Pub Date : 2021-12-17DOI: 10.1177/14695405211062066
Joep Onstenk
Recent scholarship has paid considerable attention to the emergence of the citizen-consumer in the interwar era. Drawing on the literature from the fields of ethical consumption and consumer history, this paper opts for a broader perspective on the emergence of the citizen-consumer in historical analysis. It combines the polysemic nature of the hybrid citizen-consumer from food studies and ethical consumption, and the socio-historic analysis concerning political and cultural citizenship, by showing how consumption practices have been used to shape Dutch national citizenship. In the Netherlands, the private association Vereeniging Nederlandsch Fabrikaat (VNF) was one of the earliest and most vocal organisations that linked consumerism with an ideal of citizenship. Scholars typically tend to see the rise of the citizen-consumer as a product of three interest groups: the consumers, the state, or the industry. The VNF did not just appeal to consumers themselves, but also the government, and the business community to play their part in the development of the ideal Dutch citizen-consumer. By studying the practices of this association this paper thus offers a new perspective on the emergence of the citizen-consumer within a transnational perspective.
{"title":"If it ain’t Dutch, it ain’t much: Vereeniging Nederlandsch Fabrikaat, the citizen-consumer and Dutch nationalist consumption in the interwar Netherlands","authors":"Joep Onstenk","doi":"10.1177/14695405211062066","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14695405211062066","url":null,"abstract":"Recent scholarship has paid considerable attention to the emergence of the citizen-consumer in the interwar era. Drawing on the literature from the fields of ethical consumption and consumer history, this paper opts for a broader perspective on the emergence of the citizen-consumer in historical analysis. It combines the polysemic nature of the hybrid citizen-consumer from food studies and ethical consumption, and the socio-historic analysis concerning political and cultural citizenship, by showing how consumption practices have been used to shape Dutch national citizenship. In the Netherlands, the private association Vereeniging Nederlandsch Fabrikaat (VNF) was one of the earliest and most vocal organisations that linked consumerism with an ideal of citizenship. Scholars typically tend to see the rise of the citizen-consumer as a product of three interest groups: the consumers, the state, or the industry. The VNF did not just appeal to consumers themselves, but also the government, and the business community to play their part in the development of the ideal Dutch citizen-consumer. By studying the practices of this association this paper thus offers a new perspective on the emergence of the citizen-consumer within a transnational perspective.","PeriodicalId":51461,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Consumer Culture","volume":"23 1","pages":"45 - 62"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2021-12-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44489556","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-15DOI: 10.1177/14695405211051033
A. Salonen
This study explores how ethical food consumption is framed in the accounts of ordinary people living in affluent societies, with a particular focus on income differences. Research on ethical consumption often associates ‘ethical’ with the consumption of certain predefined products. This study leaves the question of the content of ethical consumption open for empirical investigation. Further, instead of focusing only on the moment of purchasing, this study considers how people with different income levels relate to both food consumption and waste. The analysis draws from qualitative interviews with 60 people living in Canada and Finland. The analysis identified the techniques, subjects and norms through which the question ethical food consumption is posed by the informants and how they framed these issues with regard to income. The findings underline that ethical consumption is a socially constructed, contested and even internally contradictory discourse. Differences in income do not only mean differences in the role that money plays in food choices but also in what kind of consumption people consider worth pursuing. Further, differences in income dictate differences in how people are morally positioned vis-à-vis abundance. For people with a higher level of income, moral blame is asserted on wasteful consumption habits. For the people with a low income, in turn, it is ethically condemnable to refuse to rejoice at the abundance around us. The findings indicate that even in a society where the rhetoric of choice is prominent both as a right and as an obligation by which people ought to display ethical agency, the ethics of choice is tied to the resources available for consumption. People with a severely low income occasionally enjoy the trickling down of abundant treats and surprises. However, for them, occasional indulgence causes not only pleasure but also trouble.
