Table of contents
THE RISE OF CONSUMER CULTURE;
Chapter 1: Capitalism and the Consumer Revolution;
Consumption, Production and Exchange;
The Genesis of Consumer Capitalism;
From Courts to Cities, from Luxuries to Fashion;
Chapter 2: The Cultural Production of Economic Value;
Commodity Flows, Knowledge Flows;
The Invention of the Consumer and the cultural trajectories of good;
Consumer Society as Historical Type;
THEORIES OF CONSUMER AGENCY;
Chapter 3: Utility and Social Competition;
The Sovereign Consumer;
The Limits of Economic Rationality;
Fashion, Style and Conspicuous Consumption;
Beyond Emulation;
Chapter 4: Needs, Manipulation and Simulation;
From Commodity Fetishism to Critical Theory;
Nature, Authenticity and Resistance;
Post-Modern Pessimism;
Social Relations and Consumption;
Chapter 5: Taste, Identity and Practices;
Taste and Distinction;
Cultural Classification and Identity;
Appropriating Commodities;
Ambivalence and Practice;
THE POLITICS OF CONSUMPTION;
Chapter 6: Representation and Consumerism;
The Anti-Consumerist Rhetoric and the Apology of Consumption;
Advertising Cultures and their Languages;
The Functions and Meanings of Ads;
Ideology, Social Differences and Consumerism;
Chapter 7: Commodities and Consumers;
Commoditization and De-commoditization;
Goods, Values and the Boundaries of Commoditization;
The Normalization of Consumption;
Chapter 8: Contexts of Consumption;
Leisure, Commercial Institutions and Public Places;
The Home, the Commercialization of Feelings and Cultural Consumption;
Local Consumption in Mcdonaldized settings;
Alternative Consumption and Social Movements