What does it mean to be present at work? Negotiating attention, distraction and presence in working from home

What it means to be present is an important yet underexamined geographical problem. Owing to the recent surge in working from home, which has forced a rethink of the affordances of both face-to-face and virtual presence, we contend that the time is right for a re-evaluation of this foundational geographical concept. Our paper begins by synthesising existing geographical work to outline three ways that geographers have considered the concept of presence: as representational, as mediated, and as attentional. We propose that the latter is a crucial but often overlooked aspect of presence. In response, and drawing on fieldwork conducted in Australia, we explore how people who work from home navigate attentional presence in three contexts: work tasks, interactions with colleagues, and engagement with others. These three contexts involve different interplays of attention and, importantly, distraction. We argue that the dissociative dimensions of being present have far-reaching political and ethical consequences, and they can provide us with clues about how socio-spatial relationships concerning work and home life are currently being reconfigured.