Lodziak, Conrad. The Myth of Consumerism. London: Pluto Press, 2002.

The Symbolic Value of

Consumption

Current theoretical orthodoxy describes consumption as primarily,

and above all else, a symbolic activity. This is typically taken to mean
that when we consume we are essentially consuming symbolic
meanings. Obviously we consume, amongst other things, material
objects with a use value. But, for the ideology of consumerism, it is
the symbolic meanings of these material objects that take pride of
place in the description and explanation of consumption. The
symbolic value of contemporary consumption practices, it is
maintained, holds the key to explaining why people consume. This
is a radical departure from common sense understandings of why
we consume.
Within the ideology of consumerism, the exchange value and
material use value of consumer products are ignored or relegated to
a secondary or minor role in explaining consumption, or are
themselves treated as values that cannot escape symbolisation. Consumption today is thus viewed as being grounded in the symbolic.
As we shall see in following chapters, it is the alleged symbolic value
of consumption that provides the latest ideology of consumerism
with a framework for its theorisation of both identity construction
and individual freedom. Our main concern in this chapter, however,
is with the ways in which the ideology of consumerism regards the
pleasures and meanings of consumption as being based on, and
reflecting the symbolic nature of consumption.
Meaning and Pleasure
It will become clear shortly that current theoretical fashion
overstates both the symbolic nature and symbolic value of consumption. First, however, it is necessary to identify just what the
symbolic nature and value of consumption means for the ideology
of consumerism.
It must be said that while there is much talk of the symbolic value
of consumption there is very little that gives us a clear indication of
30

The Symbolic Value of Consumption

31

what this actually means. Earlier attempts to give the symbolic some
substantive content, as in the speculations of Roland Barthes,1 have
been more or less ditched by the latest ideology of consumerism.
Thus instead of declaring that by eating steak, for example, we are
actually consuming virility (its alleged symbolic value), the latest
ideology of consumerism prefers a more open-ended approach to
what things mean. Indeed, what things mean is no longer a concern.
Rather, the ideology of consumerism emphasises meaning construction as a process involving the individual interacting with
symbolic meanings.
Nevertheless, perhaps because of the association between the
symbolic and the immaterial, unreal, hyperreal, surreal and so on,
theorising consumption as a symbolic process has led, as we shall see,
to some bizarre speculations. While some of the wildest theoretical
excesses have become a part of the latest ideology of consumerism,
whether or not they attract widespread agreement is debatable. My
main concern in this chapter is with that part of the ideology which
appears to be widely supported within Cultural Studies and the
sociology of culture. Nevertheless it will be useful to highlight some
of the more extravagant and celebratory claims of the ideology of
consumerism in order better to define its consensual core.
Consumption as symbolic refers to the notion that consumption
is essentially the consumption of symbolic meanings. However, as I
made clear in the previous chapter, this is not understood as a
passive process but rather as an active one in which the consumer
is involved in a creative (and pleasurable) process of meaning negotiation and construction. Consumption is thus seen as meaningful
and pleasurable, and it is our engagement with the symbolic that
makes it so.
Viewing consumption as primarily symbolic trades on the recognition that the images (meanings) originally produced through
advertising, and circulated through the mass media and the display
of goods in shopping malls and high streets, are not only proliferating, but may (and often do) become detached from their objects
there are more signs or images in circulation than there are objects.
This detachment is normally understood to be a consequence of the
creative symbolic work of consumers themselves. In other words,
goods and services are invested with meaning (their commodified
symbolic value) by producers and advertisers. Consumers may thus
consume goods for this symbolic value, or, may adopt alternative

