Explorations in Consumer Culture Theory

John F. Sherry, Eileen Fischer

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2008
• Print ISBN: 9780415776400
• eBook ISBN: 9781135971335
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

The literature of marketplace behaviour, long dominated by economic and psychological discourse, has matured in the last decade to reveal the vast expanse of consumption activity not adequately addressed – in either theoretical or empirical perspective - by the discipline's favoured approaches. The lived experience of consumption in cultural and historical context, rendered in a fashion that is both intellectually insightful and authentically evocative, and that recognizes the dynamics of accommodation and resistance that characterize the individual's relationship with the market, is the central interpretive thrust of an emerging interdisciplinary field inquiry broadly labelled "consumer culture theory."

In this volume, some of the leading scholars of this field explore in great empirical detail and theoretical depth the relationships that the consumer has developed both with goods and services and with the stakeholders that animate markets. Beginning with an examination of the underpinnings of cultural inquiry, the focus then shifts to specific consumption venues. Analyses of advertising in personal, critical and historical perspective, examination of lifestyle trends from dwelling practices of transnational nomads and regimes of personal training to genetic testing and gambling, interpretations of the dynamics of brand loyalty and corporate image management, and investigation of family consumption rituals are among the topics explored in ethnographic and humanistic perspective.

Part One Forming and framing

1 From CCT to CCC

Building consumer culture community

Johanna Moisander, Lisa Peñaloza and Anu Valtonen

Introduction

This paper began at the 2005 European Association for Consumer Research (EACR) conference in Goteborg as a conversation, one of many spurred by Arnould and Thompson’s (2005) work on Consumer Culture Theory (CCT). We applauded the many theoretical contributions these authors recognized in their review and shared their intentions of uniting us under an umbrella acronym and putting to rest continued derogatory labels of interpretive consumer research as weird science. Even so, we wondered what sorts of hegemonic inclusions and exclusions might be brought about by this academic brand in research conventions, in university jobs and promotions, and in topics and geographic areas. Further, we pondered why pockets of interpretive work have flourished in particular places and not in others, and why so little of the work of European scholars has appeared in the Journal of Consumer Research (JCR), observations even more surprising since so many of the theoretical foundations of CCT have come from Europe, for example, Karl Marx, Ferdinand de Saussure, Claude Levi-Strauss, Jean Baudrillard, Michel Foucault, Mary Douglas, Pierre Bourdieu, and the list goes on. Above all, we were concerned about the implications of the CCT paper for the quest for pluralism that has been a central epistemic value throughout the history of interpretive consumer research. We thus take a self-reflective, genealogical perspective (Foucault 1970) on the project of building CCT in order to lay further groundwork for the evolution of expanded forms of consumer culture community (CCC). In doing so, we participate in the litany of conversations among interpretive consumer researchers strategizing to increase our numbers in the pages of journals and in university positions, firms, and graduate programs. ¹

We begin to seek answers to these puzzling observations in tracing the historical roots of the epistemic community CCT represents in the field of consumer research in the US. ² By epistemic community we refer to a network of scholars that works to construct and give authority to particular ways of knowing (Knorr Cetina 1999; Longino 1990; Longino 2002). The CCT paper began as a review of 20 years of interpretive work published in the Journal of Consumer Research (JCR) solicited by editor Dawn Iacobucci in encouraging her associate editors to reflect upon the contributions and future directions of their respective areas. Here, authors Arnould and Thompson (2005) refer to the work of a community of mainly American “interpretive” scholars, whose formative development entailed making space within the logical-empiricist, quantitative, and utterly managerial research approach dominant in the top US marketing academy and its journals. Our interest lies in drawing out particularities in the issues and points of contention scholars have dealt with within this body of work as the basis for comparisons to additional strands of interpretive consumer research. Thus our objective in mapping out what might be differs from Arnould and Thompson’s (2005) in overviewing interpretive work published in JCR.

In crafting our genealogy, we draw from studies of ethnic minority discourse (Bhabba 1994; JanMohamed and Lloyd 1991; Lipsitz 2001). Noteworthy in this work are accounts of the differential acceptance rates of literary work penned by persons of color. To summarize their findings, writings more like the mainstream canon in structure have been accepted more readily into English literature programs in US universities than those that differ in structure from the canon.

Like these literary scholars, we are concerned with two levels of difference. While the literary scholars are concerned with differences between the creative writing of whites and authors of color, and within the writings of nonwhite authors, we are concerned with differences between interpretivist and noninterpretivist work, and those within interpretivist work. We suggest that while the early interpretivist work focused on its differences from positivist research, at present differences within CCT are as relevant to our long-term development. That is, as interpretive scholars mature as an epistemic community, increasingly relevant are within group distinctions, as it is us, interpretive researchers, who are the gatekeepers, evaluating colleagues for promotions and jobs, and reviewing and editing interpretive papers in journals and conferences. Of course, of continued importance are differences between interpretive and positivist work, as competition between paradigms remains an issue in journal and conference reviews and job searches.

