Consumer Culture Essay

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American Consumer Culture Consumer culture in America has taken the place of and merged with politics, religion, family, and community, creating a new culture not bound by the typical ingredients of race and religion, but brands and products. The biggest difference between American consumer culture and most world cultures is, instead of collectively idolizing a higher power and or family traditions passed down through the generations, consumer culture is centered around multinational corporations and their marketing strategies. The concept of “consumer culture” refers to the dominant mode of consumption that is structured by the collective actions of firms in their marketing activity (Holt, 2002, 71). Instead of creating unification, consumer culture strengthens individuality through the participation of market exchange. This generates commitments to objects instead of people, creating a more separate and powerful sense of self, which turns social relations into competitive interactions. Consumer culture has introduced disposability into the minds of consumers, which means more than throwing away produced goods, but also being able to throw away values, lifestyles, stable relationships, and attachments to things, buildings, people and received ways of being and doing (Harvey, 1990,285). American consumer culture came into being after WW1, when successful American corporations faced the threat of overproduction. Corporations needed to make sure consumers would buy their products and found ways to turn luxury products into functional products. Through advertising, product placement, celebrity endorsement and even social movements, corporations found ways to convince consumers to want things they didn’t need. By linking products to the unconscious desires of the population, American consumer culture was born. Consumption was then controlled by the supply
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