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For the prolific academic writers, I am yet to add one more to the list. For now I will populate the internet. Lefebvre, Marie; Lofthouse, Vicky; Wilson, Garrath (2018): Towards a circular economy: exploring factors to repair broken electrical and electronics products by users with pro-environmental inclination. Loughborough University. Conference contribution.  https://hdl.handle.net/2134/34474   Lefebvre, Marie (2019): To repair or not to repair: an investigation of the factors influencing prosumer repair propensity. Loughborough University. Thesis.  https://doi.org/10.26174/thesis.lboro.11365325.v1

A microwave is such a handy tool, so convenient, It warms the food in a blink of 1min30s. Every worker wants a microwave. It is 7.30pm, you arrive finally at home.  The bus commute from your work office to the confine of your living room took an hour.  You are exhausted.  Sitting down in front of the computer all day wore you out.  You are starved. Your belly is rumbling. You need food it is a matter of survival. Hopefully, your level of organisation has paid off.  You have food in the fridge.  Thanks to your to-do-list called ''Get Ready For Work''. On Sunday, you prepared a week worth of dishes to keep you going.  They are all in beautifully compact Tupperware you bought in your favourite or closest super shop. You open the fridge door, you take one Tupperware, close the fridge door, take your favourite bowl on the drying rack, open the Tupperware, pour the content in.  A warm feeling wraps up your hear...

This weekend, I read the Refusal of Work by David Frayne. In the book, he defines work and exposes critical accounts of different authors on how work is valued and regarded as a morally good behaviour to engage in so that the individual can be financially independent to buy more stuff at the detriments of its own health and wellbeing and the integrity of the natural environment. He, then, shares the experiences of a number of individuals who refused to work the typical 40 hours a week in favour of working either fewer hours or not at all. The Whys, the Hows and the ongoing tension the participants of the research experience between what is currently seen as an ideal behaviour and their own provide the reader with a mirror to reflect upon their own working or non-working situation. The work of André Gorz on The Politics of Time punctuates the writing in a beautiful manner and I am thankful to have been introduced to his thoughts. Finally, He invites us to get ready to o...

In the article put forward by Graham & Thrift, he strive to put  forward that repair and maintenance is the central component of the development of economies. and a basis of our survival there is different way the article canbe quite useful within the thesis. First, in indicating that repair provide an opportunity for the being to actually learn and develop oneself through a process of innovation, indicating there and then that repair is the premist of innovation, it is when soemthing break that theindividual tend to develop himself by trying to find way to repair the item Second, that repair processes that happen in citieiss and in everyday life tend to be hidden from mot people who cannot see it happenign by reading report or hearing report when they are actually happening. people can only foresee the item as well when the alter is broken, when it works they cannot actualyy xsee the item but only focus on its function. there is all the chapter about e-waste at the ...

In the paper by ackerman,  the main intention is to delineate the research project. She decided to look at product care and define the motivation to take care of a range of products. She set her research within the content of the xircular ecinomic since it is put forward that we shall actually they to repair the items first and she put forward that by understand g the user we will be able to actually develop design interventions between the user and the product. There is a few thing that i can take from it first the way she presented the liner ecinomic in my introduction. Then the way she actually put forward the definition of product care. It will Help me to define appropriately how i differentiate my research from her. I will definitely have to put her research within repair as a strategy as well as design interventions to repair. There is also an elements within my discussion that i need to put forward in relation to design for sustainable behaviour that we shall not only lo...

This is the first Christmas that my father is not completely with us and the first month really that I am embracing the fact that he is on his own path and that I have my own. Next Christmas, my Ph.D will be submitted and who knows if he will still be with us. This piece functions as a cathartic relief as I go through what happens this year whilst being in my 3rd year of Ph.D. I hope it will Help anyone going through pre-bereavement. It gets better eventually. Last Christmas, my father is at home, he is not well, yet still vivacious and talkative. His full diagnostic is unknown. He has a depression, some hallucinations at times and can be aggressive if too tired. I spend most of the time with him. We walk in green fields, talk about the wonder of the world, laughs about silly things and discuss life and death. I even take notes of what his funeral could be like.  January comes, I am back in the UK. Two days after I left, he is at the hospital, I crash. My mum asks me to fo...