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The Myth of Consumerism

meanings that circulate throughout particular subcultures or social

groupings, or may attribute their own meanings to products.
From here, the consensual position within the latest ideology of
consumerism emphasises the way in which meanings and pleasures
derived from consumption are used to create particular lifestyles
supportive of distinctive identities. This will be the focus of the next
chapter. Increasingly theorists are happy not to specify the particular
meanings and pleasures that can be derived from consumption.
Meanings and pleasures are, after all, a matter that can be
determined only by the individual. Nevertheless, meanings and
pleasures are assumed to be of central significance for individuals in
their interpretation of experiences, in their making sense of the
social worlds they inhabit, in organising their actions and in constituting their sense of self (self-identity).
This much is agreed. Beyond this point, however, the consensual
position becomes either harder to pin down, or disappears altogether
into two theoretical directions. On the one hand there are those who
tend to give priority to the cognitive-moral-rational dimensions of
symbolic meaning. On the other hand there are academics who
privilege the aesthetic-emotional-irrational dimensions of pleasure.
In the former, the symbolic value of consumption is explored in
ways that both assume and lend support to the idea that the
individual is essentially a rational, decision-making being. In the
latter, the bodily and cerebral pleasures of consumption are closely
tied in to the manner in which the intense imagery of consumer
culture summons up dreams, fantasies and desires.
On the face of it, it would seem that the consensus that forms the
core of the ideology of consumerism breaks up into two emphases
reflecting two distinct approaches to human motivations one based
on meaning and making sense, the other on pleasure and desire. Of
course there is no necessary incompatibility here. Clearly pleasures
can be derived from the act of creating meaning and meaning can
be achieved in the pursuit of pleasure. More than this, the
complexity of human motivations does allow scope for the rational
and irrational to co-exist within the individual.
The theoretical consensus does not seem to have a problem with
this. Indeed, it is increasingly the case that the ideology of consumerism subsumes all sources of motivation to those directly
relevant to self-identity. Thus rather than opting for a view that
locates the attractions of consumption in either meaning or pleasure,
the tendency is to acknowledge that their relevance will vary in

The Symbolic Value of Consumption

33

relation to the preferences of individuals. Such a move allows the

consensus not to specify the substantive content of the symbolic,
leaving the latter to the individual consumer. The consensus is
unwilling to embrace those theoretical speculations that might be
perceived to lack credibility and hence attract criticism. The
consumer, however, given the commitment of Cultural Studies to
anti-elitism, is assumed to be beyond criticism.
The cognitive-moral-rational direction to theorising the symbolic
value of consumption has its roots in earlier Cultural Studies work
on youth subcultures, such as mods and rockers.2 In that era Cultural
Studies acknowledged the existence of a dominant culture with its
attendant dominant ideology (values and meanings). Certain youth
subcultures were seen as consciously developing a style that purposefully subverted, or even contradicted, dominant meanings.
Given the political significance that Cultural Studies attributes to
ideology (its ideology-centredness), it is unsurprising that stylistic
consumption that contested commodified meanings should be seen
as political. With hindsight, however, we can say that mods and
rockers may have had some cultural significance, but to depict this
as politically significant is to stretch the bounds of credibility.
In more recent times there are still those who treat forms of
stylistic consumption that contest commodified symbolic values as
political. Arguably the most bizarre expression of this view is to be
found in the writings of John Fiske who sees shopping as the site of
political conflict and struggle. Shopping is where the art and tricks
of the weak can inflict most damage on, and exert most power over,
the strategic interests of the powerful.3 He refers to young people as
shopping mall guerrillas par excellence,4 and women, that is the
weak, are accorded a similar status. While the theoretical consensus
around consumption does explicitly distance itself from Fiskes
extravagant assertions, it does come perilously close, as we shall see
in the next chapter, to adopting an identical stance in theorising the
role that consumption plays in the so-called politics of identity.
With regard to the aesthetic-emotional-irrational dimensions of
pleasure, the consensus acknowledges the postmodern emphasis on
the aestheticisation of everyday life. It thus goes along with Mike
Featherstones view that The centrality of the commercial manipulation of images through advertising, the media and the displays,
performances and spectacles of the urbanized fabric of daily life ...
entails a constant re-working of desires through images. The
consensus, too, seems to agree that the consumer society ...

