Sociable Solitude: exploring 'alternative' ways of living and being 

Do solo-livers simply 'cope with' their solitude? Is it merely about 'learning to live' with it? Or are there alternative, more creative and more exciting ways of looking at time spent alone?

In this talk for The Convivial, Gayle Letherby explores the complexity of solitude - in all its positive and negative aspects. We will discuss how, in a post-pandemic age of austerity, it is easy to find talk of solo-livers, and particularly older ones, as ‘coping with’ or ‘learning to live with’ solitude. We'll think about the impact of austerity on 'third space' services such as libraries, post offices, and other communal meeting places. And we will weave together the threads of hope and alternative perspectives on solitude; not least the increasing amount of evidence of individuals choosing solitude with freedom, creativity and spirituality...

Ultimately, Gayle will reflect further on her own, and others', experience of sociable solitude - not least in order to challenge some of the simplistic stereotypes of this way of living.

Speaker

Gayle is Visiting Professor at the Universities of Plymouth, Greenwich and Bath. A sociologist, her substantive interests are varied and include reproductive and non/parental identities; meanings and experiences of love; solitude and/or loneliness, gender, health and wellbeing; loss and the aftermath of death; travel and transport mobility; teaching and learning in higher education, and gender and identity. She remains fascinated by method/ological practices; by how what we do affects what we get and what to do with what we get.