Post-Mao China has been characterized in literature and the media as a burgeoning consumer society. Consuming China investigates this characterization by examining the cultural significance of consumption and consumerism in the People s Republic of China today. In questioning the notion of consumption, this impressive work suggests that it is not simply a symptom of economic reform within China neither a product of the emergence and transformation of contemporary Chinese capitalism. Rather, the essays offer a new perspective on Chinese consumption by focusing on more than just consumerism, looking at the practices of consumption in relation to different manifestations of social and cultural change.

Drawing on case studies from Taiwan, Hong Kong and the People s Republic of China, Consuming China affords a greater understanding of the practice of Chinese consumption and will appeal to China scholars and anthropologists, and to those with an interest in cultural and gender studies.

How do people communicate their romantic feelings? Gift giving is one way. Giving and receiving of gifts is a characteristic of intimate relationships. Gifts are a message, a form of communication with a tangible material object, about love, affection, or concern for the recipient. The "romantic gift" evokes a multitude of intertwined meanings: passion, intimacy, affection, persuasion, care, celebration, altruism, and nostalgia. They can also connote the negative images of obligation and reciprocity. Romantic gift giving may be practiced at rituals, during rites of passage, or for casual occasions, to affirm the continued importance of the romantic relationship. We may even romanticize the giving of gifts to the self, to nonhuman companions, and to others we do not know personally. If loving and giving are a practice, then romantic gift giving is a practice of loving with intimate-or would-be intimate-others. This book addresses gift giving among consumers attempting to express and construct romantic love. It lies at the intersection of consumption, markets, and culture. In societies shaped by the globalizing neo-liberal economic order, increasing wealth disparity, and a partially digitized social environment that they help to co-construct, it may be time to rethink romantic love. Gift giving is a key arena to do so, as gifts make love tangible and act as carriers of meaning as well as cultural symbols. In gift giving the meanings of romance are renewed, renegotiated, and reconstructed. Gifts, Romance, And Consumer Culture demonstrates a wide variety of scholarly work bearing on romantic gift giving using an interpretive consumer research perspective. The book introduces critical studies by scholars in this unfolding and new interdisciplinary field.

Standard economic theory of consumer behaviour considers consumers' preferences, their incomes and commodity prices to be the determinants of consumption. However, consumption takes time and no consumer has more - or less - than 168 hours per week. This simple fact is almost invisible in standard theory, and takes the centre stage in this book.

This book approaches consumer psychology from a unique perspective - it covers the entire lifespan, from birth to old age. Childhood and youth are not discussed as areas special, different and remote from the rest of consumer research but are integrated into our development as humans. Consumption is viewed as a process by groups and individuals with the cycle continuing through to disposal or ownership and possession. The author discusses how people's natural lifespan influences their relationship to the things they own, how preferences are developed from childhood and how motivations for purchases change throughout their lives from childhood to old age. This book brings together the most recent findings and theories on child and youth consumption, including children's understanding of advertising and marketing, teen and youth identities and their consumption tastes. Moving through Erikson's life stages chapters continue on to adulthood, the mid-life 'crisis' and possessions and ownership in older consumers. This is a deeply interdisciplinary work that will be of interest to scholars across the fields of psychology, business and marketing, as well as to the more general consumer.

Ever since the dawn of the Hollywood star system in the early 1920s, consumers have been fascinated by film stars and other celebrities and their seemingly glamorous private lives. The public demand for celebrities has become so pervasive that it is arguably an essential element of our everyday culture and market economy, and the focus of increasing study. This book explores the widespread phenomenon of celebrity fandom and provides a deeper understanding of why individual consumers develop an emotional attachment to their favourite celebrity and what this parasocial fan relationship means in their life. Based on an in-depth insider study of a consumer's fan relationship with a film actress, the book provides unique insights into the celebrity-fan relationship, revealing the meaning it has for the consumer in everyday life, and how it evolves and expresses itself over time. While this book is primarily located within the field of consumer research, fandom and celebrity are of interest to a variety of academic disciplines. It will appeal to an interdisciplinary audience from marketing and consumer research, film studies, media studies, cultural studies, and sociology.