34

The Myth of Consumerism

confronts people with dream-images which speak to desires, and aestheticize and de-realize reality.5
However, the consensus appears to part company with Featherstone and others in its attempts to link the aestheticisation of
everyday life to actual consumption practices. The aestheticization
of everyday life, Featherstone tells us, can refer to the project of
turning life into a work of art. One example of such a project was
that of dandyism, which amongst other things, manifested the
heroic concern with the achievement of originality and superiority
in dress, demeanour, personal habits and even furnishings what
we now call lifestyle.6
Featherstone provides historical examples of artistic and intellectual counter-cultures, which pursued a dual focus on a life of
aesthetic consumption and the need to form life into an aesthetically pleasing whole. But this dual focus, Featherstone suggests,
should be related to the development of mass consumption in
general and the pursuit of new tastes and sensations and the construction of distinctive lifestyles which has become central to
consumer culture.7 The consensus is happy enough to go along with
this provided that it remains as a comment that is specific to
particular groups. Consumer-based lifestyles as works of art may be
descriptive of the lifestyles pursued by very small groups. When this
observation is generalised and aligned with the notion of the artist
as hero in the context of the growing aestheticisation of everyday
life and consumer-based lifestyles, Featherstone is but a short step
away from celebrating contemporary consumption as heroic and the
consumer as a hero!8 While the consensus does celebrate consumption, to follow Featherstone all the way would be a case of the
celebration going over the top.
The theoretical consensus which forms the core of the latest
ideology of consumerism appears to prefer an understanding of the
symbolic value of consumption that retains an openness and flexibility sufficient seemingly to accommodate whatever meanings and
pleasures the individual consumer can derive or create from
consuming. But, as we shall see shortly, this is far from the case. The
very assumption that consumption is primarily a symbolic activity
does propel theory in a direction that discounts those meanings and
pleasures, for example, practically-based meanings and uncomplicated fun, which may well be of considerable relevance to
consumers. In doing this the ideology of consumerism makes itself
vulnerable to serious criticisms. In exploring some of these criticisms

The Symbolic Value of Consumption

35

I will raise the following questions. To what extent is consumption

symbolic? Has everyday life been increasingly aestheticised by
consumer culture? Are the pleasures of consumption aestheticallybased? How meaningful are the meanings and pleasures derived
from consumption?
Consumption as Symbolic?
There is no need to deny that everything that is produced and
consumed carries meanings. There is no need, either, to deny the
fact that these meanings are culturally-based and arbitrary, that is
they can vary according to the values of particular cultures. We can,
along with Marshall Sahlins, say that it is cultural values and
meanings that provide the reasons why Americans deem dogs
inedible and cattle food,9 or why, in most if not all cultures,
trousers are deemed to be masculine and skirts feminine. Obviously
cultural values and meanings play a significant role in both the
production and consumption of goods. The important question is:
how significant?
For the ideology of consumerism, cultural values and meanings
are prioritised in both the description and explanation of consumption and production. Sahlins asserts that:
Production is a functional moment of a cultural structure. This
understood, the rationality of the market and of bourgeois society
is put in another light. The famous logic of maximisation is only
the manifest reason of another Reason ... It is not as if we had no
culture: no symbolic code of objects in relation to which the
mechanism of supply-demand-price, ostensibly in command, is
in reality the servant.10
Now, contemporary ideologues, it must be said, do not attempt to
ground their assumption of the primacy of the symbolic value of
goods as Sahlins does they merely assume this primacy as a selfevident truth. It is nevertheless useful to examine this alleged
self-evident truth in the light of the kind of thinking advanced by
Sahlins not that Sahlins is particularly influential, but his thinking
is symptomatic of the kind of thinking that has produced the latest
ideology of consumerism.
In making his case for symbolic values shaping the exchange value
and use value of what is produced and consumed, Sahlins offers an

36

The Myth of Consumerism

analysis of the production and consumption of meat. This is a wellchosen example. Food, after all, is universally considered to be
necessary (absolutely useful) for our survival. The general use value
of food is beyond question, as too is clothing for protection from
the elements. If Sahlins can prove that cultural codes govern the
utility of products that are uncontroversially perceived to be
consumed in order to meet a basic need, then he will have totally
undermined commonsensical explanations of consumption.
Sahlins, in constructing his proof, quite correctly observes that
the popularity of certain meats bears no relation to their nutritional
(use) value.
It is the symbolic logic which organises demand. The social value
of steak or roast, as compared with tripe or tongue, is what
underlies the difference in economic value. From the nutritional
point of view, such a notion of better and inferior cuts would be
difficult to defend. Moreover, steak remains the most expensive
meat even though its absolute supply is much greater than that
of tongue ...11
The consumption of meat, at least in the American context, would
seem to obey the logic of cultural values rather than the logic of
needs. Or, in other words, the use value of meat is shaped by
symbolic values. Now, while we can think of examples in which
actual purchases reflect symbolic values only (the replica football
shirt), and examples in which symbolic values outweigh considerations of utiliy (the purchase of an expensive, luxury sports car), it
would be a mistake to assume that such examples are typical of all
consumption. On closer inspection these examples are the exception
rather than the rule.
Sahlins has demonstrated that use values in the consumption of
meat are culturally coded and that is all that he has demonstrated.
But Sahlins uses the example of meat as typical of the consumption
of food in general, and all consumption. This is unjustified. Then,
having mistakenly arrived at a theory of consumption Sahlins goes
on to draw on uncontroversial examples, such as trousers and skirts,
to support his theory. The initial error of generalising from the
example of meat can be recognised if we ask: what are the cultural
codes governing the consumption of vegetables, fruit, cereals,
sandwiches, etc? While cultural codes appear to have relevance in
the consumption of clothes, for example, one would be hard pressed