To continue, we suggest that forms of interpretive work more similar to the mainstream have been more readily accepted into the mainstream journals than those more different in structure, even though both have differed in content. We emphasize differences in consumption content as the explanation why interpretive work was labeled “weird science” early on in dealing with extreme forms of consumption such as collecting (Belk et al. 1991), pop music fanatics (O’Guinn 1991), and sex (Gould 1991), and agree with Arnould and Thompson’s (2005) conclusion that such work has probably distorted the larger body of interpretive work even as it has contributed to the notoriety of the latter.

To return to our argument, we contend that the strategy of emphasizing ontological and epistemological differences between interpretive and quantitative work (Belk et al. 1988; Hirschman 1986), has glossed over their similarities. We are concerned with similarities continuous with classical economics and psychology in emphasizing the rational, universal, individual consumer we playfully call the “heroic consumer.”

Finally, we challenge Arnould and Thompson’s (2005) assertion that methods are no longer relevant and their exhortation to use established methods to study new problems and canonical constructs. To the contrary, we show that interpretive work has consistently developed new research methods and ways of viewing the nature of reality and of ways of knowing that have enabled researchers and reviewers to see new problems (Thompson et al. 1989; Scott 1994; Ozanne and Murray 1991). We thus encourage the more explicit, simultaneous development of new methods and topics that transcend the individual unit of analysis, adjudicate multiple dialectics of consumer meanings, and bridge consumption phenomena with regional and global politics. For each of these avenues we cite work moving in these directions and make suggestions for further research.

CCT as an epistemic community

Epistemic community definitions and functions

In directing attention to the epistemic culture continuously produced, reproduced, and negotiated in CCT, we seek better understanding of the way it offers specific forms of intelligibility for people to make sense of “knowledge production” and themselves as “knowers.” Importantly, the epistemic culture guides and constrains action in academic research organizations by making available particular ways of thinking and talking about knowledge and knowing that are grounded in social practice. It effectively accomplishes hegemonic inclusions and exclusions of knowledge production in organizing and orienting taken-for-granted cognitive goals and values, received theoretical background assumptions, and conventions of normal practice (Longino 1990; Longino 2002). Further, like other organizational cultures, epistemic culture exerts its influence through implicit norms and received ideals and practices (Linstead and Grafton-Small 1992).

Importantly, as an epistemic community, CCT is an act of power – far more than a mere label or brand for promoting “interpretive scholars,” as Arnould and Thompson (2005) have positioned it. The label and the practices it represents effectively highlight various topics and methodological approaches over others. As its nomenclature reverberates among interpretive colleagues, and between interpretivists and noninterpretivists, CCT plays a not insignificant role in governing the review practices for journals, the selection of tracks and papers in conferences, the formation and contents of doctoral courses, and the selection of speakers in academic programs. For colleagues and students, for example, to say that they are doing CCT situates them within existing methodological customs and theoretical ways of thinking. This in itself is useful, especially for students in establishing themselves with graduate committees and in seeking jobs. Our concern is that such positioning may limit the willingness and development of skills to critique and extend the body of work and its methods, both of which is vital to their careers and to CCC in the long run.

In this paper we echo Arnould and Thompson’s (2007) addendum that there is no single consumer culture theory, and we hope that it stays that way. However, we believe it is important to go beyond acknowledging that CCT consists of numerous theoretical perspectives and methodological approaches to emphasize their different ontological and epistemological commitments. Specifically, we refer to issues within hermeneutics, ethnographic field work, and critical theory in their respective emphases on individual agents versus group units of analysis, on interpretations of textual data versus social activity in accessing the meanings of consumption, and on treatments of consumption politics as apart from versus engaged with regional and global power structures. Given these differences, our concern is with the subtle formation of research conventions privileging the former over the latter over time.

As Helen Longino (1993) has argued, if we recognize the partiality of theories, we can recognize and work towards pluralism in the community as an important condition for the continued development of knowledge. Thus, we write this paper in the hope of nurturing this pluralism in the field of interpretive consumer research for the diversity, creativity, and innovation that it stimulates. While the attempt to institutionalize “interpretive” consumer research through CCT helps us all, the sedimentation of CCT as the brand is suspect if not dangerous when it represents the one best theory or correct methodological approach in interpretive consumer research. In the next section we overview the North American socio-cultural and institutional trajectory of CCT, drawing from writings, observation, and our own personal experience towards the goal of encouraging open discussion and transformative criticism of the background assumptions and beliefs that have come to guide its research topics and practices.

