Assembles the important writings on advertising and society. This title includes 27 essays which provide readers with the some of the best-known writings on the nature, process, and social implications of advertising and consumer culture for society

In this consumer culture studies anthology, 23 reprinted essays (1934-98) consider both the empowering and disempowering elements of consumerism. In her introduction, Scanlon (women's studies, Plattsburgh State U. of New York) views consumer culture as a collaborative process, not simply a matter of perpetrators and victims. The themes the essays address are: stretching the boundaries of the domestic sphere; you are what you buy; the message makers; and sexuality, pleasure and resistance in consumer culture. The book features bandw illustrations promoting the cults of domesticity and identity through proper consumption. It lacks an index. c. Book News Inc.

A reader on children's culture

Ads aimed at kids are virtually everywhere -- in classrooms and textbooks, on the Internet, even at slumber parties and the playground. Product placement and other innovations have introduced more subtle advertising to movies and television. Companies are enlisting children as guerrilla marketers, targeting their friends and families. Even trusted social institutions such as the Girl Scouts are teaming up with marketers. Drawing on her own survey research and unprecedented access to the advertising industry, New York Times bestselling author and leading cultural and economic authority Juliet Schor examines how a marketing effort of vast size, scope, and effectiveness has created "commercialized children." Schor, author of The Overworked American and The Overspent American, looks at the broad implications of this strategy. Sophisticated advertising strategies convince kids that products are necessary to their social survival. Ads affect not just what they want to buy, but who they think they are and how they feel about themselves. Based on long-term analysis, Schor reverses the conventional notion of causality: it's not just that problem kids become overly involved in the values of consumerism; it's that kids who are overly involved in the values of consumerism become problem kids. In this revelatory and crucial book, Schor also provides guidelines for parents and teachers. What is at stake is the emotional and social well-being of our children. Like Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed, Mary Pipher's Reviving Ophelia, and Malcolm Gladwell's The Tipping Point, Born to Buy is a major contribution to our understanding of a contemporary trend and its effects on the culture.

The Consumer Society Reader features a range of key works on the nature and evolution of consumer society. Included here is much-discussed work by leading critics such as Jean Baudrillard, Susan Bordo, Dick Hebdige, bell hooks, and Janice Radway. Also included is a full range of classics, such as Frankfurt School writers Adorno and Horkheimer on the Culture Industry; Thorstein Veblen's oft-cited writings on "conspicuous consumption"; Betty Friedan on the housewife's central role in consumer society; John Kenneth Galbraith's influential analysis of the "affluent society"; and Pierre Bourdieu on the notion of "taste." "Consumer society--the 'air we breathe,' as George Orwell has described it--disappears during economic downtruns and political crises. It becomes visible again when prosperity seems secure, cultural transformation is too rapid, or enviornmental disasters occur. Such is the time in which we now find ourselves. As the roads clog with gas-guzzling SUVs and McMansions proliferate in the suburbs, the nation is once again asking fundamental questions about lifestyle. Has 'luxury fever,' to use Robert Frank's phrase, gotten out of hand? Are we really comfortable with the 'Brand Is Me' mentality? Have we gone too far in pursuit of the almighty dollar, to the detriment of our families, communities, and natural enviornment? Even politicians, ordinarily impermeable to questions about consumerism, are voicing doubts... [and] polls suggest majorities of Americans feel the country has become too materialistic, too focused on getting and spending, and increasingly removed from long-standing non-materialist values." —From the introduction by Douglas B. Holt and Juliet B. Schor

The only comprehensive, critical overview that places Canadian advertising and consumer culture in historical, social, and cultural context for studentsWith over 15 classic and contributed selections, this reader offers a comprehensive overview of the historical, social, and cultural dimensions of advertising and consumer culture in Canadian society. Taking a critical approach, this collection encourages students to deconstruct their dailyinteractions with advertising, branding, and consumer culture.

This book covers the gamut of topics related to gender and consumer culture. Changing gender roles have forced scholars and practitioners to re-examine some of the fundamental assumptions and theories in this area. Gender is a core component of identity and thus holds significant implications for how consumers behave in the marketplace. This book offers innovative research in gender and consumer behavior with topics relevant to psychology, marketing, advertising, sociology, women’s studies and cultural studies. It offers 16 chapters of cutting-edge research on gender, international culture and consumption. Unique to this volume is its emphasis on consumption and masculinity and inclusion of topics on a rapidly changing world of issues related to culture and gender in advertising, communications, psychology and consumer behavior.

The sixth edition of this approachable text draws on both academic and applied perspectives to offer a lively critique of contemporary advertising’s effects on American character and culture. Berger explains how advertising works by employing a psycho-cultural approach, encouraging readers to think about advertisements and commercials in more analytical and profound ways. The sixth edition features updated statistics, two new chapters, and new discussions of the role of brands, social media, non-binary perspectives on gender, advertising and the 2020 election, the problem of self-alienation, and how all these elements relate to consumption. Berger also considers the Values and Lifestyle (VALS) and Claritas typologies in marketing. Distinctive chapters examine the “1984” Macintosh commercial, a Fidji perfume advertisement, and a moisturizer advertisement from semiotic, psychoanalytic, sociological, Marxist, mythic, and feminist perspectives. Ads, Fads, and Consumer Culture provides an accessible overview of advertising in the United States, spanning issues as diverse as sexuality, politics, market research, consumer culture, and more, and helps readers understand the role that advertising has played, and continues to play, in all our lives.

The nineteenth century is central to contemporary discussions of visual culture. This reader brings together key writings on the period, exploring such topics as photographs, exhibitions and advertising.

'Roberta Sassatelli has written a thorough and wide-ranging synthetic account of social scientific research on consumption which will set the standard for the second generation of textbooks on cultures of consumption. Consumer Culture is an appealing and lucid introduction to the major themes - historical and contemporary, theoretical and empirical - surrounding the growth, nature and consequences of consumer culture. It will be of professional interest as well as serving a student audience' - Alan Warde, University of Manchester Showing the cultural and institutional processes that have brought the notion of the 'consumer' to life, this book guides the reader on a comprehensive journey through the history of how we have come to understand ourselves as consumers in a consumer society and reveals the profound ambiguities and ambivalences inherent within. While rooted in sociology, Sassatelli draws on the traditions of history, anthropology, geography and economics to give: - A history of the rise of consumer culture around the world; - A richly illustrated analysis of theory from neo-classical economics, to critical theory, to theories of practice and ritual de-commoditization; and - A compelling discussion of the politics underlying our consumption practices. An exemplary introduction to the history and theory of consumer culture, this book provides nuanced answers to some of the most central questions of our time.