The Symbolic Value of Consumption

37

to identify equivalent codes relevant to refrigerators, freezers,

cookers, fuel, or most other things for that matter. Even with overimaged commodities, such as cars, it is impossible, without being
incredulously speculative, to identify the symbolic code that
accounts for all of the differences between cars.
Advocates of the latest ideology of consumerism could claim that
they have moved on from Sahlins and therefore my criticisms of
Sahlins are not relevant to the current orthodoxy. As I noted earlier
the symbolic is no longer restricted to objective cultural codes the
symbolic today is understood more as an open-ended interpretative
process. This means that the ideology of consumerism avoids the
error of assuming that the motive to consume can be read off the
particular cultural codes attributed to particular commodities.
However, it fails to recognise the error of generalising from specific
examples, as in generalising from the highly stylised consumption of
youth subcultures. It assumes that all consumption is governed by
symbolic processes. It also replicates the error of using atypical
instances of stylised consumption to support its false assumption
that all consumption is stylised. More than this, it radicalises Sahlins
claim that use values are ordered by cultural values. First, by more or
less getting rid of the social content of cultural values in favour of a
symbolic process in which the social itself becomes one of a
multitude of images; and second, by obliterating the concept of use
value from its account of consumption. If the utility of a commodity
is governed by symbolic values, then, for the ideology of consumerism, there is no point in even considering the mundane world
of use values. Clearly whatever the symbolic differences between
goods, whether cuts of meat, clothes or cars, almost all goods retain
a use value.
As we shall see later, material use values (irrespective of the extent
to which the use values themselves, or the products consumed are
drenched in symbolic values), are, for most purchases and for most
consumers, prioritised. Indeed, it is typically, though not always, the
material use value of a commodity that renders its consumption
meaningful. In ignoring use values, the ideology of consumerism is
ignoring the most important and the most credible ways in which
consumption can be said to be meaningful. Instead, especially in the
pleasures of consumption approach, meaning is reduced to the
symbolic, to images and to free-floating signs. These signs may well
be understood as trans-coded, which, of course, multiplies their
meaning. But these meanings, while perhaps no longer understood

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The Myth of Consumerism

as semiotically-generated, are nevertheless understood in the same

restrictive sense.
What these comments allude to is two quite distinct concepts of
meaning the restricted semiotic, text-based concept, and the social,
practical concept. These correspond to two different concepts of
culture the former as de-materialised, even abstract, images and
symbols; the latter as a way of life. When the ideology of consumerism claims to have based itself on the everyday practices of
ordinary people,12 it is at its most confusing. It is concerned only
with those practices that can be understood via the restricted
concept of meaning.
Needless to say, a semiotically derived concept of meaning is
essentially irrelevant to the concept of meaning that is based in
practical, social lives. I might claim, for example, that buying a new
car means that I can now be more assured that I can reliably get from
A to B than was the case with my old car. A semiotically derived
concept of meaning can make no sense of this. It may, however, read
something into the colour and shape of the car, perhaps linking this
with virility, aggression, sexual motivation and so on. These images
or symbols are supposedly the resources out of which meaning is
made. Seeing the consumer as a meaning-maker is not a problem.
But understanding this process as involving a playful interaction
with commodified symbolic values most certainly is when the latter
are irrelevant to the consumer.
As we saw in the previous chapter, the latest ideology of consumerism tends toward the view that the meaning of things is
infinite, that is, things or objects are open to an infinite range of
meanings. But, as I have argued, this ideology does exclude from
consideration those meanings that derive from the practical use
value of the product. The symbolic nature of consumption, for the
ideology of consumerism, does not refer to the whole range of
potential meanings and pleasures that can be derived from
consuming, but rather to specific meanings and pleasures which may
or may not be relevant to the consumer.
The Aestheticisation of Everyday Life ?
The pleasure of consumption strand of the ideology of consumerism
does embody a range of theoretical emphases. Michel de Certeau and
his followers, for example, focus on consumption as a meaningful
process involving creative tactics and strategies.13 In the hands of

