Consumer Culture

The term consumer culture denotes the many ways in which material goods lend symbolic meaning to social arrangements. Material goods such as clothing, food and drink, movies and comic books, dwellings, and automobiles do not simply fulfill basic needs but also serve as symbolic materials through which we interpret our world and understand our lives. Symbolic materials may be the filaments of group solidarity when mutual tastes and consumption patterns form cultural common ground (as in ethnic or religious groups). Conversely, symbolic materials may serve as the currency of status competition when they are used to establish social standing (“keeping up with the Joneses”). Or individuals may use symbolic materials as resources for selfactualization and personal satisfaction (such as those who collect antiques for a hobby). In each of these instances, consumer culture shapes the values and ideals of consumers and communicates them to others.

Consumer culture has the ability to both aid and undermine the development of community. On the one hand, material goods aid in creating categorical differences, commemorating events, and establishing uniqueness, all of which are essential for producing and reproducing a sense of community. On the other hand, historically high levels of consumption are sometimes understood to be a threat to community because the more time and energy that is spent on shopping, the less that is left for noncommodified civic activities. For this reason, critics of consumer society associate rising levels of consumption with declines in civic association and religious activities.

Consumer culture has undergone momentous change since the industrial revolution. It has increasingly been dominated by the consumption of commodities, or goods produced for market, and supported by the economic structures and institutions of industrial societies including mass production techniques, improved transportation and communication infrastructures, wage labor, and increased leisure time. Karl Marx used the term commodification to describe a gradual change from production for individual consumption to the production [Page 336]of commodities for exchange in a money economy. While material culture has always been a major area of cultural activity, only within the past 200 years have the forces of industrial production made the commodity the centerpiece of consumer culture.

Three factors make the industrial revolution a watershed for consumer culture. First, it set the basic model of standardized, mass-produced, widely distributed goods that continues to dominate consumer culture today. Second, the industrial revolution made workers dependent on markets for satisfying their needs and desires. Third, the deadening routine of industrial work (as well as routine office work) causes workers to look to consumption and leisure for meaning and satisfaction. As a result, consumer culture has become both more democratic and more diverse. Qualitative evidence for such a claim can be found in a raft of products introduced over the past century, including automobiles, household appliances, and personal electronics, which have expanded the choices of consumers. Continual increases in real per-capita gross domestic product are quantitative evidence that more goods and services are being exchanged than ever before.

The thoroughgoing change set off by the industrial revolution sets the research agenda. At issue is the extent to which commodification affects symbolic communication. Top-down studies of the production of consumer culture tend to accentuate commodification, while bottom-up studies tend to focus on the power of consumers to interpret and shape the meaning of their activities. Studies of the production of consumer culture focus on how designs for products are developed and implemented, how the institutions of industrial society affect the kinds of material goods that are produced, and the part played by advertising and retail environments in the consumer experience. These studies are characterized by a top-down analytical strategy that places an emphasis on the commercial qualities of consumer culture. Other researchers concentrate on the meaning of consumer culture for individuals and groups, whether as a part of an individual lifestyle project or a full-blown subculture. This bottom-up strategy gives more credit than does a top-down strategy to the active consumer who uses consumer culture to generate meaning.

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