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Performance and Possession

This paper provides both an empirical account of the act of purchase within the car boot sale and an evaluation of the implications of these findings for theoretical debates on consumption. The paper begins by urging the need to rethink the act of purchase within consumption studies: whilst theoreti cal accounts have presumed much about the act of purchase, these same accounts are argued to exhibit serious deficiencies, some of which can be located in their assumption that the act of purchase (and consumption more generally) is confined to conventional retail environments. In contrast, car boot sale purchasing is shown to involve both separately and simultaneously theatricality and performance, unpredictability and the unexpected, skill, thrift and pleasure and desire. Furthermore, such characteristics are argued to exert considerable influence on the rituals of possession, personalization and re-enchantment that are shown to accompany much car boot sale pur chasing. We conclude the paper by emphasizing the continued need for research on consumption to connect the act of purchase to what is done with/to particular items; by examining the implications of our findings for theoretical narratives of risk; and by posing a number of questions for research on the act of purchase in conventional retail environments.