Dissertation – followthethings.com

Posted on December 19, 2024September 9, 2025 by Ian Cook

The Connectivitea Of Britain And Sri Lanka

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Grocery

“The Connectivitea Of Britain And Sri Lanka“
A dissertation by Sarah Wrathmell, submitted as part of their BA Geography degree at the University of Birmingham, UK.
Sample pages from its findings chapters are embedded in the slideshow above. Click them to read the dissertation.

Undergraduate Geography student Sarah Wrathmell has an ambitious idea for her dissertation research. She wants to travel to Sri Lanka to find the people who grow her morning cup of tea on a plantation in Kandy, Sri Lanka. She plans to ‘follow the thing’ and to undertake some multisited ethnographic fieldwork along the supply chain of ‘Tillings’ (a pseudonym) loose breakfast tea. She ends up writing about six places: the tea garden where the tea is grown, its collection spaces, its production factory (all in Sri Lanka), its blending factory, a specialist tea shop, and a tea garden where she shares a pot of tea with a group of friends (all in the UK). She talks to pickers, packers and drivers; visits factories and talks to people tasting, processing and packaging it to exacting standards; and finally drinks that tea with those drinkers. This is embodied, sensory work that she has to – somehow – get on the page. What she wants to understand is what, and who, are the ingredients in her tea? And how are the lives of the people involved in making and drinking it interrelated? As a reader, your job is to follow her on her travels as she tries to make sense of this. Its assessors say it’s a fantastic piece of work. So, it’s submitted for a national dissertation prize. It wins this unanimously. We have a grainy .pdf copy that you can download and read. It’s important to show that not only are there high profile films, publications, and other forms of trade justice research and activism to pay attention to. Students have been doing this work too, for much smaller audiences, for years. What can this work look like?

Dissertation reference: Sarah Wrathmell (2003) The Connectivitea of Britain & Sri Lanka. BA Geography Dissertation: University of Birmingham, UK (followthethings.com/the-connectivitea-of-Britain-and-sri-lanka.shtml last accessed <insert date here>)

Page reference: Sarah Wrathmell (2024) The Connectivitea of Britain & Sri Lanka. followthethings.com/the-connectivitea-of-Britain-and-sri-lanka.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 60 minutes.

Posted on November 10, 2024September 9, 2025 by Ian Cook

The Fruits Of Our Labour: An Avocado’s Story

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Grocery

“The Fruits Of Our Labour: An Avocado’s Story“
A dissertation by Freddie Abrahams, submitted as part of their BA Geography degree at the University of Birmingham, UK.
Sample pages from Introduction, Methodology & Findings in slideshow above. Click them to read the dissertaion.

Undergraduate student Freddie Abrahams is shocked to discover that the Carmel-branded, ‘Produce of Israel’ avocados he eats may be grown on illegally seized Palestinian land. There’s a campaign in the UK to boycott these fruits. So he contacts Agrexco, the Israeli company that supplies them, and asks if it’s possible to find out for himself. He travels to Israel and ends up on kibbutz farms. They’re not on Palestinian land. And they’re not farmed by Palestinian people. The people he meets are migrant workers from Ethiopia, Thailand and other countries. He’s baffled. The boycott protestors are so angry. They say that all Israeli avocados should be boycotted. But the Agrexco managers he’s met have helped him so much with his research. They have been so open. He hasn’t seen any avocados being grown on Palestinian land. But Agrexco wouldn’t help him to see that, would they? His research does throw some doubt on facts of the boycott. So what’s his dissertation about? Following acovados? And/or the politics of knowledge in following avocados. What research are thing-followers allowed to do? What access can they gain to what spaces? Who gives permission? Who shapes what they learn to see? Freddie’s research was unusually easy to do.

Dissertation reference: Freddie Abrahams (2007) The Fruits Of Our Labour: An Avocado’s Story. BA Geography Dissertation: University of Birmingham, UK (followthethings.com/the-fruits-of-our-labour-an-avocados-story.shtml last accessed <insert date here>)

Page reference: Freddie Abrahams (2011) The Fruits Of Our Labour: An Avocado’s Story. followthethings.com/the-fruits-of-our-labour-an-avocados-story.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 60 minutes.

Posted on August 28, 2024September 9, 2025 by Ian Cook

Made In Cambodia

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Fashion

BRING PEOPLE TOGETHER

ENCOURAGE EMPATHY

“Made in Cambodia“
A dissertation by Helen Clare, submitted as part of their BA Geography degree at the University of Birmingham, UK.
Click the preview pages above to read the dissertation.

Undergraduate student Helen Clare looks through her clothes and finds an H&M t-shirt ‘Made in Cambodia’. She’s traveling to Cambodia to do some charity work in her summer vacation. She wants to find and meet one of the garment factory workers who helped to make that T-shirt for her. But, despite her best efforts, she cannot gain access to the factories where she’s convinced it may have been made. So, she does the next best thing. She takes a course that will give her the qualification to work there. What does she learn along the way? Who does she get to meet? And what can she learn from them about the lives her t-shirt connects?

Dissertation reference: Helen Clare (2006) Made in Cambodia. BA Geography Dissertation: University of Birmingham, UK (followthethings.com/madeincambodia.shtml last accessed <insert date here>)

Page reference: Helen Clare (2024) Made in Cambodia. followthethings.com/made-in-cambodia.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 92 minutes.