Dormant Gifts

Abstract This article frames domestic things that are kept but not used as dormant , drawing from research in people's homes in the UK to argue that such objects are still animated through prior, potential and material lives. Focusing specifically on gifted objects people keep, I bring together literatures on everyday material culture and on the relational dimensions of gifts to centre the underexplored phase of dormancy in the lives of gifts. Taking the perspective of the recipients of gifts, I expand the “obligations” the gift presents to include the obligation to keep and to care for gifts (even when unwanted). Keeping gifts dormant is a short-term and long-term strategy to manage the mismatch between the relations, materialities and moralities of the gift. Through an adapted follow-the-thing approach, I argue that imagination is key to how gifts are (re)animated; I follow how people imagine themselves and others through the gift, which is animated by remembered pasts and possible futures.