I am so frustrated. it is unbelievable to have to do it all over again in presenting my findings. I find it extreemely tiring. I am just upset to have to do it all over again and I have no way around. if you have no choice and have to do it. stop being upset and go through it. there is no way around it. - just do it. the longer you get upset about it, the longer it will take for you to actually get your findings sorted so just get a grip and doing all as quickly as possible.

There is this major project you have been working on for the last three years. You are 6 month away to close it for good. You know you are capable of doing so but you find yourself looking back each day and thinking what did you do. This is the question - where is all this time gone? You put yourself through the task of timing yourself on each projects you are juggling on. Here is is your productivity is low - you spend approximately 4 hours a day on your major project 3 on the mundane - 4 hours on others project. Before you know it, you shattered. Time for review

Receiving the appropriate support from friends, family, mentors is an important requirement to learn a new skill. Yet some skills can be simultaneously respected and looked down by our social circle. Knowing how to repair is the aggregation of many skills for which two conflicting messages are sent by those around us Why would you learn to repair when you can buy new? Isn't it wonderful to be able to repair any object coming your way? It is to ask what traits and characteristics someone has to pursue a passion/interests when the rest of the world appear at first to not be interested. It is to ask the type of environment that will nurture the inquisitive mind we all have to pursue against the odds something that appear pointless. Acquiring the skills to repair - both pointless and wonderful

Published on Thoughful I am five years old. I’m in my bedroom with my coloured pencils and colouring book. Opening the book, I grab a pencil and start colouring. And then, it happens—the thing that always happens to kids my age. I simply cannot stay inside the lines. I am frustrated. It is SO FRUSTRATING! Crying out for my mum to save me from this colouring disaster, she opens the door. “What’s wrong?” “Help!” She sits next to me. She takes a pencil. She shows me how to do it. “Stay calm, take a deep breath, and move the pencil around the edges of the picture, like this,” she explains. I watch her carefully. I follow her instructions. I fail a few times. And then, like magic, I am no longer going outside the lines. I am a colouring genius. And all it took was one word—help. It has taken me a couple of decades, some academic research and a little reminiscing to get to this simple truth… that in a weird way, help is like glue. When something is broken, vexingly incomplete, help is the b...

I have one year left to finish my ph.d. My topic is on the factors influencing consumers to repair small electrical products. It is linked to this concept called the circular economy. It take a pro-conservation lense as opposed to a pro-growth  focus. but you will soon understand after reading how the three years went that it is all a mirage. My first year was special. I organised a festival. It was called the Green Festival of Making and Mending, here in Leicester. It was the birth of me. a painful birth but nevertheless worth it. I was trying to manage as best as I could my voluntary activities with university. I was trying to find my voice in this mess called the literature review. It was a struggle but I manage to get there eventually.  I believed that all humans can acquire new skills and flourish by working together. It is through this mean that we can make our time here better and help generations to come to live longer and safer on this planet. I wanted to organise m...

Every two weeks or so I am meeting up with my Ph.D supervisors to talk about my research topic. At out last meeting, we finalise my research question... --- 2 Years ago, 1 month after starting my new job, 3 month after finishing my studies, it was clear for me that I wanted to go back to academia. I set up myself to gain a bit of experience and look for a new job. 18 month ago, I had two interviews, one for a knowledge transfer partnership leading to Ph.D with Birmingham City University and one for a Ph.D with Cranfield University on Sustainability and Communications. Deep inside it was not really what I was looking for. 12 month ago, I almost gave up finding the Ph.D. Then, I changed my mind. I systematically send emails to to find the gap where I could jump in 9 month ago I applied for Design Star with the intention to investigate how design for sustainable behaviour and eco-design will contribute to the concept of the Circular Economy. 2 month ago, I started my Ph...