Eco-labelling is one of the key tools used by policy-makers in many parts of the world to encourage more sustainable production and consumption. By providing environmental information on products and services, eco-labels address both business users and consumers and range from mandatory approaches, such as required product declarations, to voluntary approaches, such as national eco-labels. Eco-labels can play an important role in environmental policy. They reward and promote environmentally superior goods and services and offer information on quality and performance with respect to issues such as health and energy consumption. Eco-labels fit well into a multi-stakeholder policy framework - as promulgated recently by the EU's integrated product policy (IPP) - since the development of criteria for labels and the acceptance in the market requires the involvement of a wide range of different parties, from government and business, to consumers and environmental organisations. However, many eco-labelling schemes have had troubled histories, and questions have been raised about their effectiveness. So, are eco-labels an effective tool to foster the development, production, sale and use of products and to provide consumers with good information about the environmental impacts of those products? Is eco-labelling useful to business as a marketing tool? What factors contribute to the development of successful schemes? More than ten years after its establishment, can the EU Flower be considered a success? Are national eco-labels such as the German Blue Angel and the Norwegian White Swan more effective? Should eco-labels be harmonised? Are eco-labels achieving their original aim of fostering sustainable production and consumption? For which product groups are ISO type I eco-labels appropriate and inappropriate? Are other labels, such as mandatory, ISO type II and ISO type III labels more effective in some cases? Are eco-labels focusing on the main environmental policy targets or just on "low-hanging fruit"? Are eco-labels really linked to other tools of IPP? The Future of Eco-labelling provides answers to all of these questions. Based on a major EU research exercise, the book plots a course for policy-makers to address some of the historic problems with eco-labelling, to learn what works and what doesn't and to move forward with schemes that can make a real difference to sustainable production and consumption.The book analyses the conditions under which eco-labelling schemes-both mandatory and voluntary-are or can become an efficient and effective tool to achieve given objectives; assesses previous experiences with eco-labels in different European countries and the relationship of these schemes with business strategies, IPP and market conditions; defines strategies aimed at linking eco-labels with other IPP measures; explores how eco-labels can be used to encourage sustainable consumption patterns, create green markets, foster innovation and development of green products and services, and implement multi-stakeholder initiatives; and sets out detailed recommendations for the future of eco-labelling.The book will be required reading for policy-makers, businesses involved with eco-labelling schemes and researchers interested in the development of sustainable production and consumption and IPP worldwide.

This study is an attempt to locate the practice of consumption within more general strategies of social self-definition. The essays in this volume are addressed to the understanding of consumption in terms of a larger matrix of social identity and the cultural strategies connected with it. The present volume focuses upon the relation between consumption and culturally specific strategies for self-definition, both on an individual and a group basis. Many of the essays are explicit attempts to deal with the complex articulation of modern commodities and "non-modern" modes of appropriation. The papers reflect and engage recent developments in anthropology such as the growing interest in personhood expressed in the numerous works of cultural psychology, and an increasing emphasis on the re-envisioning of culture as continually constructed in socially differentiated practice. As such, these papers deal with consumption as part of the practice of social identity and the construction of culturally specific forms of life.

This is an economic, social and cultural analysis of the nature and variety of production and consumption activities in households in the counties of Kent and Cornwall. It yields important new insights on the transition to capitalism in England.

Confusing, inadequate instructions for setting up and using consumer products are not only unhelpful, but potentially dangerous. They may contain wrong information, poor warnings, and no pictures or illustrations. Standards are either non-existent or little known, even though the U.S. government has developed and tested standards for the past thirty years. This book presents a set of guidelines written by The Human Factors and Ergonomics Society that have been tested by human factor specialists. This expert advice is applicable to writing assembly procedures, operational procedures, and user, shop, and repair manuals.

This work investigates the current state of selling, whether groceries, politicians, information or motorcars. Like no other phenomenon, "retailization" reflects the complexity and ubiquity of information flows, processes and convergence of media in the wired world. The authors explore the all-pervasive nature of the retail experience in the physical world, the virtual world - and in the peripheral spaces between the two. Companies interviewed include Asda, MOMA, The Tate Modern, Walmart, Sony, Habitat, Manchester United and Volkswagen; individuals include Naomi Klein, Tom Dixon, Benjamin Barber, Professor Bill Mitchell (Dean of Architecture at MIT), architects Jon Jerde, Rem Koolhas and Ben Van Berkel, and David Peek, psychologist behind the Bluewater shopping mall.

