Concrete Times

Our existence has become so entangled with concrete that it would be difficult to imagine life without it, though we probably should. Anthropologists recognize the part that concrete plays in mediating social relations and in shaping political subjectivities. Thinking about concrete anthropologically involves moving across multiple scales—from large infrastructure projects to modest housebuilding projects. This review asks what we might gain from a focus on this ubiquitous material. I propose that attending ethnographically to how concrete mediates social experiences across scales brings to the fore building as an activity of political, economic, social, and ecological significance. Concrete offers a lens through which to apprehend social formations and transformations as well as to examine how built forms mediate and leverage power, how space is used and claimed, and how futures are imagined and pasts remembered. I conclude with a critical reflection on the ecological implications of these concrete times.