social class.
From a Marxist perspective, it is the wage-relation, it is capitalist relations of
production that produce the consumer.
Consumer culture is incompatible with the political regulation of consumption that
suppresses the market. It does not arise in non-capitalist societies.
- Consumer culture is, in principle, universal and impersonal
Consumer culture is often identified with the idea of mass consumption. Market
relations are anonymous and in principle universal.
The idea that consumer culture serves a general public also promotes a more positive
idea that it embraces ‘everyone’. We are all formally free and equal, unconstrained in
our choices by legally fixed status or cultural prohibitions. Yet, it is also felt to be
universal because everyone must be a consumer and this particular freedom is
compulsory.
If there is no principle restricting who can consume what, there is no principled
constraint on what can be consumed: all social relations, activities and objects can in
principle be exchanged as commodities.
- Consumer culture identifies freedom with private choice and private life
To be a consumer is to make choices and this exercise of choice is in principle
unconstrained. The freedom of consumer culture is defined in a modern and liberal
way - consumer choice is a private act. Two senses of meaning of this, and they are –
firstly, in the positive sense, it occurs within a domain of the private, which is
ideologically declared out of bounds to public intervention, social and political
authority. Secondly, in the negative sense, it is restricted to the household, mundane
domesticity, the world of private relationships.
A critical remark is that in becoming ‘free’ as consumer we barter away power and
freedom in the workplace or in the political arena in exchange for more private
contentment.
- Consumer needs are in principle unlimited and insatiable
The idea of insatiable need is bound up with notions of cultural modernization: the
increased productivity of modern industry is a response and a spur to the capacity of
people’s desires to become increasingly sophisticated, refined, and personal, as well
as people’s desire to advance themselves socially and economically.
On the other hand, commercial society is systematically dependent on the insatiability
of needs. Therefore, the market society fears the possibility that needs might be
satisfied. To counter these fears, society develops demand management strategies and
advertising, marketing and promotion.
A cultural contradiction arises and that is economic modernization underpinned by
regime of rational planning and discipline and a work ethic, yet it depends upon
fostering irrational desires and passions and a hedonistic ethic.
- Consumer culture is the privileged medium for negotiating identity and status within a post- traditional society
Modern concepts of individualism sweep away the possibility and desirability of fixed
status order, characteristic of feudal times. In a post-traditional society, social identity
must be constructed by individuals because it is no longer given or ascribed.
Goods can always signify social identity, but in the fluid processes of a
post-traditional society, identity seems to be more a function of consumption rather
than as in the feudal society where social order and identity dictate consumption
patterns.
Consumer culture is crucially about the negotiation of status and identity. Regulation
of these issues by tradition is replaced by negotiation and construction, and consumer
goods are crucial to the way in which we make up our social appearance, our social
networks, our structure of social values.
- Consumer culture represents the increasing importance of culture in the modern exercise of power
Consumer culture is awash with signs, images, publicity. This involves an
aestheticisation of commodities and their environment. Consumption becomes a
privileged site of autonomy, meanings, subjectivity, privacy and freedom.
Yet, all these meanings around consumption become crucial to economic competition
and rational organization, become the objects of strategic action by dominating
institutions. The sense of autonomy and identity comes under threat. Hence the
controversy over whether consumption is a sphere of manipulation or freedom.
How is magazine publishing part of “Consumer Culture”
Magazine publishing is both a cultural activities and a business. Magazine are
vehicles of new idea and sources of entertainment. But the task of bring them into
existence and of purveying them to their readers is a commercial one requiring all the
resources and skills of the manager and entrepreneur.
In this essay I will analyze the teen girls magazines to demonstrate how is magazine
publishing part of “consumer culture”.
- Magazine is a culture of consumption
When a reader is consuming a magazine, she is consuming the culture values, ideas,
aspirations and identities provided by it.
Girls’ magazines, such as: “Bliss”, “J-17”, “Sugar”, “Cosmo girl”, “Elle girl”, are
filled with fashion, beauty, styles, music, celebrities, boys and advice. Some of them
also campaign on issues and provide a platform for the teen generation to shout from.
