Repurposing is as old as human civilization, with many contemporary scholars investigating how different societies re-appropriate the artifacts of older cultures in new and creative ways.

[1] More recently, repurposing has been celebrated by 21st century hobbyists and arts-and-crafts organizations such as Instructables and other Maker culture communities as a means of creatively responding to the ecological and economic crises of the 21st century.

Recent scholarship has attempted to relate these activities to American left- and right-libertarianism.

Incinerator and power plant exhaust stack fly-ash is used extensively as an additive to concrete, providing increased strength.

This type of reuse can sometimes make use of items which are no longer usable for their original purposes, for example using worn-out clothes as rags.