PROGRAM
THURSDAY 7/10
10.00 – 13.00 | Workshop
Jaroslav Cír
London in Olomouc: Innovating with consumers
Institution: Perfect Crowd, Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Jaroslav Cír studied psychology and sociology at University of Toronto. In 1999 he joined Unilever in Prague, working
as the head of research for Central and Eastern Europe, Home and Personal Care division. At the beginning of 2005
Jaroslav has moved to London as the global Consumer and Market Insight Director for Rexona. In 2009 Jaroslav
established a Perfect Crowd, as a marketing consultancy and market research agency, specializing in co-creation and
crowdsourcing.
Abstract
Smart companies are increasingly developing innovative processes that incorporate their customers in
co-creating new products, services and communication. The goal of the London in Olomouc workshop is
to provide understanding of the key principles of co-creation, using the latest best practice examples and
practical excercises. The workshop will address the following, particular questions: How to harness the
power of crowds? How to enable co-creation with consumers? What is the role of online communities in
consumer co-creation? How to involve consumers directly in the innovation process?
14.15 – 15.15 | Keynote Address
Wolfgang Ullrich
On the Aesthetics Education of Consumer
Institution: Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design, Germany
E-mail: [email protected]
Wolfgang Ullrich is professor of theory of arts and media studies at the State University of Design, Media and Arts
Karlsruhe. He has written several books on the history of the concept of art and contemporary visual culture. In his
current research he deals with the aesthetics of consumer culture. He is also curator of the exhibition Macht zeigen:
Kunst als Herrschaftsstrategie in the German Historical Museum in Berlin.
Abstract:
The lecture will show, how consumer products are designed today – an how they design the personality of
their users. The main thesis will be, that consumer products serve as educators, who help to cope with the
different situations of daily life. And they can do so because of their aesthetic impact, especially.
15.30 – 16.30 | Aesthetics of Consumer Culture, part 1
Heinz Drügh
Aesthetics of Consumer Culture
Institution: Institute of German Language and Literature, Goethe University Frankfurt am Main, Germany
E-mail: [email protected]
Heinz Drügh is professor of aesthetics and modern German literature at Goethe University in Frankfurt am Main. He is
interested in allegory and symbol; text, font and image: poetics of the description; classicism and romanticism,
modernism and postmodernism; commodity aesthetics and pop literature. In 2008 he organised the conference
Commodity Aesthetics: Literature, Art, Consumer Culture at Goethe University in Frankfurt.
Abstract:
Discussing the concept commodity aesthetics, how it was drafted in a pejorative way by German Marxist
philosopher Wolfgang Fritz Haug, I would like to differentiate in my paper and argue that commodity
aesthetics can provide (and concerning arts in the 20th century: have provided) a stimulating input for the
concept of aesthetics and the arts. The question is, whether this input can also evoke a differentiated
critical perspective to consumerism. Is there a place for a new critical commodity aesthetics?
Athena Hadji
On Distinction : The (conspicuous) consumption of art in the 21st century
Institution: Architecture Department, University of Patras, Greece
E-mail: [email protected]
Athena Hadji studied Archaeology and History at the History and Archaeology Department of the University of Athens
and Archaeometallurgy and Anthropology of Technology at the University of California at Berkeley, followed by a Ph.D.
on Anthropology of Space and Time in the prehistoric Aegean, with special focus on Early Cycladic sculpture and the
way prehistoric art and style were used as evaluating criteria for chronology building in archaeology. Her research
interests include, among others, anthropology of space, time, technology and art, and archaeology of the Bronze Age
Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean.
Abstract:
Drawing from Pierre Bourdieu’s idea of Distinction as a parameter of art consumption, the present essay
endeavors to discuss the mechanisms of art consumption in contemporary society and culture. The
conspicuous consumption and even more conspicuous withdrawal of highly priced works of art from the
public eye signify a certain attitude towards art, which is as much aesthetic as it is social and cultural.
The presentation will be divided into a theoretical part, introducing the framework for this inquiry, and a
discussion with specific examples to showcase the way art is circulated, postulated, consumed and, in
certain cases, withdrawn in the 21st century.
It emerges that in this process, consumption plays a key part, whereas art functions in absentia. Art is
merely utilized as a trigger for the establishment of social distinction, is conceptualized as a commodity,
is reserved for the haves whereas images of art are more widely than ever disseminated and made
available to the have-nots, especially through digital media and extensive reproduction.