Since they are popular mainstream magazines that are available in most newsagents,
and therefore arguably represent to the readers what constitutes the modern teenage
girl. Through reading a magazine aimed at her demographic group, an adolescent girl
will gain an insight into the world of the girls and will be taught what are the cultural
expectations made of them as girls, she will therefore come to learn that society
expects her to be more concerned with her appearance, her relations with other
people, and her ability to win approval from boys than with her own ideas or
expectations for herself, so magazines are central to society as they create a culture, a
culture of femininity, they defines and shapes the girls’ world, we can see that it
becomes a familiar friend for girls- it advises her, and provides entertainment,
amusement and escapism for her and speaks to her in a language she understands.
These magazines therefore symbolize a lifestyle, a life of luxury and pleasure. They
are not only just a teen magazine, but they also represent a brand name in the teen
market. They build up new trends, ideas, lifestyle and attitude, they are the new
primary producers in out so called knowledge economy. For example: Sugar
magazine was a dazzling success, it launched its own brand extension - its own line of
clothing a couple of years ago.
- Magazine is the culture of market society
Magazine publishing is aware of the demands of the market, their competition and
advertisers. Consumers represent a diverse set of groups, each possessing a distinct
lifestyle and a consumption pattern. Therefore, there are different types of magazines
in the market targeted for different groups of people, and the articles in these
magazines are primarily written with their audience in mind. For example: some teen
magazines, like: “Mizz”, “Shout” are geared toward pre-teens and early teenagers,
aged 10 -14. The content of these magazines is mainly about beauty and celebrities.
But other teen magazines, like: “Bliss”, “Sugar”, “J-17”, “Cosmo girl”, “Seventeen”,
“19”, etc. are aimed at 15 – 19 years old, or at least who think they are as mature as a
15 – 19 year old. Beside the regular content in every teen girls magazine, these
magazines are also laced with much sexual dimorphism, or the definition of particular
attitudes, actions, and objects as feminine or masculine.
- Magazine is, in principal, universal and impersonal
Though the Association for Teachers and Lecturers voted to campaign for age
restrictions to be placed on teen magazines at their annual conference in April, the UK
Government say no to age restrictions on teen magazines. And since there is no age
restriction on teen magazines, they can easily be purchased by everyone in nearly
every newsagent, most shops and supermarkets. Thus, it is a kind of mass
consumption. The more widespread the teen magazines become, the bigger audience
they can penetrate and the more people they can bring new ideas to. With more people
sharing the values, ideas, aspirations, and identities provided by these teen magazines,
they are able to set the norms for the culture. For example: these magazines reflect
images of thinness and beauty, and link them to other symbols of happiness, love and
success for girls. And the same message is repeated over and over again in the
magazines. The repeated exposure to thin bodies and perfect faces eventually sticks
and becomes the ideal image of the majority of young girls.
- Magazine identifies freedom with private choice and private life
There are varieties of teen girls’ magazines in the market, from very “girly bubbly”
Bliss, J-17, Sugar to more “elegant” Teen Vogue, Elle girl, etc. Both local and
imported foreign magazines are also available in newsagents, bookshops, convenient
stores, supermarkets, hotel lobby shops, and malls. Since most of us are living in a
free world, the free market permits individuals to make choices for themselves, and
prohibits them from forcing those choices onto others. Therefore, people from almost
everywhere around the world can choose to consume these teen girls magazines
according to their preferences.
- Consumer needs are in principle unlimited and insatiable
Since there are many different teen girls magazines available in the market, readers
are spoiled for choices. Thus, readers may easily shift from one magazine to another
magazine. In order to maintain the sales and to increase the demand, advertising,
marketing and promotion are widely used among these teen magazines. For examples:
Bliss, Sugar, J-17 magazines have all put advertisements on some other teenage pop
magazines, offered subscription discounts and free gifts to their readers. With more
advertisements and promotion sales, these magazines can increase their competitive
power and attract their potential readers.
