My chosen object for this assignment is a water bottle. More specifically, it’s my large, 40-ounce insulated water bottle that I carry with me everywhere. I have always had these types of containers with me from middle school until now, and have only since retired one of them after it physically could not hold any more liquid. I noticed that I would finish at least 3 full containers of water daily – that’s over 3 litres of water a day. I found that I would sip on water when I have nothing to do, when I’m anxious and want a break, or, of course, when I feel tired and dehydrated. If I forget my bottle at home, sometimes I struggle to focus. Water and hydration was a constant thing I sought after, and my water bottle helped keep it by me at all times. Funnily enough, I would sleep with my water bottle by my side when I was younger, needing access to water as conveniently as possible at night. Ultimately, my water bottle is more than just a vessel for water. It is an object I interact with daily that affords me comfort and mediates the body with the rest of the environment through routine care.
Similar to Marx’s table, my water bottle is an object that goes beyond materiality and the commodification of objects. Rather, it is a vessel for meaning and embodying the relationships with the self and the world around us. My personal interaction with my bottle is apparent through its appearance, with dents and scratches to reflect movement through space and time, and stickers that tell stories of who I am as an individual. The clear wear and tear of my bottle highlights how present the object has been in my lifestyle. The instances in which I use my water bottle the most emphasise how it has become a personal symbol of comfort and care, rather than a fetishised commodity. However, it is easy for capitalism to take over especially when consumer culture is as prevalent as ever and the idea of an ‘emotional support water bottle’ has become commodified, where brands such as Stanley or Owala have capitalised on lifestyle trends. Philosopher Jean Baudrillard best reflects this idea when describing a commodities’ ability to foster the desire that drives capitalism, ultimately making ideology invisible. Through this lens, a mass-produced, branded water bottle can easily disappear in the background of consumerism as just another everyday gadget. However, my bottle, with its scratches, dents, and stickers, becomes Baudrillard’s wooden radio and resists object invisibility. It instead makes visible how objects can cease to be a fetishised commodity, and instead a personal archive of lived experiences and embodied routines.
Alongside its ability to reject fetishised commodification, my water bottle has mediated my embodiment and care for the self and body. Bernadette Wegenstein’s chapter on the body describes the body as the primordial medium, where experience is produced. My water bottle makes this concept visible. While consumer culture commercialises the need to stay hydrated, my bottle affords me more than functional utility; it mediates the act of pausing, routine, and caring for my body throughout the day. Taking a break to drink water amidst a transient lifestyle helps me reconnect with my body, framing hydration as a lived experience. Especially in contemporary life, Wegenstein claims the idea of ‘multiple selves’ where the digital age has fragmented the body and the self. The act of pausing, staying grounded, and keeping a routine through hydration and the constant of a water bottle with me mediates the idea of a single embodiment. It allows the self to return to being present and bodily care in a culture of distraction. In a way, the bottle rejects the idea of disembodiment, forcing awareness and mediation of Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s concept of the ‘flesh,’ where he claims that flesh is the bridge between the body and the world. Drinking water is not just a functional act but an embodied one. The taste and smell of the water and metal container, the sensation of swallowing, carrying the bottle, hearing the water move around the bottle. These tactile, sensory moments highlight how the body and the object are intertwined. It is through this entanglement that my water bottle evolves beyond being an object. It also mediates embodiment, highlighting how self-care is shaped through everyday practices of routine, identitiy, and relationality.
Ultimately, what first appears to be an everyday commodity can be transformed to mediate the self through personal sentiments and lived experiences. While there is no doubt that ideologies of capitalism and consumerism are present in branding and current online trends that turn insulated water bottles into a fad, my personal water bottle brings these once ‘invisible’ concepts in contemporary life to the forefront. In doing so, materiality is rejected, becoming instead a unique object that serves as a record of lived practises and routines.
Works Cited
Turkle, Sherry. “WHAT MAKES AN OBJECT EVOCATIVE? .” pp. 307–326.Wegenstein, Bernadette. “Body.” Critical Terms for Media Studies, pp. 19–34.
Hi Ela!
I really enjoyed reading this, as someone who has a history of being chronically dehydrated, which is being undone by my love for my current water bottle. I related to this a lot. When I was reading this, I was also thinking about the parallel between a loved and consistently used water bottle covered in stickers, versus a perfectly kept one that can be seen as a collectible, like the Stanley Cup trend a couple of years back. People’s personality can show through in their everyday objects, and a well-loved waterbottle is a great example of that. I think your ability to tie your attachment and dependence on your water bottle to the texts we think and read about in class was flawless, and the entire essay had great flow! Thanks for sharing that side of you!
Hi Celeste! Thank you for the comment 🙂 I am glad that you were able to relate, and I completely agree about being able to customise your belongings to your liking to represent yourself through things. Especially with trends like you mentioned, it is easy for people to just ‘baby’ their items and not even use them, or use them in really outrageous ways (like those TikToks of people filling their Stanley cups with unnecessary accessories or holders for snacks, their vape, and keys, etc.), so I appreciate that we have the same sentiments for our own belongings in cherishing them by actually using them and letting them wear down!
Hi Ela,
Super glad to see that you posted your evocative object on the blog as I was really intrigued with your idea during tutorial. I just read Kim Chi’s post about her lunch box and I thought your post kind of went hand in hand with her sentiment: a childhood vessel of sustenance that you brought to school, your parents prepared for you, etc. I liked how you also connected it to more recent events in the waterbottle industry, like the Owala/Stanley pandemic and the hyperconsumerism behind it. I remember seeing videos about people BOLTING to get Wicked x Stanley waterbottles at Target, so I appreciate your loyalty to your own waterbottle.
Thank you for your comment, Victoria! I agree that my object’s sentiments are tied almost perfectly to Kim Chi’s lunchbox. Reading through hers and also listening to Nicole’s discussion of her object (her bunny) reminded me how different objects can truly evoke similar attachments to people, and I thought that was an interesting reflection point.
Hi Ela！
I really liked your post and how you turned something as ordinary as a water bottle into a way of thinking about embodiment and care. The part where you brought in Baudrillard really caught my attention — it’s interesting how you show the shift from a branded, commodified object to something deeply personal that resists invisibility through its dents and stickers. It made me think about how our everyday routines can quietly challenge consumer culture.
I also found your use of Wegenstein and Merleau-Ponty very insightful. The way you describe hydration as an embodied act — the taste of metal, the movement of water, the pause it gives you — really connects theory with lived experience. It reminded me that care is not just emotional or mental but also physical and sensory. Your reflection made me more aware of how even small gestures of routine can help us stay present in a distracted world.
Hi Nicole! Thank you for your comment! I agree with how so many little things in our everyday life subtly yet powerfully challenge consumer culture. I can definitely see how both of our objects relate in that sense, since branded items like water bottles or stuffed animals can so easily be on display in one place perpetually and never used. It is powerful how wear and tear can not only show that something is well-loved, but also reveal traces of memory and history. This, alongside your comment on how heavily sensory things are, reminds me of a reading we did in cine240 last year, where we learned about how Indigenous groups used their senses to navigate their surroundings in a cold, foggy environment, when they did not have analytical or mathematical means of navigation. I really resonate with the idea of tactile, sensory interaction being necessary in fully understanding an environment, or even something as small as a water bottle, since its purpose or significance only appears once we interact with it.