aligned with the practices associated with entertaining friends (making popcorn, drinking a cold beverage, watching a film, as he explained). The professionalizing of entertainment in homes was noted in other household visits, in the installation of large-format flat-screen television sets and high-performance audio systems. In one affluent household and single villa, the basement level had been transformed into a private cinema, complete with a bar area.

To experience dis-connectivity and challenge the normative authority of entertaining and communicating as being dependent on ICTs, we organized a community event with Happy City Lab, a cultural association in Geneva. In ‘Disconnect!’ (autumn 2015), 80 households in two cooperative buildings were invited to share a candlelit meal in the courtyard. Various activities were organized around the theme of re-connecting between generations, with a lantern-building activity, a fire dancing performance and star gazing. The main goal was to create an event that could be enjoyed collectively without connectivity, while staging strong positive emotions around experiencing a candlelit cultural event as a community. To minimize electricity usage, all appliances in the home, save for the refrigerator, were disconnected; the lighting in the buildings and common spaces were brought down to a minimum. Even in the short amount of time planned for this evening around the theme of non-smart-phone usage and disconnecting, the moments experienced were being captured by people taking pictures and videos with their phones – devices which have become an important medium for sharing emotions. In the practice of coming together as a community, the sharing of positive emotions beyond the immediate group is seen as normal and is facilitated by ICT devices and online social networks.

Practices related to cleanliness and tidiness

Practices around cleaning people, homes or clothes are often in interaction with other daily practices, such as caring for children, welcoming guests, preparing meals or balancing work obligations with domestic chores. In homes with multiple members, how and when to wash clothes is negotiated between people, sometimes involving tensions – such as feelings of anxiety or shame – in relation to differing preferences when it comes to cleanliness or the organization of time. Several people described the practice of picking up clothes from the floor and adding them to a wash cycle as a way to avoid the process of tidying the home by folding and putting away discarded clothing. In addition to negotiating intra-domestic dynamics, people also have to negotiate cleanliness in relation to extra-domestic dynamics, including expectations around workplace appearance. From our survey results, 35% claim that wearing the same clothing 2 days in a row would be frowned upon in their workplace. The expectation of some form of societal shaming in the workplace influences habits and routines around cleaning clothes in the home.

Another extra-domestic dynamic is the arrival of guests, which is often experienced as a prompt for accelerating cleaning and tidying practices. The home should be presentable to people: 40% of survey households agree that they mostly clean up the house before the arrival of guests. Certain respondents seemed to consider laundry as a rather intimate and private affair: as a reaction to a ‘messy kitchen’ image shown through photo-elicitation techniques, a woman contrasted the misplaced toys to clothing items in this way: ‘Toys are toys! But if you arrive in someone’s bathroom and there’s dirty underwear on the floor, you are in someone else’s intimacy […]’ (Nathalie, 12 October 2015, Geneva).

Having a dryer in the home relates to space availability: the material arrangement of the home is clearly a determining factor as to whether such an appliance can be acquired in the first place. Dryers also translate into feelings and desires to live in un-cluttered homes or a visually pleasing interior, devoid of laundry drying on racks, as well as to experience the sensorial comfort of clothes that have been through a dryer, which can lead to softer textures. As one respondent explained, ‘You’re going to make fun of me, but I would get a dryer, although I’m against dryers. I’ve never had a dryer, for environmental reasons. It’s really a mega consumer luxury’ (Samantha, Geneva, 25 August 2015). Later in the discussion, she explains the feelings associated with hanging clothes to dry as a chore, in a statement that was communicated in frustration:

It takes up so much space, it’s cumbersome, and it doesn’t get ironed by itself. In the dryer, (the clothes) get ironed by themselves and finally, when we take them out, we can put them away directly. Otherwise, (hanging clothes to dry) takes up space and it’s ugly, yes, actually. (Samantha, Geneva, 25 August 2015)

Only two respondents out of the 42 interviews declared that they do not dry their clothes in machines, because of the strain on the fabric and potential for cloth deterioration. Dryer acquisition is a growing trend: among survey respondents, 76% claimed that they have a dryer today, which they did not have in their childhood. While the energy efficiency of laundry machines has augmented, the overall electricity consumption of laundry machines has also increased by 20% between 2000 and 2015, due to more such appliances in homes (Prognos, 2016).

