Living in the ‘Waste Age’
In capitalist societies, to make ourselves visible, we must consume. We are also trained to throw away things after consumption to delete consumption-memories. We get rid of waste to forget and be least concerned about it, thereafter.
If all material consumption today produces material waste, then consumption habits are waste habits. This habitual waste, if inspected, is crucial to understand how personhood is maintained; and how necessity and desire are advertised and sold.
Consumption comes with the trash baggage of waste. It is so ingrained into our everyday lives that most of us are unaware of the waste we produce. Though the materiality of waste is a constant reminder of one’s consumption.
Often, waste is associated with pollution, dirt, unwantedness. It is created in the dialectic of pure, clean, and wanted. But what binds these conceptual opposites—is consumption, itself. One must use to discard, and one must want to use before discarding.
Our waste lingers and has to be hidden away into landfills. Piled-up discards make us think about the unquestioned tendency to use commodities exactly how they are meant to be — used and thrown. What will be consumed and what waste will be produced—is codified in the product. We all know how to identify what waste is, and what to toss into the bin. Want becomes consumption and consumption becomes waste.
Producing waste because of consumption is, in the Anthropocene, one of the central boulders for the discourse on climate change. It is not just that humans produce a lot of waste, the problem arises that the waste we produce is hard to get rid of.
‘Waste-age’ reminds us how we have become a waste producing species, and how getting rid of waste keeps over-consumption disguised—rather invisible.
So, one day, I decided to stop throwing away things. The dustbin was replaced with a shelf. That shelf was a space dedicated to waste. Earlier, I did not know where my waste went and stayed. Now I did.
Most of us do not know where our waste goes, and there is comfort in getting rid of waste, so we may consume more. Saving or keeping my daily trash offered immediate visibilisation of what I consumed and its quantity. In these photos, I hold onto the waste, and I wear it on me. It also serves me a reminder, how I do not hold myself responsible for what happens to these wrappers, cups, papers when I discard them from my room.
what are you looking at?
all things start with prologues- all the world’s a market, and people it’s sentient catalogues.
Come on, come come look at this everyday persona I assume, Here i am, all of me- presented through the things I consume.
from the moment I wake, so many things in use; makes me think if to have is to keep, then is to throw to lose?
combing through these thoughts streaming down my hair, cannot untangle this argument is it better to just not care?
Dreaming of the things I can be, i go about sipping on different ideas. End up catching a case of branded identity maybe over usage is my cup of tea.
heavy is the head that wears the crown can i bear the weight of my waste? i thought I had the meaning of a clean life down but here I am, my refuse un-erased.
adorning them as ornaments my hands reach out to my wants, these drinks I remember all too well not thrown away come back as taunts.
spending on daily habits how obvious is this dependency? trying to find justifications, for this trash producing recurrency.
so perfectly curated this thing I call my taste, where do i put consumption isn’t the truth in the waste?
fast cycles of news barely remembered, piled up stash. what a weird thing to behold if even knowledge gained can create trash.
my consumptions, desires and wants, with time they turn to ash, Would it change the way you see me? if the only thing visible was my trash?
Snigdha Rai is pursuing Sociology at Shiv Nadar University. This visual project has emerged out of a course on photographic image taught by Sreedeep Bhattacharya.
