202 <strong>The</strong> experience <strong>of</strong> space and timerecognize, <strong>of</strong> course, that our mental processes and perceptions canplay tricks, make seconds feel like light years, or pleasurable hourspass by so fast we hardly notice. We may also learn to appreciatehow different societies (or even different sub-groups) cultivate quitedifferent senses <strong>of</strong> time (see table 3.2).In modern society, many different senses <strong>of</strong> time get pinned together.Cyclical and repetitive motions (everything from daily breakfastand" going/to work, to seasonal rituals like festivals, birthdays,vacations, thq openings <strong>of</strong> baseball or cricket seasons) provide asense <strong>of</strong> secu,i-ity in a world where the general thrust <strong>of</strong> progressappears to be' ever onwards and upwards into the firmament <strong>of</strong> theunknown. When the sense <strong>of</strong> pr()i;!ess is checked by depression orrecession, by war or social disruption, we may reassure ourselves(somewhat) either with the idea <strong>of</strong> cyclical time ('long waves,''kondratieff cycles,' etc.) as a natural phenomenon to which we mustperforce adapt, or dredge up an even more compelling image <strong>of</strong> somestable universal propensity (such as innate human quarrelsomeness)as the perpetual counterpoint to progress. At another level we cansee how what Hareven (1982) calls 'fami!y _tme' (the time implicit inraising children and transferring knowledge and assets between generationsthrough kinship networks) may be mobilized to meet theexigencies <strong>of</strong> 'industrial time' which allocates and reallocates labourto tasks according to powerful rhythms <strong>of</strong> technological and locationalchange forged out <strong>of</strong> the restless search for capital accumulation.And in moments <strong>of</strong> despair or e;.caltation, who among us can refrainfrom invoking' the tipe' <strong>of</strong> tatte,
204 <strong>The</strong> experience <strong>of</strong> space and timetime, space, and time-space in physics has, in fact, been marked bystrong epistemological breaks and reconstructions. <strong>The</strong> conclusionwe should draw is simply that neither time nor space can be assignedobjective meanings independently <strong>of</strong> material processes, and that it isonly through investigation <strong>of</strong> the latter that we can properly groundour concepts <strong>of</strong> the former. This is not, <strong>of</strong>.course, a new conclusion.It confirms the general thrust <strong>of</strong> several earlier thinkers, <strong>of</strong> whom-Dilthey and Durkheim are the most prominent.From this materialist perspective we can then argue that objectiveconceptions <strong>of</strong> time and space are necessarily created through materialpractices and processes which serve to reproduce social life. <strong>The</strong>Plains Indians or the African Nuer ojectify qualities <strong>of</strong> time andspace that are as separate from each other as they are distant fromthose ingrained within a capitalist mode <strong>of</strong> production. <strong>The</strong> objectivity<strong>of</strong> time and space is given in each case by the material practices <strong>of</strong>\ social reproduction, and to the degree that these latter vary geographicallyand historically, so we find that social time and socialspace are differentially constructed. Each distinctive mode <strong>of</strong> productionor social formation will, in short, embody a distinctivebundle <strong>of</strong> time and space practices and concepts.Since capitalism has been (and continues to be) a revolutionarymode <strong>of</strong> production in which the material practices and processes <strong>of</strong>social reproduction are always changing, it follows that the objectivequalities as well as the meanings <strong>of</strong> space and time also change. Onthe other hand, if advance <strong>of</strong> knowledge (scientific, technical, administrative,bureaucratic, and rational) is vital to the progress <strong>of</strong>capitalist production and consumption, then changes in our conceptualapparatus (including representations <strong>of</strong> space and time) can havematerial consequences for the ordering <strong>of</strong> daily life. When, for example,a planner-architect like Le Corbusier, or an administrator likeHaussmann, creates a built environment in which the tyranny <strong>of</strong> thestraight line predominates, then we must perforce adjust our dailypractices.This does not mean that practices are determined by built form (nomatter how hard the planners may try); for they have the awkwardhabit <strong>of</strong> escaping their moorings in any fixed schema <strong>of</strong> representation.New meanings can be found for older materializations <strong>of</strong> space andtime. We appropriate ancient space __ in very modern ways, treat timeand hiStory-as' something to create rather than to accept. <strong>The</strong> sameconcept <strong>of</strong>, say, 'community' (as a social entity created in spacethrough time) can disguise radical differences in meaning because theprocesses <strong>of</strong> community production themselves diverge remarkablyaccording to group capacities and interests. Yet the treatment <strong>of</strong>Introduction 205communities as if they are comparable (by, say, a planning agency)has material implications to which the social practices <strong>of</strong> people wholive in them have to respond.Beneath the veneer <strong>of</strong> common-sense and seemingly 'natural' ideasabout space and time, there lie hidden terrains <strong>of</strong> ambiguity, contradiction,and struggle. Conflicts arise not merely out <strong>of</strong> admittedly Idiverse subjective appreciations, but because different objective imaterial qualities <strong>of</strong> time and space are deemed relevant to social lifein different situations. Important battles likewise occur in the realms<strong>of</strong> scientific, social, and aesthetic theory, as well as in practice. Howwe represent space and time in theory matters, because it affects howwe and others interpret and then act with respect to the world.Consider, for example, one <strong>of</strong> the more startling schisms in ourintellectual heritage concerning conceptions <strong>of</strong> time and space. Socialtheories (and I here think <strong>of</strong> traditions emanating from Marx, Weber,Adam Smith, and Marshall) typically privilege time over space intheir formulations. <strong>The</strong>y broadly assume either the existence <strong>of</strong> somepre-existing spatial order within which temporal processes operate,or that spatial barriers have been so reduced as to render space acontingent rather than fundamental aspect to human action. Aesthetictheory, on the other hand, is deeply concerned with 'the spatialization<strong>of</strong> time.'It is a tribute to the compartmentalizations in Western thoughtthat this disjunction has for so long passed largely unremarked. Onthe surface, the difference is not too hard to understand. Socialtheory _b.as.--'ll W_
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