The Symbolic Value of Consumption

39

John Fiske, as I noted earlier, these tactics and strategies are

attributed with a political relevance. A somewhat different, but
nevertheless compatible, view is that advanced by Colin Campbell.
He sees consumption as an expression of hedonistic desires, and
theorises in some detail how modern forms of hedonism are
influenced by consumer culture.14 And there are those, like George
Ritzer, who focus on consumption as fun and entertainment. Consumption has less and less to do with obtaining goods and services
and more to do with entertainment.15
Ritzers work, however, is of limited value for the whole of the
ideology of consumerism. Quite simply he tends to view the
consumer as manipulated by the lure of displayed goods.
The cathedrals of consumption can be seen as great stage sets that
are constructed to lure consumers and extract their money.
Employees are increasingly actors who may well be in costume
and speak scripted lines. Consumers are made to feel part of the
show, at least for the time they are in the cathedral.16
As we shall see, the ideology of consumerism, in its attempt to
explain consumption in terms of the pleasures anticipated and
experienced, has to steer an awkward path. Quite simply the sources
of pleasures made available by consumer culture must be understood
in ways that render them to be non-trivial. If the pleasures to be had
from consuming are theorised as trivial, the explanation of consumption based on anticipated and experienced trivial pleasures loses
its power and credibility. Besides, it would imply that consumers are
trivial, and this cannot be countenanced. Arguably the most popular
attempt to overcome this problem is to treat the sources of pleasure
as arising from an increasingly aestheticised consumer culture and
the consequent aestheticisation of everyday life.
The aestheticisation of everyday life, as noted earlier, can refer to
treating ones life as a work of art. The range of goods available today,
it is argued, enable more people to engage in such a pleasurable
project. As a work of art the pleasures derived from creating a
consumer-based lifestyle are supposedly meaningful rather than
trivial. The aestheticisation of everyday life thesis, however, does
include two other kinds of argument. A second sense in which
everyday life can be said to be aestheticised, according to Featherstone, arises from that activity associated with artistic subcultures
which sought in their work, writings, and in some cases lives, to

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The Myth of Consumerism

efface the boundary between art and everyday life. Influential here
is the challenge to traditional definitions of art itself, such that art
can be anywhere or anything.17 This means that consumer objects
can be treated as art.
The third sense in which it is argued that everyday life is aestheticised focuses on the rapid flow of signs and images which
saturate the fabric of everyday life.18 These images are those transmitted by advertising (in its broadest sense), and in some cases are
influenced by the techniques of artistic subcultures.
The aestheticisation of everyday life thesis generates an understanding of the pleasurable and meaningful nature of consumption
as somehow rooted in our interaction with aesthetics. On the face of
it this thesis would seem to have some merit and it does complement
trends in Cultural Studies. The thesis does attempt to support the
notion that the aesthetic pleasures facilitated by consumer culture
are meaningful. Important here is the widely recognised, at least in
postmodern theory, collapse of the boundary between serious art
and popular art. Many advertisements, particularly televised advertisements, are regarded as influential in the merging of serious and
popular art forms. On top of this, there has been, at least in Cultural
Studies and some other quarters, a broadening of the definition of
what can legitimately be called art popular or light cultural
products are amenable to the same kind of serious attention once
reserved for serious art. The consequent merging of the serious and
the popular in what is regarded as the aesthetic realm infuses
everyday reality as never before in the escalation of advertising and
in the sites of consumption. Almost all shops attempt to appeal to
consumers through window displays that are aesthetically inviting,
through the display of goods that are pleasing to the eye and
through the playing of music.
Ironically, the aestheticisation of everyday life thesis does retain an
important, powerful role for advertising. But this power is not
construed in terms of manipulating the consumer, but more in terms
of offering enticing images that, in effect, are the aesthetic resources
which we are able to use to inspire or re-route our dreams, fantasies
and desires. It can be noted that there is a strong tendency amongst
advocates of the thesis to prefer to talk of dreams, fantasies and
desires rather than simple enjoyment and fun. The former have a
serious, and thus more meaningful, conceptual history, especially in
their association with serious psychoanalytic theory. And, of course,
they are associated with powerful psychological motives. Our