Bringing together scholars in consumer behavior, history, anthropology, religious studies, sociology, and communication, this is the first interdisciplinary anthology spanning the topic of ritual studies. It offers a multifaceted exploration of new rituals, such as Celebrating Kwanzaa, and of the ways entrenched rituals, such as Mardi Gras, gift giving, and weddings have changed. Moreover, it examines the influence of both cultures and subcultures, and will enhance our understanding of why and how consumers imbue goods and services with meaning during rituals. In this volume, the first in the Marketing and Consumer Psychology series: a religious studies scholar talks about the media representation of ritual; communication scholars discuss the transformational aspects of rituals surrounding alcohol consumption; a marketing scholar demonstrates the relevance of organizational behavior theory to understanding gift-giving rituals in the workplace; and a historian describes how the marketing of Kwanzaa was so integral to its successful adoption.

Bringing together scholars in consumer behavior, history, anthropology, religious studies, sociology, and communication, this is the first interdisciplinary anthology spanning the topic of ritual studies. It offers a multifaceted exploration of new rituals, such as Celebrating Kwanzaa, and of the ways entrenched rituals, such as Mardi Gras, gift giving, and weddings have changed. Moreover, it examines the influence of both cultures and subcultures, and will enhance our understanding of why and how consumers imbue goods and services with meaning during rituals.
In this volume, the first in a new LEA series on Marketing and Consumer Psychology:
*a religious studies scholar talks about the media representation of ritual;
*communication scholars discuss the transformational aspects of rituals surrounding alcohol consumption;
*a marketing scholar demonstrates the relevance of organizational behavior theory to understanding gift-giving rituals in the workplace; and
*a historian describes how the marketing of Kwanzaa was so integral to its successful adoption.

Product placement is now an integral part of what is considered the highest-quality fiction programming on television. Throughout the history of television, until now, direct product placement within fiction has not been a significant marketing strategy. This broadcasting/marketing configuration marks a another definitive step in the history of the commercialization of television. This book is an exploration of the interconnections between media economics and communication discourse. The recessionary, highly competitive economic environment of the 1980s, which affected networks, independent broadcasting, and the media industry in general, has been widely noted in the business pages of the national press. But the dramatic effects on programming wrought by the financial strategies of this period are yet to be understood. Marketing factors account for the heightened emphasis on programming environment during the 1980s. But what are the full implications of the practice of audience marketing and the creation of appropriate programming environments?

"Commodification" refers most explicitly to the activities of turning things into commodities and of commercializing that which is not commercial in essence. The mass marketing of pets, the rise of the coffin industry, the conversion of preacher into salesmen, and the globalization of Taleggio cheese are some of the exciting but surprising topics in this volume that show how friendship, death, spirituality, and artisanship all have a price after being commodified.
This unique collection of essays is a fascinating take on creating consumer products and consumer identities when what's for sale goes well beyond the thing itself. It will be a course-in-a-box for instructors who want to teach their students about commodification.

"Commodification" refers most explicitly to the activities of turning things into commodities and of commercialising that which is not commercial in essence. The mass marketing of pets, the rise of the coffin industry, the conversion of preacher into salesmen, and the globalization of Taleggio cheese are some of the exciting but surprising topics in this volume that show how friendship, death, spirituality, and artisanship all have a price after being commodified.
This unique collection of essays is a fascinating take on creating consumer products and consumer identities when what's for sale goes well beyond the thing itself. It will be a course-in-a-box for instructors who want to teach their students about commodification.

