15, Sociology
Jan. 2008
Consumer Culture Consumerism is a global and economic force that is travelling around the world Consumerism: - rose in the early 1900 with the advent of mass production (I.E. Henry Ford and the assembly line) - consumer goods = commodities - Mass production became a problem when companies had a lot of crap and people were cheap - Mass consumerism plays on peoples fears of scarcity of resources - Consumerism had a democratizing tendency (people can own a home and go to the grocery and buy whatever they want) - Robyn's Article: o With the advent of consumer culture we entered a society of perpetual growth (mass consumption got tied into economic activity and the economy must always expand) o Consumer society was successful thanks to: Marketing in advertising successful at promoting commodities to people (people changed the way they advertised by going past the utilitarian dimensions of the product and making shit look magical) Capitalism has been successful at accommodating large numbers of individuals to live in comfort but not equally The individual had to change: construction of the consumer! Institutional changes had to be made to make individuals into consumers strategies were put into place like the shopping mall and department store. Marketers and researchers realized they had to invent shopping Social institutions had to change: the university started to make programs in marketing and business. Credit was created (mortgages and stuff). Spiritual and intellectual values had to change (frugality and self denial gave way to compulsive spending). Commodities were seen as having magical qualities that could improve people's lives. Transformation of childhood: Kinder-culture (the corporate construction of childhood). Schooling and consumption. Child psychologists were encouraging parents to inform their kids on how to make consumer decisions. This consumer strategy is helpful because it causes the parent to feel guilt when he/she doesn't buy whatever product for the child Disney world - the culture industry Product is tied to intimate moments, identity and sexuality. Ads are made like blockbusters: money, care, time.
Results: advertising is everywhere, large amounts of money and creativity are spent on it. The question is how effective are they really? What's the impact on culture? Morality, values, etc. What are the consistent stories that advertising tells as a whole? Advertising= cultural system > changes ideas, perceptions, blablabla. Trick questions: How do we become happy? (is it material possessions, etc) How does it define our society? What does it makes our society look like? Advertising tells us the story that through consumption we will find happiness. Production> Distribution> consumption. The more we produce the more money we get so we can consume products. Political freedom is defined by access to a variety of consumption options. Does happiness come from material things? Do we get happier from being able to have more? NOOOOO. Even though our quality of life and our commodities have increased in number the general happiness of people in a society has stayed the same. People don't see their happiness anchored entirely on materialism Social values outrank material values in terms of what people say they want The market is good at providing things that can be bought and sold but what we really want is outside of the market place (IE Love, friends, family) Advertising has tied itself in relation to what we want Falsity of advertising is in the answers it provides Advertising doesn't reflect how people are acting but how people dream Advertising create our dream life They translate our real desires for a social life into our dreams Advertising reduces our capacity to become happy by forcing us to carry on the direction of things What is Society? There is no such thing as society there are just individuals and their families Margaret Thatcher Society is just a bunch of individuals acting on their own Advertising talks to us on an individual basis not our collective needs Advertising relegates key issues pertaining to the culture to the outskirts of discussion far How in the future can we think? Since 1950 the world population has used up more resources than the past generations put together
In 100 years we'll exhaust the planet's resources Depletion of the ozone layer is fuckin us We need to change our habits now before it's too late The market place doesn't deal with the long term You need to make advertisements appeal to feelings and bodies instead of what you think Move from cognitive to emotional (sexual, panic etc) Advertising doesn't care for the future or future generations Different future Advertising is the main force for the capitalist threat Advertising is one of the major obstacles to our survival as a species Consumer capitalism is a house of cards: it's fragile and held together only by the effort of advertisers to convince us that we need their products Pessimism of the intellect: understanding the nature of our present reality Optimism of the will: believing in the human values that will inspire us to fight for our survival We have to insist on alternative values that will ensure our future generations will live in a world fit for human habitation
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Lecture:
You can google search the film to find out notes on the film. Advertising promises self-transformation. Reification the discourse of advertising has a special meaning attributed in our culture therefore it affects other facets of our meaning system. For eons humans have produced their own culture, but now with advertising it's created from top to bottom and en masse. Commercials in the context of academic analysis seem laughable, whereas in the context of TV they are influential. When seen on TV we take them seriously and because we're in an inactive thinking state when we watch the messages almost brainwash us. It was mentioned that this rush to extract resources will cause conflict, the demand and competition for things like oil, metal, wood. People in these countries that have these resources end up losing. Advertising and consumerism is directly related to economics. Advertising has become a significant part of our culture. It has colonized the way we view the real world. The levels of happiness have stayed relatively the same over the last few decades, which entails that material possession does not give happiness. It does give us an economic basis from which we can operate, but farther than that it doesn't make much of a difference. Our happiness is located in the level of the social. Happiness means good selfesteem, warm family relations, con troll over one's life, relaxing leisure time, romance and love and warm and close friendships. With the rise of consumer society we see the rise of individualism as opposed to social relationships. The problem with the ongoing growth is that we can and will run out of resources, but if we don't grow we go into recession.
Pessimism of the intellect and optimism of the will. When we see critique we think "this is too intense", to focus on negative things isn't negative, however, it means pointing out how this "thing" is a problem and try to solve it. Ignorance is bliss usually rules, therefore critique is necessary > optimism of the will. The pursuit of consumerism has negative effects: the individual: - Reification type of loss of self, self-deception, alienation. More complex, happens through the process of socialization and we aren't conscious of it. Type of thinking and behaviour, for example buying (you're sad retail therapy ;) ). Distorts the way you tell what will make you happy (identifying with violence as strength, which we know it's really not). Also related to false-consciousness and objectification (how an individual becomes an object, when they are manipulated as a part of a larger social process i.e. consumerism). Reification works because we're insecure and fearful(death, loss of love, etc.). It makes the mind liable to play tricks on itself and this allows reification to creep in. Advertisements say "buy this and your problems will be solved" whereas you don't even have need for it. Objects are altered to appear as tangible human experiences and therefore become part of your real needs (e.g. love, friendship, etc.). -