- Magazine is the privileged medium for negotiating identity and status within a post-traditional society
If you break down a typical teen magazine, you will notice that is almost fifty percent
advertisements. Advertisements seen in those teen magazines, and the imagery such
advertising campaigns put forward can also be seen in influence a young person
constructing their identity. Through the visual codes of these advertisements, they
work to signify a particular set of cultural values and meanings. This can be anything
from the latest labeled trainers to buy to which mobile phone is the smallest and
therefore most popular to which beauty treatment to use. The list is endless.
Sometimes these advertisements evince the excesses of materialism. A great many
young girls would look as these advertisements as a source of inspiration as to what to
have and would think that they were inadequate to some extent if they could not have
those “cool” images or products, therefore advertising screams the values of popular
culture today, and every young girl reading teen magazines wants to look like the
images portrayed throughout the magazine. For example: the present Love Kylie
lingerie advertisement or the Maybelline make-up advertisements found in Bliss and
other teen magazine, these advertisements promise to transform the girls’ appearances
into something that they have always dreamed of. Girls look up to the images they see
day after day, and the familiar thin, flawless figure becomes a role model. These
advertisements are designed to encourage girls to use make up and to diet, and
advertisers make this image acceptable.
- Magazine represents the increasing importance of culture in the modern exercises of power
A decade ago teen magazines focused on just makeup tips and fashion. However, in
1988, the launch of “Sassy”, (it had a new, different, “cool”, and straight forward
approach. It took a more modern tone in fashion and issues. The main issue being,
you guessed it, sex.) has been attributed as the cause for this sexier content. The trend
has continued with the recent introductions of “Bliss”, “Sugar”, “Cosmo girl” and
“Teen Vogue”, etc. Teen magazines nowadays are filled with images of sex and
sexuality as well as information about sexual health. Now you can open up any teen
magazine and notice the sexual influences. They not only appear in the articles, whose
subjects can range from what sex is like, unwed pregnancy, abortion, or how to be
sexy, but also in the advertisements placed throughout the magazines. Since teenagers
are curious about sex and these magazines seem to be the only way for them to obtain
information about it. Therefore, many teen magazines have increased the amount of
space focused on sexual-related issues in order to follow what their competitors do, so
as to attract more readers. Sex has been packaged as a "commodity" by these
magazines in recent years, it marks a new moment in the construction of female
sexual identities.
Conclusion
According to Slater, “consumer culture is a culture of consumption”, “consumer
culture is a culture of a market society”, “consumer culture is, in principle, universal
and impersonal”, “consumer culture identifies freedom with private choice and
private life”, “consumer needs are in principle unlimited and insatiable”, “consumer
culture is the privileged medium for negotiating identity and status within a
post-traditional society” and “consume culture represents the increasing importance of
culture in the modern exercise of power”.
From the above analysis, magazine publishing can fit into Slater’s descriptions of
consumer culture. Therefore, magazine publishing is part of consumer culture.
References
Readings:
1. Featherstone, M. Consumer Culture and Postmodernism (Sage, 1991)
2. Martyn J. Lee. Consumer Culture Reborn (Routledge, 1993)
3. Slater, D. Consumer Culture and Modernity (Polity, 1997)
4. McCracken, E. Decoding Women’s Magazines (Macmillan, 1993)
5. Grant John The New Marketing Manifesto (Texere, 1999)
6. Bourdieu, Pierre The Field of Cultural Production (Polity, 1993)
7. Bocock, R. Consumption (Routledge, 1993)
Websites:
1. Researching consumer culture -
http://homepages.gold.ac.uk/slater/consumer/
2. Article about teen magazine from ABC7Chicago.com -
http://abclocal.go.com/wls/news/connectwithkids/082904_cwk_magazines.html
3. Cause of advertising - http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~onderdonk/306fall02/teen/causesofadvertising.html
4. Periodicals Publishers Association -
http://www.ppa.co.uk/cgi-bin/go.pl/legal/article.html?uid=1355&topic_uid=82
5. Sociology of Consumption –
http://uk.geocities.com/balihar_sanghera/contheories.html