Work for food and accommodation: Negotiating socio-economic relationships in non-commercial work-exchange encounters

The concept of ‘work for food and accommodation’ is part of a significant social trend in contemporary societies, of the slow food, sustainability and back-to-the-land movement. It is an alternative form of travelling and hospitality as much as it is part of an alternative economy that deliberately avoids encounters governed by the logics of the market, where people seek alternative ways of engaging with, and relating to, others. Taking the international World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms (WWOOF) movement as my empirical context, I investigate the nature of hospitality in the work-exchange relationship by analysing how participants negotiate their social and economic relationships through food and reciprocity. Based on ethnographic research, this article discusses power and boundaries, social control, inclusion and exclusion, and exchange and reciprocity between hosts and helpers, demonstrating how the host–guest dichotomy dissolves when the boundaries between production and consumption become blurred. I argue that food and beverage, hospitality and mutual help play a significant role in establishing, negotiating and nurturing these exchange relationships between barter and gift exchange. There is a dearth of research on work-exchange that this article addresses. Drawing on insights from ethnographic and other social science research alongside theoretical discussions of hospitality ‘as a way of relating’, the article aims to contribute new ways of understanding and theorizing the work-exchange encounter.