The material dimension of cleaning practices, related to clothing, is also revealed in the types of machines available and their usage. All participants explained that they take high efficiency ratings for granted. Machines have cold water settings, but for some people, the higher temperatures indicate better outcomes in terms of cleanliness. As one woman explained,

[...] if the temperature is not adapted, you wash badly and the machine won’t last. You should not use low temperature settings. My friend was using the turbo setting and her machine broke down. The repair man told her, Madam, you can’t only use the 20-minute setting, if not the machine is too encrusted with dirt. So finally, it’s the machine that decides. (Penelope, Lausanne, 7 December 2015)

There are other issues at stake in relation to this set of practices, which relate directly to emotions in practice: there is a popular Swiss francophone axiom ‘propre en ordre’, clean and tidy. There is general consensus that adhering to cleanliness and tidiness standards is a good thing or a desirable state; to be ‘propre sur soi’ literally means being clean on oneself but translates to being presentable in society. But this positive sentiment is not only tied to social expectations, it has also become embodied: 90% of survey respondents agreed with this statement: ‘For me to feel good, I need a clean and tidy home’. However, the performance of keeping clean and tidy reveals a multitude of interpretations of this desired outcome, including what is considered to be dirty in the first place. There are two very different ways of experiencing dirtiness: as one mother of two told us, ‘Yes, oh yes, yes, yes. Worn once, it’s in the dirty laundry, even if only worn one hour’ (Amélie, Lausanne area, 1 September 2015), a mechanical sense of clean from dirty that has to do exclusively with usage. She went on to explain that if she were to go out this evening and put on a second outfit, ‘well, I would put both outfits into the dirty laundry’. For others, more sensory factors come into play: ‘So, I sniff, I sniff!’ (Jessica, Lausanne area, 12 August 2016). In our quantitative study, 59% of survey respondents declared that they change their shirts or t-shirts every day; while 46% declare that they trust their sense of smell, in deciding whether clothing should be washed or not, and also practice the airing out of clothes to keep them smelling fresh.

The availability or not of domestic help is critical to understanding cleanliness as a performance. As documented in Sahakian (2017), elite households that benefit from domestic help find themselves ‘locked into’ cleaning practices that may have nothing to do with experienced hygiene and cleanliness, and more to do with the remunerated and routinized cleaning service. In all households and across socio-economic groups, cleaning and tidying is not considered to be a noble task – contrasted to cooking meals on special occasions, which has become a source of pleasure and form of commensality for some. Having clean clothes and a tidy home is a desired outcome, some people expressed positive feelings towards ironing and vacuuming, but these are experienced individually and not in social contexts. One of the main issues at stake with cleaning was the time involved: without accounting for the time of wash cycles, the sorting, drying, folding and putting away of clothes is seen as time-consuming for most, as part of a chore that is described as a ‘mental weight’ (charge mentale). This partly explains the mis-understanding of the eco-button programme on machines: most households could not comprehend how a more ‘efficient’ cycle could actually take longer.

Inspired by Jack (2013), the research team partnered with Terragir, a community-based energy association, in recruiting 14 people to wear the same pair of jeans for 4 weeks, at least 5 days per week. Similar to Jack’s findings, our participants did not experience feeling dirty. Despite people’s expectations as to what others might think, particularly in the workplace, the continuous wearing of the (albeit ubiquitous) jeans did not solicit any remarks. Through group deliberations before and after the challenge, we put forward certain issues at stake, drawn from the qualitative research, such as saving time or preserving clothing. In the first 2 weeks, the participants shared tips and new skills for not getting their jeans dirty, such as wearing an apron for cooking or using essential oils to preserve a nice smell. In the second phase, these concerns gave way to feelings of comfort and ease with non-washing. In follow-up interviews 6 months after the challenge, some people had maintained actions to keep clothes clean, through airing out or stain removal, and reduced wash cycles; two participants continued to wear the jeans regularly, without washing them at all. The challenge allowed for new experiments with how to perform ‘keeping clean’, in a bounded time and space; by participating in the challenge, permission had been given (not by some external force, but rather by people adhering to the rules of the game) to deviate from constant washing as a normative practice. A first phase of emotions involved some concern and anxiety, and attempts to perform ‘well’ by adhering to the challenge; a second phase of emotions was about giving up control and feeling comfortable in washing less. The jeans challenge therefore served to question the normative authority around why people engage in (excessive) washing in the first place, leading to a relaxation of personal standards – as less washing did not result in the anticipated negative feelings of being un-clean.

Practices related to storing and preparing food

The set of practices around food are also related to many other aspects of everyday life, such as transit between work to home in relation to food provisioning, or adapting menus for different household members including children and the elderly, or cooking on a routine basis as opposed to cooking on special occasions. The material arrangements of interior spaces play an important role on the types of appliances people can acquire and use: most respondents in the qualitative survey explained that they would acquire more kitchen appliances, such as blenders or toasters, if they had the space for them. One main finding derived from the observations was the multiplying of refrigerators, across socio-economic groups, and the multiplying of dishwashers, in a single observable case and in an elite household. In all of these cases, the appliances themselves are efficient, but there are more of them.

