
Series
Volume 12
Life Course, Culture and Aging: Global Transformations
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The Anthropology of Retirement
Life Beyond Work
Edited by Daniel Miller and Pauline Garvey
Afterward by David Prendergast
218 pages, bibliog., index
ISBN 978-1-83695-037-0 $135.00/£104.00 / Hb / Not Yet Published (July 2025)
eISBN 978-1-83695-036-3 eBook Not Yet Published
Reviews
“This is a unique contribution to the anthropology of work, adulthood and later life, bringing ethnographic insight to local understandings of retirement in ways that provide a ground for cross-national comparison.” • Jason Danely, Oxford Brookes University
Description
As a result of growing life expectancy, the period of retirement is likely to surpass the entire period of working life in many countries. There is little acknowledgement that retirement is not an event but an extended period of life that unfolds over several decades. Experiences vary considerably across the globe, from areas where most people cannot afford to retire to places where a multitude of new possibilities are being developed for retirees. This book is an anthropological approach to consider life beyond retirement in a wide range of contexts and consequences.
Daniel Miller is Professor of Anthropology at University College London and directs the Centre for Digital Anthropology. He was the leader for two major European Research Council five-year funded projects, Why We Post on the use and consequences of social media, and ASSA the Anthropology of Smartphones and Smart Ageing. His most recent books include The Good Enough Life (Polity Books, 2023) and Ageing with Smartphones in Ireland, with Pauline Garvey (UCL Press, 2021).
Pauline Garvey is Associate Professor of Anthropology at Maynooth University. Recent research projects include the Anthropology of Smartphones and Smart Ageing led by University College London and funded by the European Research Council. Her recent book, with Daniel Miller is entitled Ageing with Smartphones in Ireland: When Life Becomes Craft (UCL Press, 2021). Other works include Unpacking IKEA: Swedish Design for the Purchasing Masses (Routledge, 2018).