Contents:
1. A Cognitive Study into Environmentally-Orientated Consumption 1.1 The green consumer 1.2 A research program for consumer behaviour 1.3 Researching green consumer behaviour 2. Cognitive Consumer Research 2.1 Understanding understanding 2.2 Knowledge structures 2.3 Experience, knowledge structure development and intelligence 2.4 Research questions on green consumer cognition 2.5 Conclusions 3. Empirical Research into Green Consumer Behaviour 3.1 Qualitative versus quantitative cognitive research 3.2 Data collection 3.3 Data analysis 3.4 Conclusions 4. Classification of Consumers 4.1 Classification and cluster analysis 4.2 Analyses of scattergrams and correlation matrices 4.3 Hierarchical cluster analyses 4.4 Sensitivity analyses 4.5 Paradigmatic subjects and cognitive categories 4.6 Conclusions 5. Interpretation of Knowledge Structures 5.1 Knowledge content 5.2 Cognitive operations 5.3 Schematic nature of knowledge 6. Experience and Learning: Problem-Solving Behaviour of the Green Consumer 6.1 Familiarity and learning 6.2 Ability and successful green consumer behaviour 6.3 Conclusions 7. The Beginning of Knowledge 7.1 A new approach to cognition 7.2 Conceptual fruitfulness of contextual research 7.3 Practical relevance of contextual research 7.4 Issues for future research

In "Educating the Consumer-Citizen: A History of the Marriage of Schools, Advertising, and Media, " Joel Spring charts the rise of consumerism as the dominant American ideology of the 21st century. He documents and analyzes how, from the early 19th century through the present, the combined endeavors of schools, advertising, and media have led to the creation of a consumerist ideology and ensured its central place in American life and global culture.
Spring first defines "consumerist ideology" and "consumer-citizen" and explores their 19th-century origins in schools, children's literature, the commercialization of American cities, advertising, newspapers, and the development of department stores. He then traces the rise of consumerist ideology in the 20th century by looking closely at: the impact of the home economics profession on the education of women as consumers and the development of an American cuisine based on packaged and processed foods; the influence of advertising images of sports heroes, cowboys, and the clean-shaven businessman in shaping male identity; the outcomes of the growth of the high school as a mass institution on the development of teenage consumer markets; the consequences of commercial radio and television joining with the schools to educate a consumer-oriented population so that, by the 1950s, consumerist images were tied to the Cold War and presented as the "American way of life" in both media and schools; the effects of the civil rights movement on integrating previously excluded groups into the consumer society; the changes the women's movement demanded in textbooks, school curricula, media, and advertising that led to a new image of women in the consumer market; and the ascent of fast food education. Spring carries the story into the 21st century by examining the evolving marriage of schools, advertising, and media and its ongoing role in educating the consumer-citizen and creating an integrated consumer market.
This book will be of wide interest to scholars, professionals, and students across foundations of education, history and sociology of education, educational policy, mass communications, American history, and cultural studies. It is highly appropriate as a text for courses in these areas.

In "Educating the Consumer-Citizen: A History of the Marriage of Schools, Advertising, and Media, " Joel Spring charts the rise of consumerism as the dominant American ideology of the 21st century. He documents and analyzes how, from the early 19th century through the present, the combined endeavors of schools, advertising, and media have led to the creation of a consumerist ideology and ensured its central place in American life and global culture.
Spring first defines "consumerist ideology" and "consumer-citizen" and explores their 19th-century origins in schools, children's literature, the commercialization of American cities, advertising, newspapers, and the development of department stores. He then traces the rise of consumerist ideology in the 20th century by looking closely at: the impact of the home economics profession on the education of women as consumers and the development of an American cuisine based on packaged and processed foods; the influence of advertising images of sports heroes, cowboys, and the clean-shaven businessman in shaping male identity; the outcomes of the growth of the high school as a mass institution on the development of teenage consumer markets; the consequences of commercial radio and television joining with the schools to educate a consumer-oriented population so that, by the 1950s, consumerist images were tied to the Cold War and presented as the "American way of life" in both media and schools; the effects of the civil rights movement on integrating previously excluded groups into the consumer society; the changes the women's movement demanded in textbooks, school curricula, media, and advertising that led to a new image of women in the consumer market; and the ascent of fast food education. Spring carries the story into the 21st century by examining the evolving marriage of schools, advertising, and media and its ongoing role in educating the consumer-citizen and creating an integrated consumer market.
This book will be of wide interest to scholars, professionals, and students across foundations of education, history and sociology of education, educational policy, mass communications, American history, and cultural studies. It is highly appropriate as a text for courses in these areas.

