S2. Holidays

TWT FM

In this final episode of our series on leisure we look at holidays. During the pandemic, we’ve seen campaigners arguing for the “right to holiday”; now, as we finally begin to open up, we see the complications of permitting limited international travel as the pandemic continues to devastate other countries. Meanwhile, the hospitality industry within the UK braces itself for what could be its busiest ever season.

All this gave us at TWT cause to reflect on the psychic and political framing of holidaying. The aesthetics of holidays are bound by class; from the gentrification and dispossession that tourism and holiday home ownership can engender, to the extreme indulgences of luxury travel. Rethinking the conditions and implications of holidaying is part of a wider socialist project.

TWT FM is a podcast from The World Transformed. This episode was produced by Sarah Vowden, Matt Huxley, Aron Keller, Oli Cox and Charlie Clarke, with contributions from Stephanie Sherman from Autonomy, Owen Hatherley, Mark Jenkin, Ben Norris and Martha Dillon from Its Freezing in LA.