A historical tale

Like other epistemic communities (Longino 1990), CCT is constituted in the discourses and interactions of those within the group of CCT researchers, and in relation to noninterpretivist modelers, experimentalists, and survey consumer researchers. Individual personalities are part of every community, including CCT, yet its mainstays are found in the numbers of people, the quality and timing of their work, the support of key academics and industry people, and exchanges with those in opposition. The founders of CCT were personalities, as playful as they were serious in applying their multi-disciplinary theories and methodological toolkits, intellectual creativity, and determination in trailblazing new consumer research paths and topics. The early conferences buzzed with stories speculating whether Paul Anderson, Russell Belk, Elizabeth Hirschman, Morris Holbrook, Sidney Levy, Melanie Wallendorf, John Sherry, and company ³ would pull off their “weird science,” in bringing forth interpretive ways of doing research and topics that recentered the consumer, reinstated the joys of discovery long buried in the confines of lab experiments and mathematical models, and reappropriated the marketplace as the eminent site of inquiry (Belk 1991a). Differences of opinion reverberated in hallways, lunches, and well into the night over drinks regarding how far they would/should go in claiming space in conferences, journals, academic departments, etc. Seldom did conversations not feature conflicts among interpretivists regarding feasible/appropriate ways to proceed in refuting gatekeeping journal editors, conference organizers and colleagues; in advancing the scientific versus humanistic merits of the work in responding to charges of its lack of relevance and rigor; and in infiltrating existing power structures and forming new ones.

In tracing the history of this epistemic community, it is useful to include sentiments in the field at the time. Kuhn (1970) speaks of the necessity of a critical mass recognizing the inability of the existing way of thinking and doing research, which Suppe (1979) termed the “received view” to address pressing contemporary phenomena. The scientific revolutions Kuhn detailed begin at the periphery, where “desert scientists” investigate “anomalies” either ignored or not dealt with adequately in the received view of “normal science.” Over time “weird science” becomes viewed as central and valuable in addressing issues increasingly recognized to be relevant, and ultimately becomes the mainstream.

It is our assertion that early interpretive work entailed such a revolution in the US, and is now well on its way to becoming a global mainstream. The following excerpt from Elizabeth Hirschman’s preface to her 1989 edited volume stands in stark contrast to the present global diffusion of interpretive work. Here she relates a lunch conversation at the 1987 AMA doctoral consortium pondering the present marginalized status and future challenges of interpretive methods and relativist philosophies.

There was a fair amount of agreement that interpretive research was not faring as well as we had hoped: editors were recalcitrant, reviewers hostile, colleagues less than enthusiastic. The moods of the lunch table participants ranged from the mildly ironic to the radically cynical. Various anecdotes of disappointment and distress were recounted. What to do? Retreat was intellectually unacceptable; once you’ve crossed over that mental bridge to interpretivism, there’s no turning back. Rebellion and secession seemed certainly doomed to failure; internecine warfare is always destructive to all parties, and besides, we had nowhere to go, anyway. Starting our own journal appeared too grandiose and egocentric; holding a conference, too small and redundant with the many special topic sessions at ACR that would have preceded it. Someone, perhaps Paul Anderson or Morris Holbrook, suggested a book.

(Hirschman 1989)

The budding group earned vital legitimacy from senior marketing academics and executives in highly esteemed institutions, such as Needham Harper Worldwide and the Marketing Science Institute, disillusioned with quantitative consumer research. Their support of the Consumer Behavior Odyssey would become a key turning point in the development of the group and a vital tool for it in making headway in the field. For example, in their letters of support, Hall Kassarjian expresses excitement and contrasts the field studies and interpretive analysis with “dull” consumer research he attributes to “technocrats” who have “overpowered the field and squeezed it dry of fun” (cited in Belk 1991b: 4), while William Wells writes of his distress and encourages colleagues to counter the tendency of academic researchers to migrate from real consumers to labs and “theoretical never-never land” (cited in Belk 1991b: 5).

Flashing forward to the present, it is an understatement to say CCT has outgrown the derogatory label of weird science. Over time members of this ever-expanding group ⁴ have taken positions in marketing and other university departments; published scores of articles in JCR and other journals; edited and written books and b...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contributor biographies
• Introduction Explorations in Consumer Culture Theory:what are we exploring now?
• PART ONE Forming and framing
• 1 From CCT to CCC: building consumer culture community
• 2 Theoretical realism: culture and politics in commercial imagery
• PART TWO Time and space
• 3 Rethinking marketing’s evolutionary paradigm and advertisers’ role as cultural intermediary
• 4 Home away from home: home as order and dwelling in mobility
• PART THREE Setting and self
• 5 Are we there yet? Co-producing success and failure in a “consumer-intensive” service context
• 6 Designer genes: DNA testing services and consumer identity
• PART FOUR Brands and images
• 7 Allomother as image and essence: animating the American Girl brand
• 8 Engineering a mainstream market for sustainability: insights from Wal-Mart’s perfect storm
• PART FIVE Rites and games
• 9 Tinsel, trimmings, and tensions: consumer negotiations of a focal Christmas artifact
• 10 Stacking the deck: gambling in film and the legitimization of casino gambling
• PART SIX Poetry
• 11 Poetry
• Conclusion Reflections and revanche