In the end, consumer society seems to have appropriated art in a way which mandates a redefinition of
the idea of the happy few, pointing toward the direction of the unhappy many.
15.30 – 16.30 | Consumption Patterns, part 1
Urszula Swadźba
Consumption as a Value
Institution: Institute of Sociology, University of Silesia, Katowice, Poland
E-mail: [email protected]
In May 2009 Urszula Swadźba received a professorship at the University of Silesia. Since June 2009, is head of the
Department of General Sociology. Her research interests are sociology of values (family, religion and especially the
value of work), sociology of local communities, sociology of borderland and Silesian problems. Her habilitation thesis
is called Silesian work ethos, Sociological study (Katowice 2001).
Abstract:
The aim of the paper will be to show the value of consumption in the Polish society. To achieve this, the
author will use research of her own and that of other sociologists conducted in Poland, in particular,
Silesia.
The theoretical part discusses the notion of value. Then, what place consumption has in the system of
values. Consumption is one of the utilitarian values and above all applies to usable functions. The most
valuable for the utilitarian is, in a sense, what is desirable and achievable. It will also define the notion of
consumption and consumerism. The empirical analysis will be based on studies of the system of values
and consumers’ behavior, as well as the impact of socio-demographic variables on the system of value
and on consumer behavior. Two approaches to consumption will be discussed, primary and secondary.
The primary approach will be characterized by the dominating value which is the possession of tangible
property, as well as putting human endeavors before everything else, enjoying life, having a life full of
sensations, and in general leading a prosperous life. The secondary approach - modern consumerism –
will be manifested in the emergence of new trends in consumption, its rationalization, the growth of
critical attitudes, the awareness and the functioning of post-modern values.
These two types of approaches to consumption as a value will be shown through the research. In
conclusion, the model of the transition from the primary to the secondary consumption will be presented.
Oksana A. Kozlova
Consumer Education in the Concept of Ecological Marketing
Institution: Department of Marketing and Advertising, Faculty of International Business, Omsk State
University n/a F. M. Dostoyevsky, Russia
E-mail: [email protected]
Oksana Kozlova graduated with Ph. D. thesis entitled The Mechanism of Marketing Cooperatives Organization in Agribusiness. Currently, she is an associate professor at Faculty of International Business, Omsk State University n/a F. M.
Dostoyevsky. She teaches marketing, international marketing and ecological marketing. Her current research
interests lie within behavior of consumer in the market of an ecological food product, development of the concept of
ecological marketing and international trade of the organic products.
Abstract:
Within the limits of the concept of ecological marketing, it is necessary to consider training as purposeful
educational activity not only manufacturers, but also societies in whole (with use of the state marketing),
focused on formation of ecological consciousness and a culture of behaviour corresponding to it for the
purpose of life improvement of quality.
The understanding of mechanisms of education of consumers is necessary for the analysis and influence
on consumer behaviour, as was object of our researches in a current of three years (2008-2010).
The analysis focused on the system of relationships between society, food producers and consumers. In
order to attain the research objectives stated above, we have collected and analysed databases in three
directions: government’s programs and the information of mass-media; consumer behaviour and
segmentation; strategy of food companies that produce eco-product. During all stages of the research
process were used both secondary and primary data.
For carrying out of qualitative research some methods have been chosen: experiment in which basis the
model of belief of Fishbena-Ajzena is put; Means-Ends Chain method (MEC).
In a basis of segmentation were consumer values. As the basic method to data processing has been
chosen cluster analysis. Data processing has been lead in a package SPSS.
By results of spent monitoring of consumers of articles of food, despite unity of development of the
market as a whole, the Russian consumers are characterised by different stages of consumption. The
relation of consumers to ecological products in the course of researches has essentially changed under
the influence of a number of external factors that once again proves efficiency of educational activity.
As a result of research have been revealed four basic consumer segments of organic food stuffs in Russian
market there are “Carefree singles”, “Mistrustful family”, “Egoistical bachelors” and “Careful mums”. The
biggest segment has appeared to be the first segment “Carefree singles” - 48 % in the general sample.
We had been developed recommendations about methods of education taking into account specificity of
each allocated segment.
