Consumerism on TV

Presenting case studies of well-known shows including Will and Grace, Birds of a Feather, Sex and the City and Absolutely Fabulous, as well as 'reality' television, this book examines the transformations that have occurred in consumer society since its appearance and the ways in which these have been constructed and represented in popular media imagery. With analyses of the ways in which consumerism has played out in society, Consumerism on TV highlights specific aspects of the changing nature of consumerism by way of considerations of gender, sexuality and class, as well as less definable changes such as those to do with the celebration of ostentatious greed or the righteousness of the ’ethical’ shopper. With attention to the highly delineated consumer field in which ’shopping’ as an embedded practice of everyday life is caught between escapism and politics, authors explore a variety of themes, such as the extent to which consumerism has become embedded in forging identity, the positing of consumerism as a form of activism, the visibility of the gay male consumer and invisibility of the lesbian consumer, and the (re)stratification of consumer types along class lines. An engaging invitation to consider whether the positioning of consumerism through on-screen depictions is indicative of a new type of non-philosophical politics of 'choice' - a form of marketised, (a)political pragmatism - this book will appeal to scholars and students of sociology and cultural and media studies, with interests in class, consumption and gender. <p>Acknowledgements</p><p></p><p>Preface by Alison Hulme </p><p></p><p>1. Blurring Fiction with Reality: American Television and</p><p></p><p>Consumerism in the 1950s </p><p>Susan Nacey</p><p></p><p>2. From ‘Make do and Mend’ to ‘Your Country Needs You to</p><p></p><p>Spend’: Constructing the Consumer in Late-Modernity </p><p>Alison Hulme</p><p></p><p>3. Birds of a Feather Shop Together: Conspicuous Consumption</p><p></p><p>and the Imaging of the 1980’s Essex Girl </p><p>Rachel Rye</p><p></p><p>4. Absolutely Ethical?: Irony, Subversion and Prescience in</p><p>Absolutely Fabulous </p><p>Susie Khamis</p><p></p><p>5. The ‘Good Life’ on the Small Screen: Ethical Consumption,</p><p></p><p>Food Television and Green Makeovers </p><p>Tania Lewis</p><p></p><p>6. Consuming the Lesbian Body: Post-Feminist Heteroflexible</p><p></p><p>Subjectivities in <i>Sex and the City </i>and <i>The L Word </i></p><p>Ella Fegitz</p><p></p><p>7. Effeminacy and Expertise, Excess and Equality: Gay Best</p><p></p><p>Friends as Consumers and Commodities in Contemporary</p><p></p><p>Television </p><p>Susie Khamis and Anthony Lambert</p><p></p><p>8. ‘A Thousand Diamonds’: Gypsies, Romanies and Travellers and</p><p></p><p>‘Transgressive Consumerism’ in Reality Television </p><p>Emma Bell</p><p></p><p>9. Shopping for Identity: Post-Feminist Flâneuses in <i>Sex and the City</i></p><p></p><p>and <i>In the Cut </i></p><p>Lisa French</p><p></p><p>Index</p>