The Symbolic Value of Consumption

41

powerful motives thus interact with the powerful images of

consumer culture. For Featherstone the latter are so powerful that
... it is important to stress that ... it needs discipline and control to
stroll through goods on display, to look and not snatch, to move
casually without interrupting the flow, to gaze with controlled
enthusiasm and a blas outlook, to observe others without being
seen, to tolerate the close proximity of bodies without feeling
threatened. It also requires the capacity to manage swings between
intense involvement and more distanced aesthetic detachment.19
Additionally, certain consumer products themselves contribute to
the so-called growing aestheticisation of everyday life. Televisions,
radios, personal stereos and music centres are obvious examples.
They enable access to cultural products, some of which are aesthetically overloaded, as in radio and television programmes that are
unnecessarily shot through with music. And if a pile of bricks or dog
shit can be transformed into a work of art, or even seen as such, so
too can a house. Each of its rooms can be aetheticised. The availability of DIY tools and materials enables this. Numerous other
examples of the aestheticisation of everyday life, from quadrophonic
sounds spilling out of cars to the particular decor and music of theme
pubs, from the wide range of styles and colours in cars and clothes
to the colourful presentation of exotic foods, can be cited to compile
an impressive dossier of evidence in support of the aestheticisation
of everyday life thesis.
Given the pervasiveness of aesthetic values, and their close association with meaningful pleasures, it is difficult to imagine how
consumption could be anything but pleasurable in ways that are sufficiently meaningful to ensure that the motive to consume is
unproblematically rooted in the aesthetic value of consumption. It
would thus seem that in its emphasis on the meaningful pleasures
of consumption the ideology of consumerism is not an ideology after
all, but a theory offering a credible explanation of consumption.
However, such an estimation cannot be further from the truth. The
aestheticisation of everyday life thesis is a convenient myth that
falsely upgrades the pleasures of consumption.
I appreciate that any dismissal of the validity of the aestheticisation of everyday life thesis is more or less guaranteed to attract the
charge of elitism. Apart from a few diehard cultural conservatives,
of both left-wing and right-wing persuasions, nobody dares to

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The Myth of Consumerism

challenge this thesis. To make this challenge invariably involves the

raising of distinctions, and the values underpinning them, that are
widely regarded as being untenable. I am thinking here of the distinctions that were once (but now no longer) routinely made
between true or serious art on the one hand, and popular or light
art on the other. Unfortunately, this distinction was almost universally (mis)understood as reflecting the value-laden distinction
between highbrow and lowbrow culture and their close identification with the bourgeoisie and the masses. The anti-elitism of
Cultural Studies quite rightly railed against this. But, as I argued in
the previous chapter, Cultural Studies has gradually adopted an
uncritical populism that rules out the legitimacy of making qualitative judgements about popular cultural products. The
aestheticisation of everyday life thesis falls into the same trap and
provides a spurious grounding for the ideology of consumerism.
The aestheticisation of everyday life thesis refuses to make
judgements either about the aesthetic status of the images of
consumer culture or about the pleasures to be had from interacting
with these images. But it nevertheless assumes that meaningful
pleasures are facilitated by the aesthetic imagery of consumer
culture. This assumption, which has little empirical support, is based
on a series of loose associations that implicitly trade on the
recognised aesthetic value of art life as art, the techniques of artistic
subcultures, artistic imagery, art as meaningful while explicitly
denying this value. This denial allows the aesthetic value of
consumer culture to be of equal status to that of art. In other words
the aesthetic status of the imagery of consumer culture is elevated.
This is unwarranted.
First, aesthetic resources do vary in terms of their capacity to
enable pleasures. It is widely recognised that cultural products such
as films, plays, novels and so on vary in their capacity to promote
self-engagement, absorption, contemplation and reflection. While
individuals do react and interact differently in relation to specific
cultural products, the meaning of the pleasures derived is invariably
related to the individuals level of self-engagement and absorption.
It thus seems somewhat odd that the meaningful pleasures of consumption are so closely tied in to particular aesthetic resources, that
is signs and images, that have a restricted capacity for promoting
meaningful pleasures. The display and packaging of goods cannot
be aesthetically equated with those cultural products that do
promote an enduring involvement. In spite of textualisation, signs