{"title":"‘If I could afford an avocado every day’: Income differences and ethical food consumption in a world of abundance","authors":"A. Salonen","doi":"10.1177/14695405211051033","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14695405211051033","url":null,"abstract":"This study explores how ethical food consumption is framed in the accounts of ordinary people living in affluent societies, with a particular focus on income differences. Research on ethical consumption often associates ‘ethical’ with the consumption of certain predefined products. This study leaves the question of the content of ethical consumption open for empirical investigation. Further, instead of focusing only on the moment of purchasing, this study considers how people with different income levels relate to both food consumption and waste. The analysis draws from qualitative interviews with 60 people living in Canada and Finland. The analysis identified the techniques, subjects and norms through which the question ethical food consumption is posed by the informants and how they framed these issues with regard to income. The findings underline that ethical consumption is a socially constructed, contested and even internally contradictory discourse. Differences in income do not only mean differences in the role that money plays in food choices but also in what kind of consumption people consider worth pursuing. Further, differences in income dictate differences in how people are morally positioned vis-à-vis abundance. For people with a higher level of income, moral blame is asserted on wasteful consumption habits. For the people with a low income, in turn, it is ethically condemnable to refuse to rejoice at the abundance around us. The findings indicate that even in a society where the rhetoric of choice is prominent both as a right and as an obligation by which people ought to display ethical agency, the ethics of choice is tied to the resources available for consumption. People with a severely low income occasionally enjoy the trickling down of abundant treats and surprises. However, for them, occasional indulgence causes not only pleasure but also trouble.","PeriodicalId":51461,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Consumer Culture","volume":"23 1","pages":"27 - 44"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2021-10-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44524636","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-04DOI: 10.1177/14695405211039616
Tori Holmes, Carol Lord, Katherine Ellsworth-Krebs
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, governments around the world placed communities under ‘lockdown’. Various practices of consumption were uprooted from their instituted settings and re-rooted in homes. This unprecedented reorganisation of normality resulted in increased instances of domestic consumption as practices occurring in offices, gyms and eateries were forced into homes, demanding the acquisition of materials and altering expectations of what homes are for. This article contributes to literature on COVID-19 and practice-based consumption research by complicating optimistic narratives about the potential for this disruption to downsize the consumer economy. Combining qualitative household interviews, with secondary data about wider trends, and historical reflection on changes in the meaning of the ‘home’ in the UK, we reveal how the re-rooting of instituted practices structures material acquisition and spikes desire for more domestic space. Recognising that professional practices and institutions have taken on increasing significance for domestic consumption, with stay-at-home orders blurring boundaries between home, work and leisure, we conclude by arguing that future research and sustainability policy should attend more to the institutional qualities of practices.
{"title":"Locking-down instituted practices: Understanding sustainability in the context of ‘domestic’ consumption in the remaking","authors":"Tori Holmes, Carol Lord, Katherine Ellsworth-Krebs","doi":"10.1177/14695405211039616","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14695405211039616","url":null,"abstract":"Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, governments around the world placed communities under ‘lockdown’. Various practices of consumption were uprooted from their instituted settings and re-rooted in homes. This unprecedented reorganisation of normality resulted in increased instances of domestic consumption as practices occurring in offices, gyms and eateries were forced into homes, demanding the acquisition of materials and altering expectations of what homes are for. This article contributes to literature on COVID-19 and practice-based consumption research by complicating optimistic narratives about the potential for this disruption to downsize the consumer economy. Combining qualitative household interviews, with secondary data about wider trends, and historical reflection on changes in the meaning of the ‘home’ in the UK, we reveal how the re-rooting of instituted practices structures material acquisition and spikes desire for more domestic space. Recognising that professional practices and institutions have taken on increasing significance for domestic consumption, with stay-at-home orders blurring boundaries between home, work and leisure, we conclude by arguing that future research and sustainability policy should attend more to the institutional qualities of practices.","PeriodicalId":51461,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Consumer Culture","volume":"22 1","pages":"1049 - 1067"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2021-10-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47912202","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-10-03DOI: 10.1177/14695405211049926
E. T. Withers
