The question of consumption emerged as a major focus of research and scholarship in the 1990s but the breadth and diversity of consumer culture has not been fully enough explored. The meanings of consumption, particularly in relation to lifestyle and identity, are of great importance to academic areas including business studies, sociology, cultural and media studies, psychology, geography and politics.
The SAGE Handbook of Consumer Culture is a one-stop resource for scholars and students of consumption, where the key dimensions of consumer culture are critically discussed and articulated. The editors have organised contributions from a global and interdisciplinary team of scholars into six key sections:
Part 1: Sociology of Consumption
Part 2: Geographies of Consumer Culture
Part 3: Consumer Culture Studies in Marketing
Part 4: Consumer Culture in Media and Cultural Studies
Part 5: Material Cultures of Consumption
Part 6: The Politics of Consumer Culture
Industry Reviews
A thorough and comprehensive guide filled with insightful and up to date articles written by foremost experts. This belongs on the bookshelves of researchers and practitioners, indeed anyone with an interest in the consumer culture that dominates the world. -- Richard Wilk Two of the most important elements of this volume are a) the truly diverse approaches to the study of consumer culture at the global level, and b) the rich bibliographies provided by each of the chapters. The authors come from around the world, teaching at institutions in at least 10 different countries, in a variety of disciplines. Academic libraries with programs in any or all of the disciplines mentioned in the book [business, psychology and sociology, geography and politics] should consider adding this volume to their collections. -- Mark Schumacher This Consumer Culture Handbook is an exciting, useful and frankly valiant overview of the intensely multidisciplinary field that consumer culture studies have become. It will provide an excellent vantage point from which to make sense of this dynamic field. -- Don Slater The Sage Handbook of Consumer Culture provides a remarkably comprehensive treatment of how this controversial, contested, and consequential intersection of consumption, the market, and culture is conceptualized and investigated across diverse intellectual fields. More than just a review, each chapter recognizes past influences while articulating cutting edge ideas, new analytic tools, and anticipating future directories. The Sage Handbook of Consumer Culture allows for a ready and intellectually enriching comparison of how the complexities of consumer culture are addresses across the spheres of sociology, anthropology, history, media studies, material studies and business/marketing. In its grand finale, this collection offers a series of integrative, interdisciplinary studies that explore how forces of neoliberalism, consumer activism, discourses of sustainability, and nationalism are inflected through the marketized prism of consumer culture, generating a nexus of political and societal effects. The Sage Handbook of Consumer Culture is essential reading for anyone seeking a fuller understanding of this interdisciplinary and dynamic sphere of inquiry. -- Craig Thompson
