{"id":307,"date":"2026-05-09T19:27:55","date_gmt":"2026-05-09T18:27:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/2026\/05\/09\/reading-list-ethnographies-of-construction\/"},"modified":"2026-05-09T19:30:18","modified_gmt":"2026-05-09T18:30:18","slug":"reading-list-ethnographies-of-construction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/2026\/05\/09\/reading-list-ethnographies-of-construction\/","title":{"rendered":"Reading list: ethnographies of construction"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This is a working bibliography of <em>book-length<\/em> ethnographies of construction sites \u2014 not edited volumes, not journal articles, not sociology of the building industry written from the office. The selection criterion is method: the author spent a substantial period on at least one site, and the resulting book is structured around what the site taught them.<\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The list is organised first by region and then by publication year, oldest to newest. It is not exhaustive, and that is the point: missing entries should be added, and outdated framings should be flagged. Use the contact form to propose additions or corrections.<\/p>\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">South Asia<\/h3>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Six titles from 1986 onward, focused on rural-to-urban migrant labour, wage withholding, and the social organisation of contracting chains. Three of the six are in Hindi or Bengali first editions; English translations are noted where they exist.<\/p>\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Latin America<\/h3>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Eight titles, weighted toward Brazilian and Mexican sites, two from the Andes. Several engage formally with the design-as-command argument that anchors a strand of the field.<\/p>\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Sub-Saharan Africa<\/h3>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Four titles, with strong emphasis on infrastructure megaprojects and the political economy of contracting. The most recent (2024) covers a port expansion and is the only one in the list that engages the carbon politics of cement directly.<\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Open call:<\/strong> we are looking for nominations from East and Southeast Asia, the Maghreb, and the post-Soviet space, where the list is currently thin. <a href=\"\/staging\/contact\/\">Send titles in.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A working bibliography of book-length ethnographies of construction sites, organised by region and date. Open for additions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":68,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"subgroup":[],"class_list":["post-307","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-resources"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":312,"href":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307\/revisions\/312"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307"},{"taxonomy":"subgroup","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/productionstudies.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/subgroup?post=307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}