non-representational theory A movement in human geography that aims to bring into critical focus those routine and diverse aspects of daily life that generally go unnoticed, even by the people who live and perform them, such as the sensations we experience walking down the street and the bodily knowledges we deploy in order to walk down the street. It is non-representational theory because it is interested in the pre-personal and pre-subject affects and bodily engagements that are not fully present to the mind, and are not fully available to the mind. To continue the example of walking down the street, this refers to the fact that in walking we do not have to consciously tell our legs what to do in order to walk: we just do it. Non-representational theory has three key practical and theoretical commitments: firstly, it is thoroughly materialist (it is in many ways a parallel or perhaps sub-branch of new materialism in this regard) in that it places no restriction on what kind of material it considers---it treats all material as active, as doing something; secondly, it pays particular attention to the ontology of relations which, following Deleuze, Gilles, it treats as external to its terms (i.e. the relation of being taller or shorter than another person does not depend on the existence of that other person); it gives consideration to transcultural entities as well as entities that are present or absent. Ultimately, it may be said that non-representational theory is a theory of emergence; it is interested in the coming-into-being and the individuation of bodies, affects, subjects, and practices. and it tracks these wherever they may be found, regardless of how mundane or ordinary. Further Reading: B. Anderson and P. Harrison Taking-Place: Non-Representational Theories and Geography (2010).