17.00 – 18.30 | Aesthetics of Consumer Culture, part 2
Yu Chen (Vivienne)
Aesthetics, Materialism and Life Satisfaction
Institution: Department of Management and Marketing, Northeastern Illinois University, Chicago, USA
E-mail: [email protected]
Yu Chen has Ph.D. in Marketing from HEC School of Management, Paris and currently is a Assistant Professor of
Marketing at Northeastern Illinois Universtity and also at Oakland University, Michigan. Her research interests are
quantitative (modelization) and qualitative (ethnography) marketing, consumer behavior, cultural products,
international marketing. Professional experiences include positions like Marketing and Communication Manager for
Edition de Saint Guillaume, Paris, and teaching at various universities.
Abstract:
Previous research in materialism accents the importance of possessions in consumer’s lives and shows
that possessions could be considered as a source of pleasure or satisfaction (Richins and Dawson 1992).
Aesthetics, a totally different concept, is also interpreted as a source of pleasure: throughout history and
in every known culture, people have found pleasure and meaning in what they see. If the value of a society
is measured by its ability to develop fully the potentialities of its members, then the making of the beauty
and the knowledge of how to enjoy it should become more important than possessions for society as a
whole.
An object is aesthetic whenever we look at it for no other reason than simply to look and enjoy it (Maquet
1986). The realm of the aesthetics is defined in terms of a distinctive kind of looking. Only looking at or
just seeing is a quite frequent reaction of beholders vis-à-vis an aesthetic object, especially in visual
artistic experiences (Stolnitz 1965). According to anthropologists such as Maquet (1986), it is a mental
deconditioning and a state of bare attention. Three specific traits of the only looking attitude --attention,
nondiscursiveness, and disinterestedness-- are found in previous literature (Maquet 1986, Wagner 1999).
These traits reflect a different logic from that of materialistic personality-- jealousy, possessiveness and
envy (Belk 1983, 1988) and warrant investigation on the effect of this experience on consumer behavior.
Aesthetic experience is found to have positive impact on human behaviors: Adams (1982) made the links
between aesthetic experience and art, design and environmental education, and found that aesthetic
appreciation could help developing environmental consciousness. The later could not only increase visual
awareness, but also form the basis of taste formation and interest promotion in environmental
improvement. Witkin (1995) suggests that aesthetic education could be an affective approach for
understanding the relationship between the self and the world. He argues that through aesthetic
education, the ability to use our sensuous connection to the world as a way of receiving could be fully
developed. On the contrary, materialism —linked to the importance of possessions—evokes the wish to
own and to have exclusive use of objects, the proprietorial sentiments concerning things which are not
objects, the tendency of control of property, and even the rivalry and jealousy (Isaacs 1937). In long term,
materialism might have very serious consequences for the society.
Even though previous research hasn’t made links of aesthetics with materialism, the opposite natures of
the two suggest investigating their relationship. This research examines twenty families of similar
demographic backgrounds in Michigan, U.S.. Ten families have aesthetic-oriented lifestyles and ten
families have possession-oriented lifestyles. Life satisfaction is then discussed with all the families. The
interpretation and analysis of the interviews are forthcoming.
Agata Skórzyńska
Subversive Use of Commodity and Image. Relational Aesthetics as a Criticism of
Consumer Culture?
Institution: Institute of Cultural Studies, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznań, Poland
E-mail: [email protected]
Agata Skórzyńska received Ph.D. in Humanities on the basis of the doctoral dissertation Theatre as a source of
postmodern social spectacles. Her current research fields are urban and performance studies focused on human
performance in the city space, the "presentation of self in everyday life", theatrical aspects of human behavior in
public places, subversive behavior in popular, consumer culture and media. She is co-editor of a book Art – cultural
capital of polish cities (Wydawnictwo Naukowe UAM, Poznań 2010). She lectures sociology of culture and cultural
animation.