{"title":"Book Review: Vegas Brews: Craft Beer and The Birth of a Local Scene","authors":"E. T. Withers","doi":"10.1177/14695405211049926","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14695405211049926","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":51461,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Consumer Culture","volume":"23 1","pages":"229 - 232"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2021-10-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49096269","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-09-25DOI: 10.1177/14695405211049925
Yao‐Tai Li
work. And openly rejects power/inequality focused understandings of the topics at hand, indicating that these standpoints are overused and do not capture the full picture of all the things going on in any given cultural space. This is a compelling argument by the author. However, he commits the same offense that he accuses the power/inequality lens of. By rejecting more critical standpoints and advancing a constructivist argument, the book limits itself and does not capture the full breath of how taste operates and how cultural scenes develop. We know from decades of research that culture can be deployed in ways that divide people and cultural products, spaces and scenes are used in ways that bolster the interests of those in power and disadvantage oppressed groups (take for example the connection between craft beer and gentrification). Although it is slowly changing, the craft beer scene in many (if not most) cities and areas in the US is not diverse at all. Craft beer tends to draw in a white more affluent consumer. But this important detail goes overlooked in this book and at times rejected. For example, on page 68 the author dismisses Elijah Andersen’s work which conceptualizes the craft beer scene in Philadelphia as a “white space” and offers evidence against this by reflecting on his observations at a brewery, which according to him, had a diverse mix of racial groups, ethnicities and genders. This overlook falls short of capturing the complexities of the scene. But on the other hand, the book does offer a convincing account of how people’s interactions around cultural products are central within scenes.
{"title":"Book Review: Upsetting Food: Three Eras of Food Protests in the United States","authors":"Yao‐Tai Li","doi":"10.1177/14695405211049925","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14695405211049925","url":null,"abstract":"work. And openly rejects power/inequality focused understandings of the topics at hand, indicating that these standpoints are overused and do not capture the full picture of all the things going on in any given cultural space. This is a compelling argument by the author. However, he commits the same offense that he accuses the power/inequality lens of. By rejecting more critical standpoints and advancing a constructivist argument, the book limits itself and does not capture the full breath of how taste operates and how cultural scenes develop. We know from decades of research that culture can be deployed in ways that divide people and cultural products, spaces and scenes are used in ways that bolster the interests of those in power and disadvantage oppressed groups (take for example the connection between craft beer and gentrification). Although it is slowly changing, the craft beer scene in many (if not most) cities and areas in the US is not diverse at all. Craft beer tends to draw in a white more affluent consumer. But this important detail goes overlooked in this book and at times rejected. For example, on page 68 the author dismisses Elijah Andersen’s work which conceptualizes the craft beer scene in Philadelphia as a “white space” and offers evidence against this by reflecting on his observations at a brewery, which according to him, had a diverse mix of racial groups, ethnicities and genders. This overlook falls short of capturing the complexities of the scene. But on the other hand, the book does offer a convincing account of how people’s interactions around cultural products are central within scenes.","PeriodicalId":51461,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Consumer Culture","volume":"23 1","pages":"232 - 238"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2021-09-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43335340","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-09-25DOI: 10.1177/14695405211049927
Hallie Chu
{"title":"Book Review: The Age of Fitness: How the Body Came to Symbolize Success and Achievement","authors":"Hallie Chu","doi":"10.1177/14695405211049927","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14695405211049927","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":51461,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Consumer Culture","volume":"22 1","pages":"1081 - 1085"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2021-09-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42435235","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-09-08DOI: 10.1177/14695405211039607
J. Zalewska, M. Jewdokimow
Consumption in modern, capitalist countries is studied through the lens of fashion. We claim that it is fruitful to apply the concept of fashion to an analysis of consumption in a modern socialist country. By using the example of the wall unit, we discuss the emergence of fashion through the mechanism of state policy in Poland under the Communist regime. The socialist state was responsible for the propagation and implementation of modernity. The idea of progress was internalized by citizens and enacted by social emulation. Additionally, our study reveals that social class was a means of determining different attitudes toward fashion: members of the working class saw value in imitation and exact copying (revealing a monocentric approach to fashion) while the middle class engaged in a polycentric approach, that is, they valued individual creativity, mixed various styles, and were inspired by trends from western countries.