The Symbolic Value of Consumption

43

and images are signs and images. No amount of theorising about the
artistic techniques involved in the production of images can alter
this fact.
The kind of judgement involved in determining the relative value
of commodities or experiences for meaningful pleasures, aesthetic
or otherwise, is in fact one that is commonly made. The football
purist, for example, will eulogise about the poetry or other aesthetic
delights provided by the Dutch national team of 1974, the Brazilians
of 1982, Liverpool of 1989 and Real Madrid of 2000, and bemoan
the standardised dross of much professional football. For the
spectator (consumer) of this standardised product aesthetic pleasures
are few and far between, perhaps a few isolated moments of eyecatching and pleasing skill.
Second, the example of football illustrates the obvious fact that
aesthetically irrelevant pleasures may be far more common than the
anticipated and experienced pleasures of an aesthetic variety. For the
typical football fan, with aesthetic pleasures more or less ruled out,
and unanticipated, the pleasures of attending a match are more
likely to derive from the experience of the atmosphere generated by
the crowd, from chanting and cheering or having a moan, from
verbally abusing the referee, players, or opposing fans, and most of
all from the teams victory. The aestheticisation of everyday life
thesis says nothing about these kinds of pleasures. It says nothing
about most of the little pleasures that are widely experienced
through consumption the pleasures initially experienced, for
example, in replacing old, inefficient products with more reliable
and efficient ones, or from getting a bargain, or from purchasing a
gift for a loved one, or from just having fun with the kids at a theme
park and so on. Presumably, for the ideology of consumerism, these
kinds of pleasures dont have the same kind of status and power as
grand-sounding aesthetic pleasures.
It ought to be clear that I am not denying that pleasures can be
experienced from consumption. I am, however, questioning the
ideology of consumerisms tendency to theorise the pleasures of consumption as essentially aesthetically-based. This may hold true for
specific forms of consumption for a small minority of consumers.
And, when this is true, it is most unlikely to take a form that corresponds to the aestheticisation of everyday life thesis. This brings me
to my third point. The aestheticisation of everyday life thesis is not
particularly sensitive to the fact that the packaging and presentation
of commodities, the glitz of shopping malls and advertisements,

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The Myth of Consumerism

televisual and otherwise, constitute, for some at least, not so much

evidence of aestheticisation but rather visual pollution. Similarly one
persons (or one shops) music is another persons irritating noise.
Fourth, in equating the aesthetic with the imagery of consumer
culture, the aestheticisation of everyday life thesis is in fact redefining the aesthetic in terms of the decorative and superficial, that
is, in terms that denude the aesthetic of the content that renders it
meaningful. Indeed, Featherstone refers to the playful exploration
of transitory experiences and surface aesthetic effects involved in
the active stylization of life.20 Yet, the ideology of consumerism
insists on the importance of this for consumers. Incoherently it is
insisting on a nonsense the significance of the insignificant, the
importance of the trivial.
Finally, if anything can be art and art is everywhere, why does
the aestheticisation of everyday life thesis focus on consumer
culture? The aesthetically meaningful would seem far more likely to
be experienced in ways that have very little to do with consumption.
Meanings, Pleasures and the Meaningful
My arguments throughout this chapter suggest that consumption
can be experienced as both meaningful and pleasurable, but not in
ways proposed by the ideology of consumerism. We have seen that
the latter embraces an understanding of the value of consumer
culture for facilitating pleasures that is unconvincing. Likewise it
theorises the meaningful nature of consumption in highly specific
ways that seem to have little relevance for most consumers. We can
make some sense of this in the context of the evolution of Cultural
Studies and the sociology of culture, outlined in the previous
chapter. However, we can go further than this in attempting to
identify why it is that the ideology of consumerism insists on
depicting consumption as meaningful and pleasurable in ways that
do not ring true. In what follows I shall argue that the ideology of
consumerism adopts a concept of the meaningful that is essentially
divorced from experience, and it is this that enables it to present a
distorted picture of the meaningful nature of consumption.
As I noted earlier the ideology of consumerism operates with two
distinct concepts of meaning. It not only tends to slide between the
two concepts in ways that are inappropriate, it also fails to realise that
the concept of the meaningful cannot be derived from either of the
two concepts of meaning. It is just this the assumption that the