Abstract:
The commodification of culture, diagnosed first by the philosophers of Frankfurt School is now one of the
best commented process declining across the division between economy and culture. The innovative
ideas of neo-marxist philosophy at that time is today also the widely criticized view on the relation
between commodity and culture. After postmodern and poststructuralist theory we recognize perfectly
the opposite process: a specific “cultural turn” in consumer society in the second half of XX century,
diagnosed for example by Baudrillard, Jameson, Featherstone, Lasch, Lury and many others. The core of
postmodern criticism was the recognition, that commodity turns in symbolic value rather than material
object and the base of the new economy of the developed societies is the exchange of this symbolic value,
establishing semiotics as necessary background to analysis of economical processes or to participate in
“markets of meaning”. The symbolic economy (S. Sassen) or the cultural economy (S. Zukin) shows the
new logic of social reflexivity and cultural creativity in the production, distribution and consumption of
things but also proves that the division between economy and culture is problematic and no longer exist
as obvious. It shows clearly that autonomy of the art and culture, postulated by Adorno as a mode of
resistance against the cultural industry is no longer adequate. Instead of isolation, we can now observe an
emergence of the new subversive practices of everyday life including “critical use” of things, spaces,
images and meanings of consumer culture and described as tactics by Michael de Certeau. Paradoxically,
these practices require a specific return to the materiality of the commodity because the subversive use
of the object consists on reconfiguration of its appearance and function, which is similar to the bricoleur’s
(C. Levy-Strauss) or craftsman’s (R. Sennet) performance rather than creativity of the autonomous artist.
Taking as an example cultural practices such as subvertising or guerrilla marketing but also a relational
aesthetics (J. Ranciére) of contemporary public art I would like to point out in my paper main topics
related to cultural analysis of these forms of creativity, but in the first place I would like to ask a question
about their effectiveness as a modes of political criticism in contemporary consumer culture.
Dmitry Tikhaze & Anastasia Kurilova
Design of Things in Consumer Society: A critical analysis
Institutiton: Peoples´ Friendship University of Russia, Moscow, Russia
E-mail: [email protected]
Dmitry Tikhaze and Anastasia Kurilova are both Ph.D. students of Sociology specialized in Sociology of Design. They
are authors of the book Man in the world of things, published in Moscow, 2010.
Abstract:
This paper deals with the phenomenon of design of modern things. The main idea of consumption today
lies not only in satisfying material needs, but in desire to maintain the endless circle of production and
consumption. Things in modern society are considered to be a new instrument of economy, policy and
ideology. As a result things nowadays have a set of specific features. In the first place this is a built-in
obsolescence designed in mass-produced products. That is why amongst the distinctive characteristics of
the design of modern things are the use of weak parts in their construction, an easy damaged external
appearance (glossy finish, etc.) and so on. In the second place is the fact that a great number of things
today are designed with the idea of combination with other things in order to unlock all the features. The
argument is illustrated with the examples of professional photo cameras, game consoles, toys, gadgets,
etc. In the third place is an ideological component that is embodied in total domination of rounded, socalled “friendly” design of commodities (e. g. cars, computers, furniture, etc.). In spite of the total illusion
of abundance of goods in consumer society the lack of what V. Papanek called “design for the real world”
(“fair design”) remains one of the main issues. This paper attempts to enhance sociological understanding
of design in consumer society.
17.00 – 18.30 | Consumption Patterns, part 2
Michaela Pyšňáková
"We´re Not Sheeple!" The Meaning of Consumption in Everyday Lives of
Mainstream Youth
Institution: Department of Sociology, Masaryk University Brno, Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Michaela is a Ph.D. student in Sociology. She is specialized in youth, consumption, brands, mainstream, subcultures,
fashion, consumer lifestyles and qualitative data analysis. She was the leader of research project Youth and
Consumption: The Meaning of Logo as a Symbol of Cultural and Social Ex/inclusion among Young People (Masaryk
University).
Abstract:
Recent sociological analyses of young consumers have been pre-occupied with more postmodern
theoretical concepts of club-cultures, post-subcultures, neo-tribal patterns of activities and fragmented
consumer lifestyles. This obsession with the spectacle has lead to the neglect of the experiences of
mainstream youth who cannot be easily pigeon-holed in the above categories. This paper deals with the
following questions: Is ‘mainstream’ youth a‘zombie‘ category with no analytical potential for
contemporary sociological research? How can research on young people´s experience with consumption
contribute to reconceptualisation of mainstream youth? Does mainstream youth´s consumption reflex
sheep-like or herd-like behaviour and passive conformity? Drawing on a series of focus groups and smallgroup semi-structured interviews with 61 young people between the ages of 15 and 27, this paper
discusses young people’s experience of consumption in the Czech Republic. Using the experience of
young consumers, the research attempts to understand what it means to belong to the mainstream. The
results indicate that mainstream youth cannot be equalled to sheep-like behaviour. It is argued that
belonging to the mainstream does not imply straightforward compliance with dominant power structures.