There are different issues at stake that lead to normativity in practices that involve multiple refrigerators and freezers. In a low-income household, purchasing food is tied up with financial and time constraints: cheaper food is purchased in bulk in neighbouring France, and stored in a 300 L freezer located in the main bedroom. In this small two-bedroom apartment, the kitchen is already equipped with a combined refrigerator and freezer unit. In the same apartment, the living room is a space of display and grandeur, boasting a large flat-screen TV, silky curtains, a dining room table and white leather couch. However, the bedroom is a private space, generally not on display to guests, and the freezer makes it possible for this family to store foods in preparation for large meals for their religious congregation (outside of the home) and guests (inside the home). Such an appliance is therefore justified as something that should and ought to be, for this family, in relation to the significance of social interactions. The notion that ‘bigger is better’ was made explicit in my interview with the mother, in referring to her freezer: ‘I like big things. I think it’s great to have all this extra space, if not, where would I store things, where would I put things?’ (Tally, Geneva, 18 November 2015).

Often in Swiss lease agreements, the refrigerator is not included in the rental agreement – it is up to the tenants to determine what model they want to instal and, if there is enough space available, the American model has become a normal feature in many households. The size of the refrigerator in relation to energy usage is a non-issue for the people who participated in the study, due to energy labels that rate efficiency based on models of similar volume: thus, the larger models are deemed to be efficient, even if they consume close to triple the amount of energy than smaller models. An energy efficiency rating that compares different volumes would lead to inefficiency ratings for larger models. Here, the interest is rather in having a large space for placing and displaying food – including sometimes additional devices such as ice machines. In our quantitative study and across all socio-economic groups, most people felt that having a large-format fridge is very useful (87%). In our survey, we found that 77% of respondents claimed to have a larger refrigerator today than in their childhood. In addition, 81% did not agree that certain food items can be stored outside of the refrigerators. Over a period of two generations, people have lost all memory of living without a refrigerator and the practices of storing food without such devices.

Larger or multiple freezers also relate to food consumption practices, and eating healthy and environmentally sustainable foods – for storing large amounts of vegetable produce, for example, or vegetable baskets provided through community supported agriculture schemes.³ As one woman explained,

We have a refrigerator in the kitchen, with a freezer and that’s normal, it works very well. But since we have so many fruits from the garden, when we harvest, well, we can’t eat it all so we freeze quite a bit. This year, last summer, we had 40 kg of cherries. We had to put them somewhere, so we froze them in the freezer unit. (Jessica, Lausanne area, 12 August 2016)

Among higher socio-economic groups, the American model of refrigeration has become a standard; it is common for such households to have additional freezers or refrigeration units, but adhering to high standards when it comes to interior aesthetics is a priority: it would not be a normal practice to instal the freezer in a bedroom, but rather out of sight – in a basement area, for example. In the kitchen, another feature was revealed in one home visit: the double-dishwasher. The issue at stake here is twofold: the kitchen has become a site of food performance and increasingly a public space, where guests can watch or even participate in the preparation of meals. Such households might have 20 guests around a table for a meal, whereby the dual dishwasher becomes useful. On a more regular basis, the dual dishwasher is aligned with cleanliness and tidiness as highly desirable. Not a single spoon or pot can be seen loitering on a counter: all dirty dishes can be stored away, in this double washing space. The energy efficiency of each dish washing unit is put forward as achieving an environmental aim: that the appliance has doubled in volume is not questioned. While this household may very well be an exception, the double dishwashing machine in this social group is already in a process of normalization. Through social relations, as guests visit this home and experience the meals prepared in the kitchen, the double-dishwasher becomes normalized through its use in meal-preparation performances.

There is a growing sentiment which could challenge norms around ‘more, bigger, better’ appliances in relation to meal preparation specifically. First, preparing a meal is a noble and creative task for some, but when highly routinized, it can also be seen as a time-consuming chore. This relates to a normative authority around preparing ‘balanced’ meals, which requires time for provisioning and preparation. Saving time by sharing cooking preparation or eating out was seen as desirable for some. In addition, several people expressed frustration and strong negative emotions around having too many appliances, in relation to the storage required for keeping them at home, and the frustrations around cleaning and repairing appliances. In visiting homes and conducting observations in situ, we noted shelves, closets and basements filled with all sorts of appliances, from raclette to sorbet machines, and seldom used.

In partnership with the community association Terragir, we hosted a workshop in the Les Vergers eco-neighbourhood in Geneva which brought together researchers, practitioners and consumers (10 participants), towards discussing the ‘Future of food’ in relation to different food preparation and storage practices. In a World Café format, we discussed the negative emotions associated with having ‘too much stuff’ in relation to household appliances, and what could be gained by sharing products and services in relation to food preparation. We generated ideas and proposals for a shared community food storage area, the mutualizing of appliances in building laundry facilities, the preparation and delivery of food at a community level, as well as the unplugging of refrigerators during the winter months. For each exercise around envisioning future scenarios, we engaged with a social practice framework to discuss what material arrangements, skills and competencies, and social norms would be implied in how these future practices could be performed. The ideas have been fed into the deliberations underway in the urban development of Les Vergers.

