Policy Press

Retail Ruins

The Ghosts of Post-Industrial Spectacle

By Jacob C. Miller

Published

Apr 25, 2023

Page count

150 pages

ISBN

978-1529225532

Dimensions

203 x 127 mm

Imprint

Bristol University Press

Published

Apr 25, 2023

Page count

150 pages

ISBN

978-1529225549

Dimensions

203 x 127 mm

Imprint

Bristol University Press

Published

Apr 25, 2023

Page count

150 pages

ISBN

978-1529225549

Dimensions

203 x 127 mm

Imprint

Bristol University Press
Retail Ruins

In the context of widespread precarity and ongoing crises, it is no surprise ruins have captured much attention in recent years. This book is about a new kind of space, one that is deeply troubling for consumer society: the retail ruin.

Jacob C. Miller bridges human geography, archaeology and critical urban studies to offer a starting point for conceptualizing retail ruins. Drawing on fieldnotes and photographs, Miller crafts a hauntological approach informed by the theories of Walter Benjamin and Jacques Derrida to more recent thinking on assemblage, spectacle and the politics of urban space.

Jacob C. Miller is Assistant Professor of Human Geography at Northumbria University.

Introduction

1. What Are Retail Ruins?

2. Retail Ruins

3. Spectacle, Haunted

Conclusion