Rather it reflects a degree of reflexivity in which young people challenge stereotypes of passive
conformism in complex and often paradoxical ways that are not yet well accounted for in the literature.
The paper concludes by suggesting that the notion of ‘mainstream youth’ offers some potential as a
conceptual way of understanding young people‘s relationship to social change in what appears to be an
increasingly individualised society. At the same time, this notion provides an alternative approach that
challenges many of the assumptions underpinning the sociology of youth’s conception of consumption.
Vanessa Fonseca
Costa Rica Sims: The convergence of virtual aesthetics, social distinction, and
environmental activism in Second Life
Institution: Department of Communications, The University of Costa Rica, Republic of Costa Rica
E-mail: [email protected]
Vanessa Fonseca became Master of Arts in Advertising in 2000 at The University of Texas at Austin. The topic of her
thesis was Advertising and the Poetics of Capitalism. In 2003 she graduated her Ph.D. studies with dissertation Fractal
Capitalism and the Latinization of the US Market. She is currently teaching at the Department of Communications,
The University of Costa Rica. Her interests and expertise are advertising, computer mediated communications and
education, global studies, global marketing and cultural studies.
Abstract:
In the last years, the proliferation of metaverses that allow consumers to buy virtual objects or services
has blurred the boundaries between multiplayer online games, ecommerce, and the establishment of
virtual communities. In 2003, Linden Labs from San Francisco, California, introduced Second Life, a
metaverse that has been growing despite the current global economic crisis. Ranked among the best 25
places in Second Life, Costa Rica Sims has develop an e-business model that successfully positioned the
Sim as a coherent brand that involves strong sense of community, environmental sensitivity, and a
devotion to virtual aesthetics that resulted in the creation of an amazing collection of sims that houses
over 300 residents-avatars from more than 43 different countries all over the world. In April, 2010, Second
Life Enquirer (SLEnquirer.com described Costa Rica Sims as follows : “Costa Rica Sims must be one of the
most outstanding sims in the whole of Second Life. With shopping to die for and natural environments
that defy description”.
This paper analyzes Costa Rica Sims in Second Life as an example of how virtual aesthetics, social
distinction, and ecological activism build a virtual branded community in Second Life. It also surveys how
Costa Rica Sims’s residents relate to the brand, how they find value and differentiation in shopping, living,
and entertaining in the multiple activities hosted here. The paper also assesses the impact of virtual
worlds in “real life” and viceversa, by describing the dynamics that take place in this metaverse and the
relationships that the avatars in-world have with the real people behind them in “first life”. Finally, it
studies Costa Rica Sims as a true example of what Boellstorf (2008) calls creationist capitalism, a moment
in late capitalism where production and consumption converge in virtual spaces that blur the boundaries
between work and pleasure.
Karolina Wojtasik
Emile Zola´s Enchanting World
Institution: Institute of Sociology, University of Silesia, Katowice, Poland
E-mail: [email protected]
Karolina Wojtasik has MA in sociology and political sciences and is preparing doctorate on French literature. Her other
interests are social history of India, Pakistan – Indian relationships, Iran and its president, terrorism, sociology of
literature, history of XIX - century novel. She works at Institute of Sociology (University of Silesia).
Abstract:
Consumption is understood as systemic and pervasive and quite often the source of the most perverse
features of social life. Zola shows how systemic and pervasive it was 100 years ago. Emile Zola, an
influential French writer, the most important example of the literary school of naturalism, pretended to be
a researcher of society, he wanted to show, describe and analyze the French society under the Second
Empire (1852-1870). His great novel, “The Ladies' Delight” is a portrait of thousands of women, who can’t
resist massive advertising, huge sales, home delivery, system of refunds, and many other innovations –
characteristic for shopping centers we know today. Zola showed consumption as a seduction, because
Octave Mouret, the owner of The Ladies' Delight Store, wants not only to earn a lot of money but also
overwhelm the senses of his female customers, forcing them to spend by bombarding them with an array
of buying choices and by juxtaposing goods in enticing and intoxicating ways. The most interesting facts
about Zola’s case study are mechanisms which worked more than 150 years ago (when capitalism was
rising) and, what is the most fascinating, they are working still nowadays. He described they with details,
showing that almost nothing has changed in the field of forcing the innocent consumer to desire more
and more goods.