Conclusion

Appliances and other devices are caught up in a trend towards ‘more, bigger, better’, which can be problematic in terms of overall energy usage. Following Rouse, we have demonstrated how normativity in practice – or what is correct or incorrect, appropriate or inappropriate, right or wrong in how practices are performed – can be reinforced in not only interactions between household members, who (re)negotiate what it means to be clean or prepare a meal, but also interactions between practices, such as tidying up the home and entertaining or welcoming guests. When the ‘issue at stake’ is explicit (as articulated in sayings or demonstrated in doings), tensions arise within households on how personal standards are negotiated, around laundry practices, for example. In contrast to laundry, there are no clear goals around ICT usage, yet an issue at stake is that excessive usage can be addictive. The normative authority in ICT acquisition and usage is unstable and has yet to settle: the lack of clear guidelines on how many devices is normal, or how much usage one ought to be engaged in, at different ages, has become a source of tension for many. Although the material dimension of practices was not a focus of this article, normativity in practices cannot neglect material arrangements; space availability signals the possibility of acquiring more and bigger appliances. The desirability of such objects is not questioned and their efficiency is assumed.

By following the performance of these practices, as described by interlocutors and observed in the home, the normative dimension becomes apparent. The attention paid to emotions in practices serves to reveal the tensions between how people feel things ought to be, how they are performed and their feelings as part of that performance. In many cases, there are feelings of anxiety and frustration with performances that involve ICT usage, laundry and preparing meals. Yet even in these cases, people do not necessarily and spontaneously attempt to perform practices differently; there is a hesitation to deviate from routinized and habitual ways of doing, precisely because they are normatively constituted as coherent. By engaging participants in different initiatives, we created a space and time configuration for practice ‘deviancy’: people were given permission (by the research team and through their own engagement) to challenge their usual ways of doing.⁴ Similar to the ‘suspension of disbelief’ from the Romantic literary period, people were invited to put aside what they believed to be ‘normal’, in order to do things differently, over the course of one evening, over several weeks or imagined in the future. And yet they did not experience a feeling of being deviant themselves: the normative authority of practices was challenged, but the new ways of doing or imagining were still found to be coherent.

We attribute this to emotions, which we found to be a powerful vector for change, following Weenink and Spaargaren (2016), but only when they are staged or placed at the forefront of an initiative. In this case, three initiatives designed to lower energy usage in relation to consumption domains served to challenge normativity in practices through deliberations (discourse) and the enactment of alternative practices (performances), rendering explicit the emotions tied to the performance and creating opportunities for new emotions. The positive feelings involved experiencing a magical cultural and community event, as a way to disconnect from ICT usage; the feelings of relief and comfort at washing less and not experiencing un-cleanliness; and the feeling of imagining new ways of preparing and sharing meals while using less stuff. While more negative feelings of shame and blame are often touted as impactful towards social change, addressing the normative authority of a practice through initiatives which set the stage for positive emotions is also effective. People performed ‘deviant’ practices differently from what they have routinely experienced, and found that there could still be coherence between the different practices they engage with, because their emotions worked favourably towards supporting the change.

Trends towards ‘more, bigger, better’ appliances prevail because they are consistent with other ‘issues at stake’, notably neo-liberal economic framings of consumption and energy usage that present endless consumption and energy efficiency as compatible with economic growth. Towards limits to consumption and reductions in energy usage, understanding normativity in practice becomes all the more relevant for reframing the issues at stake through the sustained enactment of consumption practices that aim for sufficiency, rather than efficiency. Our research suggests that sufficiency measures and positive feelings, as a form of subjective well-being, may not be incompatible.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

The author would especially like to thank Béatrice Bertho, her research partner in fieldwork and analysis. In addition, she gratefully acknowledges the anonymous reviewers, and Manisha Anantharaman, for their insightful comments which substantially improved the arguments presented in this article. The author sincerely thanks all those who agreed to participate in this study.

Declaration of conflicting interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article: This article is based on the National Research Project ‘Understanding household energy consumption: social practices, norms, and learning how to change’ funded by the Swiss National Science Fund (SNSF; NRP71; 4O7L4O_L53744), co-directed by Marlyne Sahakian and Suren Erkman.

ORCID iD

Marlyne Sahakian

Notes

Author Biography

Marlyne Sahakian, assistant professor of Sociology (University of Geneva), brings a sociological lens to consumption studies and sustainability. Her research interest is in understanding everyday practices in relation to environmental promotion, social equity and social change. She is a co-founder of SCORAI Europe, a network for sustainable consumption research and action.

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