New intellectual energies The emergence and basis of non-representational theory

‘New intellectual energies: the emergence and basis of non-representational theory’ sets the disciplinary and theoretical scenes for the book so that readers are well prepared for the arguments that follow it in the subsequent seven chapters. As an ‘initiation’ to NRT, it leads readers to key developments, literatures and debates that have set up and constituted the approach to date. Chapter 1 rounds off by outlining the main critiques of NRT (i.e. getting them out of the way early in the book and providing some early responses) and by summarizing the main empirical fields that constitute current ‘more-than-representational health geography’. In terms of definitions, here the term ‘more-than-representational’ incorporates a range of scenarios including (i) research that obviously and explicitly is or uses NRT, and (ii) research that aligns with NRT’s principles and/or uses similar ideas and/or looks at least partly at similar non-representational things in the world, yet does not explicitly claim to be, or be using, NRT (see Lorimer, 2005). ‘Health geography’ meanwhile is also broadly defined as (i) research by all ‘brands’ of human geographers – including and beyond self-identifying health geographers – which has a health focus or implication, and (ii) geographical/spatial research by non-geographers which has a health focus or implication. These are liberal typologies that hold for the remainder of the book, particularly where studies in more-than-representational health geography are mined, the data from them helping to illustrate some key concepts and ideas