FRIDAY 8/10
9.00 – 10.00 | Keynote Address
Søren Askegaard
Markets and Mirrors: Mythologies of the consumer
Institution: Department of Marketing & Management, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
E-mail: [email protected]
Søren Askegaard is professor of marketing at University of Southern Denmark in Odense. He has a Masters Degree in
Social Sciences from Odense University, a post-graduate Diploma in Communication Studies from the Sorbonne
University, Paris and a Ph.D. in Business Studies from Odense University. His research interests generally lie in the
field of consumer behaviour analysis from a cultural perspective, including such topics as life styles, consumer
motivations, food culture, product imagery, branding, and globalization. He has published in numerous anthologies as
well as in journals such as among others Consumption, Markets, and Culture, European Journal of Marketing,
International Business Review, Journal of Consumer Research and Journal of Macromarketing, Qualitative Marketing
Research and Psychology and Marketing. He is also the co-author of a European textbook in consumer behaviour and
a founder of the university-business collaboration project Brand Base.
Abstract:
Research in consumer behaviour, whether in the academic format or as commercialized market research,
has traditionally been highly divided between quantitative and qualitative methods, between approaches
stressing explanatory models of preference formation and choice and interpretive Verstehen-based
insights into consumer lives. It will be argued that both of these standard approaches build on the
negotiation of a particular set of mythologies concerning the character of the consumer, the Romantic
and the Gnostic myth respectively (Thompson 2004). A more fundamental mythology of consumer tēchnē
constitutes the shared foundation of the two approaches and that this is the basic mythology behind
scientific market research. Current market research in the commercial form should in principle try to free
itself from this scientific tēchnē mythology. However, the continued social legitimacy of science and the
functioning of the market-oriented organization make this a difficult process. I will conclude by drawing
some implications also for academic consumer research, in terms of negotiating an epistemological space
for Consumer Culture Theory based research in a nexus between sociologies and anthropologies of
consumption.
10.15 – 11.45 | Market Research and Making of Markets, part 1
Franz Liebl
A Strategic Approach to Customer Orientation
Institution: Berlin University of the Arts, Germany
E-mail: [email protected]
Franz Liebl has been professor of strategic marketing at Berlin University of the Arts since 2005. From 1986 to 1994 he
worked with the Institute for Systems Research (University of Munich) and was its vice-director from 1990 to 1994. In
1994 he became professor of Business Administration at Witten/Herdecke University, where he held the Chair of
General and Quantitative Management until 1998, and the Aral Chair of Strategic Marketing until 2005. His research
interests include strategy development, strategic issue management, business design and marketing in a context of
individualised societies. He is editor of two series of books: Cognitive Strategy Concepts and Experience-based
Lifeworlds. His latest books include Cultural Hacking: Kunst des Strategischen Handelns (Springer, Vienna/New York)
and New-School Strategy (forthcoming).
Abstract:
Customer Orientation was one of the most important concepts in strategic marketing during the 1990s.
However, the interpretation of customer orientation as a mere "customer centricity" has lost its power
since then. From an entrepreneurial view of strategy, which focuses on the creation of new markets and
new rules of competition, customer orientation has to be reconceptualized. This has important
implications for using market research, segmenting customers, and interacting with them.
Rainer Gries
Brand Communication: The intergenerational production of sustainability
Institution: Institute for Media and Communication, University of Vienna, Austria
E-mail: [email protected]
Rainer Gries is professor at the University of Vienna and Fridrich-Schiller-University Jena. He specialized in modern
history, cultural anthropology and communication studies. In his research he deals with the cultural history of product
communication in East and West Germany and has developed a theoretical model of product communication. Main
research topics of Rainer Gries are: History of Germany and Austria in the 20th Century; history of persuasive
communications (advertising, product communication and political propaganda in the 19th and 20th Century); history
of generations. He recently published the book Ernest Dichter and Motivation Research: New Perspectives on the
Making of Post-war Consumer Culture.
Abstract:
Currently, many of our leading brand products have a living history of over one hundred years or more.
