Lecture Notes
on Consumer Culture
(overlapping with Schor’s The Overspent American)
I.
Schor: the new consumerism
A. Two key features
1. “stretching
out reference groups vertically”
2. Anxiety
B. Contributing factors
1. Advertising and the media
2. Accelerating pace of
product innovation
a.
Lifestyle marketing (targeted)
3. Credit cards
4. Relentless ratcheting up of standards
a. New
products (air conditioning in your next car; redesign your old kitchen)
b. Redesign
of existing products (computers, cd players. Etc.)
5. Transmutation of want and need
(want becomes need)
C.
Evidence/examples
1. spending has
increased dramatically, but many people feel they’re
barely making it
2. 80’s and 90’s competitive consumption
intensified dramatically
a. size of
homes has doubled
b. more second
homes
c. more loaded
cars
d. more travel
(expenditures on recreation more than doubled since 1980)
3. new items part of middle class lifestyle (computers;
microwave, restaurant meals, a.c.
D. But,
same time, rise in anxiety/pessimism
1. diverging
income distribution + vertical stretch in aspirations
II. Status Symbols (Goffman)
A.
Signs that convey information about one’s position in society
1. Occupational
symbols: (position in organization; in relation to authority structure) corner
office, name on door; parking spot, etc.
2. Status
symbols: more generalized signs, about status in society as a whole
B.
Control of Status Symbols
1.
Can be used deceptively; hence, restrictions on use
a. Moral
restrictions (misrepresentation “just isn’t done”)
b.
Intrinsic restrictions
i. actually making use of the
resource the symbol represents
a) spending the $; using the power; displaying the skill
c.
Natural restrictions
i. actual scarcity in the world (a
large unflawed diamond; an original oil painting)
ii. historical closure (connection with something no longer
true: made fortune in the shipping trade)
iii. family name
d.
Socialization restrictions
i. manner of interaction
ii.
cultivation
D. Two additional considerations
regarding symbols of class status
1.
Meanings and symbols change over time
a.
continual struggle between/among status groups over control of meanings
b. status
groups, a la Weber: groups with shared style of life
2.
“Curator Groups”: care and maintenance of status symbols falls to those of
lower class position almost always
a.
groundskeepers; architects; interior decorators; fashion experts; higher
education teachers, etc.
III. For symbols to communicate,
as Schor notes:
A.
They must be visible, socially
B. Schor’s hypothesis: people will spend more for visible
goods than for non-visible
1. Tested
with women’s cosmetics (lipstick, eye shadow, facial cleanser)
2.
hypothesis supported
C. Who
engages in competitive/comparative spending?
1. higher
education
2. higher
income
3. urban
& suburban
4. white
D.
Consumption & Identity
1. who we are
both affects and is affected by what we buy
2. self-image
+ expression of individuality
3. Not keeping up with, but
differentiating from, the Joneses
a.
boutiques vs. chains
b.
home furnishings
c.
quality, craftsmanship, uniqueness, individuality
