New Forms of Consumption

New Forms of Consumption PDF Author: Mark Gottdiener
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 9780847695706
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description
Consumption as a field of cultural studies overlaps with theories of postmodernism, the social construction of self, commodification in late capitalism, and the role of mass media in daily life. New forms of consumption such as those facilitated by cyberspace, themed environments, the commodification of sex, and the increasing role of leisure in society all play new and interesting roles in daily life that combine consumerism with the most contemporary social forms. This collection of essays examines the recent ways in which consumerism has been approached by cultural studies with special emphasis given to these and other newly emerging topics. The book is divided into three parts. The first part provides a theoretical overview of consumption studies dealing with classical and more contemporary approaches in light of the debate between advocates and critics of postmodernism. In this section there are papers on McDonaldization, tourism and cultural studies, and the Theory of Shopping. The second part emphasizes empirical studies of the commodification process. Papers address the transformation of women's bodies and the mass commodification of milk, the creation of the toddler as a subject and the commodification of childhood, the commodification of sports, and the commodification of rock music. The third section of the book explores new forms of consumption on a more detailed and concentrated level. Papers in this section include the rise of sex tourism as a global industry, the commodification of the sacred, and the emergence of new consumer spaces in the city. An introduction by the editor delineates the advantages of his approach to new forms of consumption based squarely in the emerging issues of cultural studies, debates transcending postmodernism, and the society of the spectacle.

New Forms of Consumption

New Forms of Consumption PDF Author: Mark Gottdiener
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 9780847695706
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 322

Get Book Here

Book Description
Consumption as a field of cultural studies overlaps with theories of postmodernism, the social construction of self, commodification in late capitalism, and the role of mass media in daily life. New forms of consumption such as those facilitated by cyberspace, themed environments, the commodification of sex, and the increasing role of leisure in society all play new and interesting roles in daily life that combine consumerism with the most contemporary social forms. This collection of essays examines the recent ways in which consumerism has been approached by cultural studies with special emphasis given to these and other newly emerging topics. The book is divided into three parts. The first part provides a theoretical overview of consumption studies dealing with classical and more contemporary approaches in light of the debate between advocates and critics of postmodernism. In this section there are papers on McDonaldization, tourism and cultural studies, and the Theory of Shopping. The second part emphasizes empirical studies of the commodification process. Papers address the transformation of women's bodies and the mass commodification of milk, the creation of the toddler as a subject and the commodification of childhood, the commodification of sports, and the commodification of rock music. The third section of the book explores new forms of consumption on a more detailed and concentrated level. Papers in this section include the rise of sex tourism as a global industry, the commodification of the sacred, and the emergence of new consumer spaces in the city. An introduction by the editor delineates the advantages of his approach to new forms of consumption based squarely in the emerging issues of cultural studies, debates transcending postmodernism, and the society of the spectacle.

India’s Middle Class

India’s Middle Class PDF Author: Christiane Brosius
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136704841
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 401

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Book Description
This book is one of the first ethnographic studies to examine the complexities of lifestyles of the the upwardly mobile middle classes in India in the new millennium. It reveals an original theory on cosmopolitan Indianness and urbanisation in the age of globalisation.

Car Cultures

Car Cultures PDF Author: Daniel Miller
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 100018143X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 208

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Book Description
Anyone who assumes that a car is simply a means to get from point A to point B, or who even thinks that they know what a car is, should read this book. Profoundly shaped by culture, the car gives rise to a wide range of emotions, from guilt about the environment in the UK to aboriginal concerns with car corpses, to struggles to keep the creatures alive with everything but the proper spare parts in West Africa. Cars and their landscapes prove central to human life from its most intimate to the widest sense of global crisis, and are capable of inspiring epic passions. From road rage in Western Europe to the struggles of cab driving in Africa to the emergence of Black identity in the US, this book examines the essential humanity of the car, which includes the jealousies, gender differences, fears and moralities that cars give rise to. Firmly grounded in detailed ethnographic and historical scholarship, this is the first book to provide an informed sense of cars as one of the most familiar and significant forms of material culture.

The Sociology of Consumption

The Sociology of Consumption PDF Author: Joel Stillerman
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0745696910
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 202

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Book Description
The Sociology of Consumption: A Global Approach offers college students, scholars, and interested readers a state-of-the-art overview of consumption the desire for, purchase, use, display, exchange, and disposal of goods and services. The book’s global focus, emphasis on social inequality, and analysis of consumer citizenship offer a timely, exciting, and original approach to the topic. Looking beyond the U.S. and Europe, Stillerman engages examples from his and others’ research in Chile and other Latin American countries, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and East and South Asia to explore the interaction between global and local forces in consumption. The text explores the lived experience of being a consumer, demonstrating how social inequalities based on class, gender, sexuality, race, and age shape consumer practices and identities. Finally, the book uncovers the important role consumption has played in fueling local and international activism. This welcome new book will be ideal for classes on consumer culture across the social sciences, humanities, and marketing.