Successful brands are the result of long-term social processes of negotiations that involve several groups
of players. These discourses are developed over periods of time and they operate as constant constructs
throughout time: What does this mean?
The theory of product communication is also an attempt to consider the essential historic dimensions of
branding. The story of a certain brand seen from this perspective is also the history of the generations
who have worked together on the testimony of the product. Brands have become not only a type of
modern media, but have also advanced to a media of collective memory. The basic principle of brand
culture is therefore sustainability. This raises the question as to which way both the knowledge and the
feeling of the long-term historicity of brand products may contribute to the further development of
sustainability skills.
10.15 – 11.45 | Consumption and Media, part 1
Jakub Macek
Convergence or Divergence? Between the Two Styles of Media Consumption
Institution: Department of Media Studies and Journalism, Masaryk University Brno, Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Jakub Macek is a Lecturer at VŠB – Technical University of Ostrava and Faculty of Social Studies, Masaryk University.
He has a Masters Degree in Media Studies and Journalism from Masaryk University, now he is Ph.D. student at the
same place. He focuses on social theory of new media and cyberculture. He is an editor of magazine Media Studies.
Abstract:
Do we live in a radically new media environment where old practices of mass media consumption are
going to be definitely replaced by new, interactive media experience? The optimistic proponents of new
media are prophesying the brave new world of active media consumption since late 1980s and the
discourses of user-controlled and user-co-produced contents shape the field of new media studies very
powerfully. This paper confronts the theoretical optimism – represented here by Henry Jenkins’ work on
convergence culture – with the latest empirical data collected and interpreted by my two of my students,
Nela Studýnková and Martin Čepička. When putting their conclusion into the wider context, we can ask
questions that partly undermine the optimism about new media consumption.
Henry Jenkins insightfully announced a shift in media consumption – shift to culture where contents are
spread and shared over various media, from traditional mass media to a wide range of digital media.
However, from data collected by Studýnková and Čepička there appear two different types of audiences,
two types of consumption, two different ways of control of mediated contents – the one based on
practices of convergence culture as depicted by Jenkins; the other is based on strict division of use of
media channels where particular channels are strictly used for particular activity and where not only work
and leisure, but even specific types of media consumption (such as consuming news, movies and TV
shows, music) are separated.
The questions we have to ask are: Can we really speak about prevailing convergence culture, or should we
regulate the optimism by a more realistic approach? Are the convergence / divergence modes of
consumption strictly separated on the line of generation and social status, as it appears, or are we just
focused to narrowly? And, finally, is the normative approach – the one that prefers the “good activity” –
really adequate? Or does the “digital-centrism” make us blind in some ways?
Ondřej Krajtl  Lenka Svobodová
Vampire Consuming and Consumed
Institution:Department of Aesthetics, Masaryk University Brno, Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Ondřej Krajtl is a Ph.D. student at Seminar of Aesthetics at Masaryk University, Brno. He is speaker and editor at Radio
Proglas and also works for Radio Vaticana. He is specialized in aesthetics of comics and aesthetic of evil.
Lenka Svobodová is a Lecturer at Seminar of Aesthetics at Masaryk University, Brno. She is specialized in aesthetics of
latin language and literature. Her Ph.D. thesis is called The Aesthetic Categories in the Treatise De amore. She has
study experiences from Universität Regensburg, Germany and Università degli Studi di Torino, Italy.
Abstract:
True Blood, the HBO channel TV 'vampire' series, brings to the screen social motives, reflects pop-culture,
and works as a perfect allegory of consumer culture. The metaphysical, ethical, and social ramifications
were pointed out among others in the anthology True Blood and Philosophy from the Blackwell publishers
(edition The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series), which unfortunately did not deal with the
characteristic artistic reflection of the consumer world and consumerism that is specific for the series.
The aim of this text is an aesthetic analysis of the product of consumer culture, which reflects the
behavior of consumers and also helps to shape their habits and preferences. While studying the series, we
found a lot of aesthetically relevant topics. Among them are the question of beauty, desire for eternal
youth, perfect appearance, attractiveness, and fascination for otherness, which significantly connect the
idea of a vampire to the world of commercials and consumer culture. The figure of the vampire in the
True Blood series is closely linked to the world of fashion and elegance. Vampires do not suffer from the
effects of time, and they set the style; they are the modern arbiters elegantiarum. The vampire is
absolutely “cool”. Another topic relevant to aesthetics is the ethical evaluation of artwork, in this case of
vampires (artificiality, non-humanity). From the perspective of many of the series’ characters, vampires
are beyond good and evil; the series does not deal with the creation and the raison d'être of vampires.
