It makes you make the time: ‘Obligatory’ leisure, work intensification and allotment gardening

Abstract

This ethnographic study of busy allotment-holders explores the juxtaposition of time spent on the allotment with paid employment and caregiving. Highlighting the recent surge in allotment demand among professionals such as nurses and educators, the article examines the seeming contradiction of adding a very time-consuming responsibility onto an already packed schedule. It shows how the allotment’s normative structure creates a sense of obligation, helping busy professionals make the time to explore what most pleases. The research is informed by the idea that paid work continually extends its reach and that leisure is caught up in the dynamics of intensification. It suggests instrumental use of the allotment in ways that are functional for wage labour, yet it also argues that contemporary leisure has been over-characterized as an extension of internalized control and urges closer attention to the allotment as fertile soil for the post-work imaginary.