Critical Approaches to Consumer Culture 3301-KA2522-2ST
The course discusses various critical perspectives on the phenomenon of consumer culture while stressing the particular role it plays in the United States. The course starts with a brief historical overview of consumer culture in the US, drawing attention tp the most important events and developments that had an influence on it. Following the work of Michael Schudson, it also discusses the established critiques of consumer culture in the US. Then, adopting a interdisciplinary approach, it focuses on the questions of:
• Anthropological approaches to consumer culture (following Arjun Appadurai, Daniel Miller, Mary Douglas, and Baron Isherwood);
• The social role of consumption (e.g. Veblen’s conspicuous consumption, Bourdieu’s distinction, Ritzer’s McDonaldization, liquid modernity);
• Psychological aspects of consumption (Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi’s research on the costs and benefits of consumption, Russell Belk’s concept of the extended self; the emotional aspects of consumer culture based on the work of Eva Illouz).
Additionally, the course touches upon the social changes that have been associated with consumer culture, particularly in the 20th and 21st centuries. It also looks at the relationship between people and their possessions, noting the increasing role of digital technologies. It further points towards the dynamics of consumer culture based on gender. It also discusses alternative approaches to consumption, such as Duane Elgin’s simple life, and problems that are associated with them. Consumer culture and its relationship with postmodernism as well as the political aspects of consumption are also tackled during the course.
Type of course
Mode
Prerequisites (description)
Learning outcomes
Students understand the peculiar role consumption plays in the US, particularly its associations with the nation’s history and economy. They have advanced knowledge pertaining to processes associated with consumption as it is understood from anthropological, sociological and psychological perspectives. Students are capable of critically analyzing consumer culture, noting its positive and negative aspects. Students know the terminology associated with the topic, and are capable of arguing their point of view while maintaining a respectful stance towards diverging views.
Assessment criteria
In-class activity; presentation, final paper (essay).
Bibliography
Adorno, Theodor and Max Horkheimer. “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception”. The Dialectic of the Enlightenment, Stanford University Press, 2002, pp. 94-136
Appadurai, Arjun. “Commodities and the Politics of Value”. The Social Life of Things, ed. Arjun Appadurai. Cambridge University Press 1986, pp. 3-63.
Bauman, Zygmunt. Liquid Modernity. Polity, 1999.
Belk, Russell W. “Possessions and the Extended Self”. Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 15 (September 1988), pp. 139-168.
Belk Russell W. “Extended Self in a Digital World”. Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 40, (October 2013), pp. 477-500.
Benjamin, Walter. “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.” Illuminations, ed. Hannah Arendt, Shocken, 1969.
Bourdieu, Pierre. Distinction. Routledge, 2010.
Csikszentmihalyi, Mihalyi. “The Costs and Benefits of Consuming”. Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 27, no. 2 (September 2000), pp. 267-272
Csikszentmihalyi, Mihalyi and Eugene Rothberg-Halton. The Meaning of Things: Domestic Symbols and the Self. Cambridge University Press, 1981.
Douglas, Mary and Baron Isherwood. “The Uses of Goods”. The Consumer Society Reader, ed. Martyn Lee. Blackwell, 2000, pp. 73-83.
Eckhart, Giana, Belk, Russell W., and Jonathan A.J. Wilson. “The Rise of Inconspicuous Consumption”. Journal of Marketing Management, 2015 vol. 31, nos. 7–8, pp. 807–826.
Featherstone, Mike. Consumer Society and Postmodernism. Sage, 1991.
Glickman, Lawrence B., ed. Consumer Society in American History: A Reader. Cornell University Press, 1999.
Illouz, Eva. Consuming the Romantic Utopia. University of California Press, 1997.
Jameson, Fredric. Postmodernism, or the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism. Duke University Press, 1991.
Lee, Martyn. The Consumer Society Reader. Blackwell, 2000
Miller, Daniel. Material Cultures: Why Some Things Matter. University College of London: 1998.
Ritzer, George. The McDonaldization Thesis: Explorations and Extensions. Sage: 1998.
Scanlon, Jennifer, ed. The Gender and Consumer Culture Reader. New York University Press, 2000.
Schor, Juliet. “In Defense of Consumer Critique: Revisiting the Consumption Debates of the Twentieth Century”. Annals of the AAPSS, 611 (May 2007), pp. 16-30.
Schor, Juliet, Douglas B. Holt. The Consumer Society Reader. The New Press, 2000.
Schudson, Michael. “Citizens, Consumers, and the Good Society”. Annals of the AAPSS, 611 (May 2007), pp. 236-249.
Veblen, Thorstein. Theory of the Leisure Class. Public domain.
Additional information
Additional information (registration calendar, class conductors, localization and schedules of classes), might be available in the USOSweb system: