Foot Work: What Your Shoes Tell You About Globalisation

(Paperback)

---

Publishing Details

Classifications

Physical Properties

Description

'Fascinating and eye-opening' OWEN JONES

DO YOU KNOW WHERE YOUR SHOES COME FROM

DO YOU KNOW WHERE THEY GO WHEN YOU'RE DONE WITH THEM

In 2019, 66.6 million pairs of shoes were manufactured across the world every single day. They have never been cheaper to buy, and we have never been more convinced that we need to buy them. Yet their cost to the planet has never been greater. In this urgent, passionately argued book, Tansy E. Hoskins opens our eyes to the dark origins of the shoes on our feet. Taking us deep into the heart of an industry that is exploiting workers and deceiving consumers, we begin to understand that if we don't act fast, this humble household object will take us to the point of no return.

Reviews

Fascinating and eye-opening, FOOT WORK shows brilliantly how a simple everyday object can shed light on the hidden costs of globalisation and environmental degradation -- OWEN JONES
Tansy is one of the sharpest and most committed analysts of the true cost of the stuff we own. FOOT WORK is an absorbing, meticulous and at times completely horrifying account of the shoes on our feet and how that supply chain is marching us towards an even more dystopian future, especially for the workers in the system. Read this and you will make better decisions about all fashion, and all consumer goods in the future
From the first cottage industries to the use of robots, from sneakerheads to Syrian refugees, and from the abattoir to homeworkers in Asia, FOOT WORK tackles all aspects of the shoe industry. But it does much more, too, by placing footwear manufacture in the wider context of globalisation, capitalism and consumerism. A superb primer on everything that is wrong with our world - and how we can start to change it * NEW INTERNATIONALIST *
Makes a strong case for nothing less than a revolution
A book that hangs like a garment on a coat-hanger. A garment with many pockets. In the pockets numberless notes and remarks about clothes and history. Take it off the hanger and put it on. By which I mean - read it and walk through history -- JOHN BERGER on STITCHED UP
An incredible accomplishment -- SUSIE ORBACH on STITCHED UP

Author Bio

Tansy E. Hoskins is an author and journalist based in London. She can be found writing about the textile, clothing and footwear industries for the GUARDIAN, Al Jazeera, i-D, and THE i PAPER, or making TV documentaries. This work has taken her to Bangladesh, Kenya, Macedonia, and to the Topshop warehouses in Solihull. Her first book, the award winning STITCHED UP: THE ANTI-CAPITALIST BOOK OF FASHION was placed on Emma Watson's 'Ultimate Book List.'