What is Rhythmanalysis?

In recent years, there has been growing interest in Henri Lefebvre's last, posthumously published and ambitious work, Rhythmanalysis. In Rhythmanalysis, Lefebvre rethinks the everyday and urban life – key themes of his life's work - through the notion of rhythm in an attempt to grasp space and time together. Despite critiques of Lefebvre's thinking, his focus on rhythm offers researchers today a way of thinking through social questions at multiple scales.

This engaging text introduces students and researchers to Lefebvre's concept of rhythmanalysis, discusses its uptake in the social sciences in recent years, and explores its potential as an approach to research. Taking the principles of rhythmanalysis as envisaged by Lefebvre as a starting point, this introduction critically discusses where thinking through rhythm in this way can take contemporary researchers in their investigation of the social world. In particular, this book foregrounds modes of research which have brought together novel combinations of resources and techniques to tune into the different co-existing rhythms of everyday life.

Chapters review debates about the concept of rhythmanalysis and consider a range of case studies including research around walking, dancing, commuting and the financial market. Importantly Dawn Lyon highlights both the gains, limitations and potential of using rhythmanalysis to analyse the social world in the future.