"Make Do and Mend" became the catchcry of a generation that kept calm and carried on through the darkest days of World War II.
The slogan was adopted by the British Ministry of Information as part of a general campaign of advice on everything from growing vegetables, disguising leftovers and making new clothes from old. Woollen jumpers were unpicked and reknitted, government-issue blankets upcycled into skirts and jackets and municipal flower beds given over to cabbages and carrots.
Today, as the world confronts fresh environmental and economic hardships, the lessons of that time are being heeded with a growing sense of urgency. Blogs offering tips on how to "Cook Like Grandma", books with titles such as Cold Meat and How to Disguise It and online discussions about keeping chooks, preserving vegetables, stocking a larder and baking bread point to a hankering for the past that goes beyond pure nostalgia.
Melbourne sociologist and writer Ruth Quibell lives with her husband and two young children in a rented house devoid of microwave, television or car. An elderly neighbour once told her: "You live like you're in 1940s England!"
Quibell says that while the family's lifestyle "might look like deprivation to outsiders", it arises from a carefully considered choice that is "primarily about a relationship to time".
"We earn less to have more time with our children, more choice over work and more time to be creative and independent. As a result, we largely only buy what we need and can afford. We work, sew, write, cook, walk ... our home is a hodge-podge of old and hand-me-down things."
Other evidence of this back-to-basics boom is all around: retro-hip magazines such as Frankie and Peppermint offer cute stick-on labels with their homemade jam recipes, step-by-step embroidery guides for revamping old jumpers and fashion spreads featuring clothes made from disused film reels and recycled newspapers. Charities target hip young shoppers through specialist recycle boutiques in inner-city suburbs and farmers' markets draw ever-growing crowds of people prepared to pay more for locally grown food. Gleaners, meanwhile, opt to pay nothing at all by raiding supermarket bins or "feral fruit trees" whose branches overhang laneways and other public spaces. Anecdotally, there are tales of young Melburnians making their own dripping from reused fat or saving tomato seeds for next year's backyard crop.
A 2003 study by the Australia Institute's Clive Hamilton and Elizabeth Mail found that 23 per cent of Australians aged 30-59 had downshifted in the previous 10years. The study defined downshifters as "those people who make a voluntary, long-term lifestyle change that involves accepting significantly less income and consuming less".
Quibell says "downshifters" are among "a plethora of individuals" adopting a simpler life – "frugals, downshifters, those who practise backyard self-sufficiency, dumpster divers, home schoolers, crafters, artisans, bohemians, environmentalists. The list could go on.""In the '70s, women were told 'don't cook, don't make clothes for your family, go out to get a job'. There's a generation of women whose mothers went back to work ... It was the rise of consumerism, you had more money, so you bought clothes, you didn't make them ... [their children] missed out on learning to do things with their hands, getting their hands dirty."For Quibell, the return to basics satisfies "a hankering for the past, when life was slower, simpler, things lasted and were better made".At the dawn of what may well come to be regarded as the new age of austerity, there is also, she says, "the sneaking suspicion that progress isn't all that it was cracked up to be".
Quibell says "downshifters" are among "a plethora of individuals" adopting a simpler life – "frugals, downshifters, those who practise backyard self-sufficiency, dumpster divers, home schoolers, crafters, artisans, bohemians, environmentalists. The list could go on."
...former deputy PM Tim Fischer has floated the radical idea of selling visas for $1 million each to rich foreigners and using the money to build a high-speed train.
The special permanent quota residence visas would be "aimed squarely at the nervous, rich middle class of parts of Asia, Europe and the Middle East who want bolt holes", he said.
COMPLAINTS about the rising cost of living appear to have little basis in fact, a new study reveals.
It shows that incomes have more than kept up with prices, and in 2009-10 the average family was $224 a week better off than in 2003-04.
''I don't want to say everyone is doing wonderfully well,'' said Ben Phillips, the study's author. ''But there's been this 'rising cost of living' story over the last decade when, really, Australian households are doing better than ever.''
The study, by the National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling at the University of Canberra and AMP, says it is ''bigger lifestyles'' rather than higher costs that are exerting pressures on many households.
''If there are pressures they are coming from keeping up with the Joneses and our higher expectations,'' Mr Phillips said. ''We're spending bigger, and on a wider range of goods and services, such as private schools, and we're spending more on discretionary or luxury items, like restaurants.''
Working couples with children are $328 a week better off in real terms than in 2003, and single parents are better off - but only by $59 a week. The highest quintile of income earners are $576 a week better off.
Petrol has increased by 208 per cent since 1984 but is still cheaper than in every country except the US, Canada and Mexico.
at the current rate Australia's population will double in less than 70 years
How likely is it that the younger generation of Australians will start emigrating out to other countries due to the persistant drought conditions?
Return to Australia & New Zealand Discussion
Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 0 guests