{"title":"The wall unit: State policy and the emergence of fashion in People’s Poland","authors":"J. Zalewska, M. Jewdokimow","doi":"10.1177/14695405211039607","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14695405211039607","url":null,"abstract":"Consumption in modern, capitalist countries is studied through the lens of fashion. We claim that it is fruitful to apply the concept of fashion to an analysis of consumption in a modern socialist country. By using the example of the wall unit, we discuss the emergence of fashion through the mechanism of state policy in Poland under the Communist regime. The socialist state was responsible for the propagation and implementation of modernity. The idea of progress was internalized by citizens and enacted by social emulation. Additionally, our study reveals that social class was a means of determining different attitudes toward fashion: members of the working class saw value in imitation and exact copying (revealing a monocentric approach to fashion) while the middle class engaged in a polycentric approach, that is, they valued individual creativity, mixed various styles, and were inspired by trends from western countries.","PeriodicalId":51461,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Consumer Culture","volume":"22 1","pages":"1032 - 1048"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2021-09-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48536098","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-08-23DOI: 10.1177/14695405211039608
Amber Martin-Woodhead
Minimalism is an increasingly popular lifestyle movement in western economies (predominantly in the USA, Japan and Europe) that involves voluntarily reducing consumption and limiting one’s possessions to a bare minimum. This is with the intention of making space for the ‘important’ (potentially immaterial) things that are seen to add meaning and value to one’s life. Drawing on interviews with minimalists in the UK, this article reveals that minimalists practice sustainable (non)consumption via limiting their consumption. This is achieved by actively buying less, using up and maintaining what is owned, and, when objects are acquired, only practising highly intentional, considered and (sometimes) ethical consumption. For some, such practices are predominantly based on strong ethical and environmental motivations or are seen as a positive ‘by-product’ of their minimalist lifestyles. Whilst for others, their motivations are primarily aligned to personal well-being. The article subsequently argues that the limited and considered practices of minimalist consumption can be seen as sustainable practices in outcome, if not always in intent.
{"title":"Limited, considered and sustainable consumption: The (non)consumption practices of UK minimalists","authors":"Amber Martin-Woodhead","doi":"10.1177/14695405211039608","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14695405211039608","url":null,"abstract":"Minimalism is an increasingly popular lifestyle movement in western economies (predominantly in the USA, Japan and Europe) that involves voluntarily reducing consumption and limiting one’s possessions to a bare minimum. This is with the intention of making space for the ‘important’ (potentially immaterial) things that are seen to add meaning and value to one’s life. Drawing on interviews with minimalists in the UK, this article reveals that minimalists practice sustainable (non)consumption via limiting their consumption. This is achieved by actively buying less, using up and maintaining what is owned, and, when objects are acquired, only practising highly intentional, considered and (sometimes) ethical consumption. For some, such practices are predominantly based on strong ethical and environmental motivations or are seen as a positive ‘by-product’ of their minimalist lifestyles. Whilst for others, their motivations are primarily aligned to personal well-being. The article subsequently argues that the limited and considered practices of minimalist consumption can be seen as sustainable practices in outcome, if not always in intent.","PeriodicalId":51461,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Consumer Culture","volume":"22 1","pages":"1012 - 1031"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2021-08-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42252525","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-08-19DOI: 10.1177/14695405211039611
Dimitris Lallas, Yorgos Drosos
This article focuses on the processes that the largest shopping mall in Athens has developed in order to produce meaning about itself as an institution of consumption, as well as the consumer experience and practices, and its visitors–consumers. From a poststructuralist perspective, we analyze the signifying articulations that the promotional discourse attempts, along with the linguistic and visual techniques which activate specific significations about this microcosm of consumption, the “fun” experience, fashion, beauty, shopping and entertainment practices, eating out, and the consumer subjectivity. The ultimate aim of this research is to point out the cultural role of such an institution with regard to the configuration of an order of discourse about consumption and the reproduction of the consumerist ethos during an economic crisis, as well as the possible effects that such a discourse might have on a wider cultural level.
