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Car Seat

Car seat (assembled in the UK, sat on in the UK and beyond)
Film (2006): in 1968, a group of women sewing car seat covers at a Ford factory in the UK go on strike for equal pay. The strike leads to the passing of equal pay legislation in the UK and overseas. In 2003, film producer Stephen Woolley hears the strikers' reunion on the radio and he's fascinated. Can he turn their struggle into a mainstream movie that celebrates strike action? Click for more...

Jeans

Ford Ka + (made in Spain, driven in the UK)
Undergraduate coursework (2014): student Charlotte Brunton gets free lifestyle catalogues in the mail all the time. But the lifestyles they showcase are those of consumers, whose lifestyles are separated from those who have made the products on show: like her Ford Ka. She wonders what a catalogue would look like if their lifestyles were shown together. So she makes one, about her lifestyle, featuring her favourite things, and the people who may have made them. Click for more...

Oil

Oil (produced in Caspian Sea, consumed in Europe)
Popular book (2012): authors James Marriott and Mika Minio-Paluello travel the length of the 'oil road' taking crude oil from the Caspian Sea to refineries in Europe and, from there, into the region's cars, buses, & other oil-burning machines. This is not a dry account of the region's 'energy security' and oil geopolitics. It's a vivid piece of industrial travel writing. They find this oil's human stories, secret places and complex connections, and companies and governments that don't want them to be revealed. Click for more...

Oil

Oil (produced in Nigeria, consumed worldwide)
Coffee table book (2008): photojournalist Ed Kashi visits the oilfields of the Niger Delta to document the consequences of 50 years of oil extraction on people and environment. His photographs are published in a book edited by geographer Michael Watts containing essays by prominent Nigerian journalists and human rights activists, and Watts himself. It looks and feels like a coffee table book: hardback, large glossy photos, and text. It's a thing of beauty, but its subject matter is very far from 'beautiful'. Click for more...

Oil

Oil (produced in Ecuador, consumed worldwide)
Documentary film (2009): 30,000 people living in Ecuador's remote Amazon rainforest are taking oil producer Chevron to court in the US over the dumping of toxic waste that has (allegedly) ruined their environment, livelihoods and health. Filmmaker Joe Berlinger follows the case, as it grows 'from a little known legal story into an international cause célèbre'. Click for more...