Practice matters! Geographical inquiry and theories of practice

Abstract

Recent developments in theories of practice have seen place and space taken explicitly into account. In particular, Theodore Schatzki’s ‘site ontology’ offers distinctive but as yet under-explored means of engaging with human geographies. By giving ontological priority to practices as constitutive of the social, this kind of practice theory provides an integrative conceptual framework that enables the analysis of diverse phenomena in relation to each other, over space and time, as they are constituted through practices. This article develops an outline agenda for bringing theories of practice, and particularly Schatzki’s ‘site ontology’, together with geographical inquiry. We elucidate this agenda through consideration of three contemporary preoccupations in human geography, comprising emotion, materiality and knowledge.