Tourism and Agriculture

Tourism and Agriculture PDF Author: Rebecca Maria Torres
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1136849238
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description
Shifting global consumption patterns, tastes and attitudes towards food, leisure, travel and place have opened new opportunities for rural producers in the form of agritourism, ecotourism, wine, food and rural tourism and specialized niche market agricultural production for tourism. Agriculture is one of the oldest and most basic parts of the global economy, while tourism is one of the newest and most rapidly spreading. In the face of current problems of climate change, rising food prices, poverty and a global financial crisis, linkages between agriculture and tourism may provide the basis for new solutions in many countries. A number of challenges, nevertheless, confront the realization of synergies between tourism and agriculture. Tourism and Agriculture examines regional specific cases at the interface between tourism and agriculture, looking at the impacts of rural restructuring, and new geographies of consumption and production. To meet the need for a more comprehensive appreciation of the relationships and interactions between the tourism and agricultural economic sectors, this book consider the factors that influence the nature of these relationships; and explore avenues for facilitating synergistic relationships between tourism and agriculture. These relationships are examined in thirteen chapters through case studies from eastern and western Europe, Japan and the United States and from the developing countries of the Pacific, the Caribbean and Ghana and Mexico. Themes of diversification, economic development, and emerging new forms of production and consumption, are integrated throughout the entire book. This essential volume, built on original research, generates new insights into the relationships between tourism and agriculture and future economic rural development. Edited by leading researchers and academics in the field, this book will be of value to students, researchers and academics interested in tourism, agriculture and rural development.

Consumption and Everyday Life

Consumption and Everyday Life PDF Author: Mark Paterson
Publisher: Psychology Press
ISBN: 9780415355070
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 268

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Book Description
This engaging book introduces key ideas and theorists of consumption in an accessible way. Case studies that describe familiar acts of consumption from areas of everyday life are used to ground relevant debates and ideas.

Consuming People

Consuming People PDF Author: Nikhilesh Dholakia
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134706332
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 393

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Book Description
Consumption is widely regarded as one of the most important phenomena in contemporary society, but, till now, there has been very little analysis of how consumption patterns evolve, transform and proliferate. This revealing book provides an incisive treatment of consumption on a global scale from a cultural, philosophical and business perspective. Beginning with an analysis of how a dominant form of consumption pattern took hold in modern, capitalist, market economies, this book explores the contemporary changes and paradoxes in our consumption patterns during the transitional period from the modern to the postmodern. The text focuses on the forces shaping American consumption patterns, from corporations to Hollywood, and concludes with an analysis of the emerging trans-modern possibilities of the new 'theatre of consumption' where communities with a variety of consumption styles will flourish. This is an original and radical analysis in which its first-rate authors structure this key topic in a multi-disciplinary and forward-thinking way. As such, it will be of great interest to students and researchers of consumer behaviour in business and the social sciences, as well as those concerned with contemporary cultural transformations.

Canonical Authors in Consumption Theory

Canonical Authors in Consumption Theory PDF Author: Søren Askegaard
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317233964
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 371

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Book Description
Canonical Authors in Consumption Theory is the first work to compile the contributions of the greatest social thinkers in the global conversation about consumption and consumer culture. A prestigious reference work, it offers original chapters by the world's most prominent thought leaders and surveys how the work of historical theorists has influenced and shaped consumption theory, both through history and at the cutting edge of research. Consumption is at the core of contemporary lifestyles, of political successes and failures and of discussions around sustainability and environmental change. Contemporary consumer culture shapes modern identities, and is the engine of the globalizing capitalist economy. Still, most social theorizations over the last century and a half have addressed production processes rather than consumption processes. This is about to change. Studies of consumption play an increasing role as a topic and a domain of study in marketing, anthropology, sociology and cultural studies. Currently, there is no single compilation that systematically links scholarly work published by the greatest social thinkers of the last 150 years to the understanding of contemporary consumer society. This book provides a solid framework for understanding the relevance of these canonical authors in social theory to facilitate analysis of consumer culture, and to act as a comprehensive reference point for consumer researchers, doctoral students and practitioners.

Consumer Culture and Modernity

Consumer Culture and Modernity PDF Author: Don Slater
Publisher: Polity
ISBN: 9780745603049
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
This book provides a comprehensive introduction to the issues, concepts and theories through which people have tried to understand consumer culture throughout the modern period, and puts the current state of thinking into a broader context. Thematically organized, the book shows how the central aspects of consumer culture - such as needs, choice, identity, status, alienation, objects, culture - have been debated within modern theories, from those of earlier thinkers such as Marx and Simmel to contemporary forms of post-structuralism and postmodernism. This approach introduces consumer culture as a subject which - far from being of narrow or recent interest - is intimately tied to the central issues of modern times and modern social thought. With its reviews of major theorists set within a full account of the development of the subject, this book should be of interest to undergraduate and postgraduate students in the many disciplines which now study consumer culture, including communications and cultural studies, anthropology and history.

Cognitive Capitalism

Cognitive Capitalism PDF Author: Yann Moulier-Boutang
Publisher: Polity
ISBN: 0745647324
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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Book Description
This book argues that we are undergoing a transition from industrial capitalism to a new form of capitalism - what the author calls & lsquo; cognitive capitalism & rsquo;