Published on Restart Project My name is Marie Lefebvre. I co-founded with Divya Pujara, Leicester Fixers in 2014 with the support of  Footpaths , a carbon footprint project,  Leicester Hackspace  and Transition Leicester. Other little things about myself, I am not a repairer yet I am absolutely delighted every time an electrical item gets opened and I can see inside it. I am also a Ph.D student at Loughborough University investigating the propensity of users of stuff to repair. I love each and every Restart Party because I always learn something new and meet lovely people.

I have been contemplating using storytelling as a method to investigate the narrative of people trying to repair devices. Instead of looking for journals that indicate the limitations and quality of this particular research method. I spent most my day looking out for pieces of information on how to become a storyteller. I have learnt a few things. First of all, a story is a strategic tool that can be used to change the world. It is a device that most of us as some way some how have and this through the magic of language. Language, sound is what allow us to connect with others. It is through this connection that we make that we can find ways to create a more compelling world. It is a leadership device that we have to make the best use of. It is our opportunity to get closer to others through the story we tell. There is ways of telling a compelling stories. The story has to be visual in order to transport the audience in your realm. You have to show and not tell, body gestures an...

This Saturday at the Restart Party, we haven't managed to repair my poor mobile phone ( PART 1) . Luckily, one of the members of the Hackspace have a spare one that is happy to lend me until I am able to repair my own. I accept gratefully. I get home and get myself two spares part to replace the screen on my mobile phone. They arrived at home. I put them in a drawer. They stay there. The current mobile phone that was lent to me is perfectly convenient for the time being. I forget to bring the replacement screen at the next restart party and I come to learn that the person who lent me the mobile phone has gone and will never come back to Leicester and I will not find a way to give it back to him. I accept fate. Months pass by and I never manage to repair my old mobile phone. it is somewhere in a drawer with its spare parts. I forget about it. I have a working phone in my hands. Until this Sunday morning after having repaired the bottom drawer of a cupboard, the scre...

Since September 2014, My main project focus has been on repair. I have been working with Zina, founder of Footpaths, a carbon reduction project in Leicester to organise the Green Festival of Making & Mending on the 31st October 2015 and a serie of events throughout 2015. Our main aim was to introduce people to ingenious ideas to repair and upcycle items in an environmentally friendly way. The event idea stemmed the recognition of our own vulnerabilities. Zina and I were not really the creative/diy type. For me, personally, my hands were only used as so far for typing and some random drawing but never to make something tangible. Maybe they were but I never appreciated their magnificence. Is gold in our hands? A year working on festival and following up to that, I mended all my clothes, darned socks and gloves, repaired a mobile phone, made a rag rug and a banner, painted signs, made sculptures out of papers and christmas decorations, repaired pieces of furnitures, shortened cu...

Quote  ''the experience of the last decades shows that the current neo-liberal policies lead to income polarisation, an increasing number of poor plus a growing number of very rich individuals, at the detriment of the middle class (OECD, 2011c). Whereas there is no correlation between economic growth and poverty reduction, there is a strong one between reducing poverty and the existence of a welfare state (Alber, 2002). Thus redistribution of wealth and income can be understood as an immediate necessity for sustainable development. However, such considerations play no role in the OECD green growth concept'' (Lorek & Spangenberg, 2014) References Alber, J. (2002). Besser als sein Ruf - Der Sozialstaat als erfolgreiches Modell. Witteilungen 98. Lorek, S., & Spangenberg, J. H. (2014). Sustainable consumption within a sustainable economy – beyond green growth and green economies. Journal of Cleaner Production, 63, 33–44. http://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2...

A while ago, I had dinner with this lovely young eastern European woman. It was our first encounter. She has been living in the UK for only two weeks. she had already a job and an accommodation. We started talking about our academic achievement. She mentioned that she had a master in digital literature. I suggested that she could possibly do her Ph.D at the University of Reading. She shrugged and said  'I have been working as a research administrator in a university for two years. I was the one who convinced students not to do their Ph.D.  Ph.D students slave themselves away for three years of their life. They carry out valuable research, write papers and go to conference, yet they are underpaid and they will probably not get a job at the end of it. Academia is an industry where Ph.D are a herd being truthfully exploited.' It was partially true. I started my Ph.D to escape the dogma of some other mainstream form of exploitation I wanted to be my own project. Academ...