{"title":"“Inspiring” and configuring consumer experience in times of crisis: An analysis of the discursive practices of an Athenian shopping mall’s promotional system","authors":"Dimitris Lallas, Yorgos Drosos","doi":"10.1177/14695405211039611","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14695405211039611","url":null,"abstract":"This article focuses on the processes that the largest shopping mall in Athens has developed in order to produce meaning about itself as an institution of consumption, as well as the consumer experience and practices, and its visitors–consumers. From a poststructuralist perspective, we analyze the signifying articulations that the promotional discourse attempts, along with the linguistic and visual techniques which activate specific significations about this microcosm of consumption, the “fun” experience, fashion, beauty, shopping and entertainment practices, eating out, and the consumer subjectivity. The ultimate aim of this research is to point out the cultural role of such an institution with regard to the configuration of an order of discourse about consumption and the reproduction of the consumerist ethos during an economic crisis, as well as the possible effects that such a discourse might have on a wider cultural level.","PeriodicalId":51461,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Consumer Culture","volume":"22 1","pages":"992 - 1011"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2021-08-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42734853","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-08-18DOI: 10.1177/14695405211039614
K. Bingham
This article begins with two central ideas – that feelings of rage appear to be on the increase in present modernity and that one of the main sources of rage is directly linked to consumer culture and the retail experience it fosters. Although retail trade allows twenty-first century individuals to spend their money on material goods and experiences which provide structure and a sense of meaning and belonging, what it also causes is ambivalence, insecurity and anxiety. These are formidable feelings that cause irritation, frustration and anger to gradually fester until it accumulates into something violent that distorts the way an individual thinks, acts and treats other people. With these points in mind, what this article provides is a thorough sociological interpretation of twenty-first century retail rage. Veering away from existing interpretations of rage by drawing on Herbert Marcuse’s analysis and image of a one-dimensional society, what this article explores is the idea that retail experiences turn people into individuals who are bound and controlled by a consumer duty. As I contend, based on my unique position as a researcher turned retail worker, it is this administered, one-dimensional kind of lifestyle that cultivates rage. To support my argument and understand more comprehensively how and why retail breeds frustration and anger, I use a selection of narrative episodes to unpack three key sources of consumer rage in the twenty-first century. These sources have been labelled instantaneity, performativity and unfulfillment.
{"title":"A short ethnography of twenty-first century consumers: On retail rage and one-dimensionality","authors":"K. Bingham","doi":"10.1177/14695405211039614","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/14695405211039614","url":null,"abstract":"This article begins with two central ideas – that feelings of rage appear to be on the increase in present modernity and that one of the main sources of rage is directly linked to consumer culture and the retail experience it fosters. Although retail trade allows twenty-first century individuals to spend their money on material goods and experiences which provide structure and a sense of meaning and belonging, what it also causes is ambivalence, insecurity and anxiety. These are formidable feelings that cause irritation, frustration and anger to gradually fester until it accumulates into something violent that distorts the way an individual thinks, acts and treats other people. With these points in mind, what this article provides is a thorough sociological interpretation of twenty-first century retail rage. Veering away from existing interpretations of rage by drawing on Herbert Marcuse’s analysis and image of a one-dimensional society, what this article explores is the idea that retail experiences turn people into individuals who are bound and controlled by a consumer duty. As I contend, based on my unique position as a researcher turned retail worker, it is this administered, one-dimensional kind of lifestyle that cultivates rage. To support my argument and understand more comprehensively how and why retail breeds frustration and anger, I use a selection of narrative episodes to unpack three key sources of consumer rage in the twenty-first century. These sources have been labelled instantaneity, performativity and unfulfillment.","PeriodicalId":51461,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Consumer Culture","volume":"22 1","pages":"835 - 851"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2021-08-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45566149","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}