Therefore, vampires seem to be mere objects whose sole function is to be consumed (sex with a vampire
as a maximization of delight, drinking vampire blood in order to escape everydayness).Aesthetics of the
unfinished, as described by Peter Lunnenfeld, is the third important parallel to the world of consumer
culture. Constant delaying of the definitive consummation of the product so it can be offered and sold
further (the life of the series and a vampire can be eternal). The True Blood series itself is based on the
creation of a perfect product of fake vampire blood. Emphasis on the brand, nonexistence of competition,
and symbolic importance of the invention are refined to perfection by the idea of linking consumer
behavior and politics. In this case, the creation of a new product and its consumption leads to a change in
the American Constitution.
Irena Reifová  Kateřina Gillárová  Radim Hladík
Commodity Retro-signifiers in the Television Serial "Vyprávěj" and Their Reception
Irena Reifová
Institution: Department of Media Studies, Charles University Prague, Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Irena Reifová is an Assistant Professor in Media Studies Department at Faculty of Social Sciences at Charles
University, Prague. Her theoretical focus is on media cultural studies and theory of popular culture. Her research
interests are situated in the field of television studies with an emphasis on television seriality.
Kateřina Gillárová
Institution: Department of Sociology, Charles University Prague, Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Kateřina Gillárová is a Ph.D. student in Sociology at Faculty of Social Sciences at Charles University, Prague. She
specializes in media audiences and consumers ethnography (mainly teenage people). Kateřina is also a marketing
researcher in the consultancy company Idealisti, based in Prague, the Czech Republic. She has several years of
experience in advertising and social research.
Radim Hladík
Institution: Department of Sociology, Charles Universtiy Prague, Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Radim Hladík is a Ph.D. student in Sociology at Faculty of Social Sciences at Charles University, Prague. He focuses on
conjunctures of media and memory studies with regard to media representations of the socialist past. In 2009-2010
he is a Fulbright scholar at the The New School for Social research.
Abstract:
The paper relates to the (by now well-established) strand of research that seeks to illuminate processes of
turning the socialist past into an object of a post-socialist memory (Kansteiner 2002). We are mainly
concerned with the esthetical surfaces of the socialist everyday life as they are represented in the
television serial “Vyprávěj” (ČT, 2009-2010). Our main interest is the question how these representations
are used by the television audiences as specific mnemonic tools that help them to generate memories
and create links to the past. We refer to these specific material and commodity reminders of the past as
to “the retro-signifiers” of the socialist period.
“Vyprávěj” is a programme on the verge of a comedy drama and a docudrama, the story of an ordinary
family whose fictive everyday life is intertwined with the real political events and their consequences
across the decades from 1960s to noughties. Representation of the everyday life is heavily based on a
detailed use of particular objects, references to the timely fashion code and life-style esthetics (e.g. in
accommodation styling or food preparation). The above mentioned visualization of the socialist past has
been previously interpreted as a way of practicing post-socialist nostalgia (Boym 2001, Hutcheon 2000).
Some authors claim that nostalgic „structure of feeling“ in post-socialist cultures is initiated by profitdriven media institutions that bring about reification and fetishization of the past (Sarkisova, Apor 2007;
Enns 2007; Boyer 2006). We want to alter this perspective by looking at how “the retro-signifiers” of the
socialist past are used by the viewers in their re-constructions of the history and re-constitutions of
continuity of everyday life that was suspended after 1989.
Our paper is based on in-depth focus-groups interviews with approximately 70 regular viewers of the
serial “Vyprávěj”. The focus-groups were organized in two clusters: the first consisted of young viewers
with no personal, adulthood experience with the state-socialism and the second invited the viewers who
have had their own direct experience with the socialist everyday life in the course of their adult age.
12.00 - 13.00 | Market Research and Making of Markets, part 2
Ivana Uspenski
Mass Intelligence and the Commoditized Reader
Institution: University of Arts, Belgrade, Serbia
E-mail: [email protected]
Ivana Uspenski is Ph.D. student in Media Theory Department at University of Arts in Belgrade. