Teaching Responsibility
LJMU Schools involved in Delivery:
Humanities and Social Science
Learning Methods
Lecture
Seminar
Module Offerings
6108MEDCUL-JAN-MTP
Aims
1. To explore scholarly accounts of the development and nature of consumer society and its associated cultures of consumption.
2. To enable students to produce a critically and theoretically-informed essay.
3. To develop critical interpretive skills for the observation of consumption practices.
Learning Outcomes
1.
Critically evaluate the theoretical and methodological techniques used to study consumer culture.
2.
Produce a critically and theoretically-informed essay about a selected aspect of consumer culture and/or cultural consumption.
3.
Produce a theoretically-informed interpretation of a given consumption practice.
Module Content
Outline Syllabus:Consumption and The Romantic Ethic; Simmel and the city; Veblen and conspicuous consumption; Bourdieu and distinction; Consuming Gender; Consuming Postmodern Leisure; Consuming The Mall; Consuming Nostalgia; Observing Consumption; Remediation and Consumer Culture.
Module Overview:
This module offers a wide range of theoretical and conceptual perspectives on the critical study of consumer society and consumer culture, beginning with a series of lectures on core theoretical approaches and concluding with case studies of a range of cultures of consumption, such as: the shopping mall, nostalgic consumption, luxury consumption, gender identity and consumer culture and postmodern leisure consumption. You will develop critical interpretive skills for the observation of consumption practices and will produce a critically and theoretically-informed essay about a selected aspect of consumer culture and/or cultural consumption.
This module offers a wide range of theoretical and conceptual perspectives on the critical study of consumer society and consumer culture, beginning with a series of lectures on core theoretical approaches and concluding with case studies of a range of cultures of consumption, such as: the shopping mall, nostalgic consumption, luxury consumption, gender identity and consumer culture and postmodern leisure consumption. You will develop critical interpretive skills for the observation of consumption practices and will produce a critically and theoretically-informed essay about a selected aspect of consumer culture and/or cultural consumption.
Additional Information:In the module we will examine theoretical accounts that are profoundly pessimistic about the rise of consumer culture and others that see it as a potentially creative and empowering resource for the formation of self-identity. We hope you will
approach your studies with the same energy and enthusiasm we feel for the subject. To us, the study of consumer culture is fascinating, mainly we suspect, because the real object of study is ourselves and the way we have come to live
today.