The Symbolic Value of Consumption

45

meaningful is an automatic product of the process of making sense

or meaning that can be identified as the main source of the ideology
of consumerisms peculiar approach to consumption as meaningful.
On the face of it, it might seem perfectly reasonable to assume
that the meaningful is a product of meaning construction. If consumption involves a meaning-maker (the consumer) interacting
with commodities that are full of meaning, is this not the same as
saying that consumption is meaningful? We can answer this in the
affirmative only if we are prepared to use a concept of the
meaningful that not only radically departs from normal usage, but
does so in ways that lose the significance of the latter. The process
of meaning construction is, in fact, unremarkable. It is something
we all do, more or less continuously and routinely, and more often
than not, tacitly. If we want to refer to the product of this process as
meaningful then we have to acknowledge that the meaningful is
likewise unremarkable. Whether or not our meaning construction
processes actually generate the meaningful, in the more typical use
of the term, is an open question. Since the process of meaning construction is more or less continuous, and since a small proportion
only of our experiences tend to merit the judgement of meaningful,
it is clear that the meaningful as experienced is not the same as the
product of meaning construction. In other words when the ideology
of consumerism claims that consumption is a meaningful activity it
is using a concept of the meaningful that is substantially irrelevant
to what the meaningful is normally taken to mean. This is a clear
case of a major misleading claim of the ideology of consumerism.
In its normal usage the meaningful is differentiated from the
mundane and the unremarkable. Indeed, the latter are more
typically associated with meaninglessness. When we refer to a
meaningful experience we do so following an assessment of the
quality of the experience that differentiates it from the mundane
and unremarkable. In other words, to declare an experience to be
meaningful (or to have been meaningful) is to make a judgement
about the quality of the experience in question. This judgement is a
thoroughly subjective one and can be made only by the individual.
All sorts of considerations influence this judgement, but it inherently
involves comparison with other experiences, in the context of the
individuals totality of experiences, and in relation to the individuals
own sense of priorities.
The ideology of consumerisms failure to appreciate all that is
involved in making judgements about the relative meaningfulness or

46

The Myth of Consumerism

otherwise of our experiences is partially disguised by claims that it

is, in fact, a theory that is based on empirical evidence of the consumption practices of ordinary people in their everyday lives. In
other words, advocates of the ideology of consumerism claim that a
number of studies reveal that the meaningful as a product of
meaning construction is actually the meaningful as experienced.21
This claim, I will argue, is invalid.
These studies, normally referred to as ethnographic, are more
sensitive to the experience of those being studied than the traditional empirical methods of surveys and formal questionnaires.
Ethnographic studies ideally involve researchers in informal communicative interaction with those being studied. Typically however,
the purpose of the ethnographic study is not to discover the
research subjects own ways of representing their experiences and
actions, but only those ways that are relevant to the topic of the study.
It is thus already potentially distanced from the individual research
subjects own priorities. This sets up the possibility that the ethnographic study is researching representations of experiences that are
actually experienced as irrelevant and meaningless.
While social scientists accept that ethnographic studies do not
produce generalisable results, we have already noted that this
limitation has not prevented Cultural Studies academics from generalising from examples of highly specific forms of consumption to
all consumption and all consumers. As we know from the critique of
more traditional research methodologies, the interests of the
researcher, let alone his or her own values, do distort research
outcomes. The potential for undisclosed distortion in the looser
ethnographic study is far greater than in more formal studies. Quite
clearly when in researching consumption practices, if the
meaningful, or meaningful pleasures, do not reflect the subjective
assessments of research subjects, but are nevertheless reported as
such, the findings merely reflect and support the researchers own
inadequate conception of the meaningful.
The claim that ethnographic studies support the ideology of consumerisms emphasis on the symbolic nature and symbolic value of
consumption is thus not only highly misleading, it is also
mystifying. To avoid this mystification ethnographic research should
attempt to uncover the meaningful and the pleasurable as experienced, regardless of their sources. As we shall see later this suggests
that life-satisfaction studies offer a more valid means of assessing
the role of consumption, and the nature of its pleasures and mean-

The Symbolic Value of Consumption

47

ingfulness. Without pre-empting later discussion, it can be noted

here that the evidence of these studies offers very little support for
the ideology of consumerism.
In an academic environment in which anything goes bad theory
can readily isolate itself from criticism all the more so if the bad
theory becomes fashionable. This is unsurprising. Within all
academic fields there is a long history of the once popular and fashionable being replaced by a new perspective. Where relevant the
new perspective, or paradigm, bases its ascendancy on being better
able, perhaps by being more comprehensive and coherent, to
explain existing evidence. What is disturbing about the ideology of
consumerism is that it is a theory that is underinformed by appropriate empirical evidence. It thus immunises itself against both
theoretical criticism and the reality-check of relevant empirical
evidence. As we shall see in the next chapter, instead of submitting
itself to the test of appropriate empirical evidence, the ideology of
consumerism reinforces its own misconceptions about the
meaningful nature of consumption in its theorisation of the value
of consumption for self-identity.