Feeling at Home - by Alva Gotby

About the Book

"Alva Gotby grapples with the practical and emotional questions of housing - domestic labour, privacy, security, ownership, and health. Is it possible to imagine success without home ownership? Alva Gotby makes clear that solving the housing crisis is about much more than housing stock. It is about revolutionising our everyday lives and labours"--

Book Synopsis

Our feelings about housing are political, and a grasp of them is essential to solving the housing crisis - from the author of They Call It Love

Housing is more than bricks and mortar. The home is where our hopes and dreams play out, and it lies at the heart of our lives. This is where we rest, eat, and relax. The home we enjoy can determine our health, life expectancy, and day-to-day well-being. In contrast, the lack of a stable residence can lead to mental and physical illness and often premature death. This is central to how we conceive of a good and dignified life.

Feeling at Home grapples with the practical and emotional questions of housing - domestic labour, privacy, security, ownership, and health. Is it possible to imagine success without home ownership? Alva Gotby makes clear that solving the housing crisis is about much more than housing stock. It is about revolutionising our everyday lives and labours.

Review Quotes

"Gotby is good at unpicking the contradictory positions of the Left and is great at observing the peculiarly British subplot in this global narrative ... The stratagems in this book put rational logic and utopia back in the mix."
--Holly Pester, Frieze

"A radical and refreshingly thoughtful study of housing, its effects on health and wellbeing, and the extent to which a home can dictate the quality of our lives."
--Foyles, Top Ten Reads for January 2025

"This is an insightful and necessary book by one of the most promising feminist thinkers working today. The analysis is sharp, accessible, and timely. The short, punchy chapters never outstay their welcome, and there is a wonderful diversity of approach which is impressive in such a short book. Feeling at Home is a vital resource for anybody interested in the ways we organise our domestic lives."
--Helen Hester, author of Xenofeminism, co-author of After Work

"Feeling At Home makes a compelling political case for something housing movements seem to forget: more homes, even very affordable ones, will not dismantle a fundamentally harmful and exploitative system. Gotby points toward a new horizon where housing can be a means of radically reshaping family, care, and society."
--Leslie Kern, author of Feminist City

"In the best traditions of Marxism and feminism, Alva Gotby insists on asking far better questions. The result is this sophisticated, humane and exciting book.Feeling at Homeis a multi-point perspective that reveals everything that 'home' means, and - more importantly - ought to mean. It makes the radical seem obvious, and the impossible seem essential"
--Nick Bano, author of Against Landlords

"An important focus on the complex and multi-layered nature of home and the housing question, and why we still need to fight for it."
--Andrea Gibbons, author of City of Segregation

"In her riveting new book, formidable scholar and organiser Alva Gotby tackles the personal and social calamities created by our continuing housing crisis. With elegant precision, Gotby shows how we can and must help restore the hope and vision necessary for the collective struggle for better homes for all, eliminating the widespread sense of powerlessness generated by housing precarity and instability. Feeling at Home is an essential resource for winning that struggle."
--The Care Collective, authors of The Care Manifesto

"An important contribution to debates around social reproduction, care, the family and home. In this set of essays Alva Gotby sets new horizons for the housing justice movement, laying out terrain for discussion - and struggle."
--Isaac Rose, author of Rentier City

"Alva Gotby's short, passionate, and incisive book forces us to see how the current housing crisis is exacerbated by idealized patriarchal and capitalist notions of domesticity that link private home ownership with personal success. Instead of simply calling on the state to provide more public housing, Gotby demands that we interrogate our very definition of the domestic. By breaking down the artificial boundaries that demarcate the public from the private, expanding our definition of the family, and reimagining the ways we mark successful adulthood, Gotby argues that we need bold new visions of architecture and urban planning as we endeavor to build more caring, connected, and contented societies."
--Kristen R. Ghodsee, author of Everyday Utopia

"Calmly radical ... [Feeling at Home] is a worthy handbook for those looking to, as the book's subtitle says, "transform the politics of housing"."
--Megan Kenyon, New Statesman

"Readers interested in housing policy as well as the housing crisis more generally will find much to ponder."
--Booklist

About the Author

Alva Gotby is a writer and organiser living in London. Her first book, They Call It Love, was published in 2023. She holds a PhD from the University of West London and writes about feminist theory, social reproduction, housing, emotions, and family. She is active in struggles for better homes for all.