Molotch takes us on a fascinating exploration into the worlds of technology, design, corporate and popular culture. We now see how corporations, designers, retailers, advertisers, and other middle-men influence what a thing can be and how it is made. We see the way goods link into ordinary life as well as vast systems of consumption, economic and political operation. The book is a meditation into the meaning of the stuff in our lives and what that stuff says about us.

Surveillance happens to all of us, everyday, as we walk beneath street cameras, swipe cards, surf the net. Agencies are using increasingly sophisticated computer systems - especially searchable databases - to keep tabs on us at home, work and play. Once the word surveillance was reserved for police activities and intelligence gathering, now it is an unavoidable feature of everyday life.

Surveillance as Social Sorting proposes that surveillance is not simply a contemporary threat to individual freedom, but that, more insidiously, it is a powerful means of creating and reinforcing long-term social differences. As practiced today, it is actually a form of social sorting - a means of verifying identities but also of assessing risks and assigning worth. Questions of how categories are constructed therefore become significant ethical and political questions.

Bringing together contributions from North America and Europe, Surveillance as Social Sorting offers an innovative approach to the interaction between societies and their technologies. It looks at a number of examples in depth and will be an appropriate source of reference for a wide variety of courses.

Surveillance happens to all of us, everyday, as we walk beneath street cameras, swipe cards, surf the net. Agencies are using increasingly sophisticated computer systems - especially searchable databases - to keep tabs on us at home, work and play. Once the word surveillance was reserved for police activities and intelligence gathering, now it is an unavoidable feature of everyday life.

Surveillance as Social Sorting proposes that surveillance is not simply a contemporary threat to individual freedom, but that, more insidiously, it is a powerful means of creating and reinforcing long-term social differences. As practiced today, it is actually a form of social sorting - a means of verifying identities but also of assessing risks and assigning worth. Questions of how categories are constructed therefore become significant ethical and political questions.

Bringing together contributions from North America and Europe, Surveillance as Social Sorting offers an innovative approach to the interaction between societies and their technologies. It looks at a number of examples in depth and will be an appropriate source of reference for a wide variety of courses.

Over the past twenty years, questions concerning the nature of early modern European consumption have increasingly become the object of critical focus for historians and cultural theorists. Why did such changes arise? Did they create a consumer society in the 18th century? What relationships did they bear to the Industrial Revolution, to colonialism, and to modernization in general.
In Consumption and the Making of Respectability, historian Woodruff Smith focuses on the radical alterations that occurred between 1600 and 1800 in European consumption of commodities produced overseas and provides extremely significant and seldom-investigated process of cultural construction.

Over the past twenty years, questions concerning the nature of early modern European consumption have increasingly become the object of critical focus for historians and cultural theorists. Why did such changes arise? Did they create a consumer society in the 18th century? What relationships did they bear to the Industrial Revolution, to colonialism, and to modernization in general.
In Consumption and the Making of Respectability, historian Woodruff Smith focuses on the radical alterations that occurred between 1600 and 1800 in European consumption of commodities produced overseas and provides an extremely significant and seldom-investigated process of cultural construction.

Contents:
Preface 1. Introduction and Overview 2. From Economics Imperialism to Globalization 3. The World of Commodities 4. Use Value and Consumption 5. Consumption through Systems of Provision 6. Systems of Provision and Cultural Systems 7. Economics and Consumption 8. What is Consumer Society? 9. Whatever Happened to Public Consumption? 10 Welfarism in Light of Globalization 11. Whither Consumption Studies?

Consumption has become one of the leading topics across the social sciences and vocational disciplines such as marketing and business studies. In this comprehensively updated and revised new edition, traditional approaches as well as the most recent literature are fully addressed and incorporated, with wide reference to theoretical and empirical work. Fine's refreshing and authoritative text includes a critical examination of such themes as:

*economics imperialism and globalization
*the world of commodities
*systems of provision and culture
*the consumer society
*public consumption.

This book presents an updated analysis of the cluttered landscape of studies of consumption that will make it required reading for students from a wide range of backgrounds including political economy, history and social science courses generally.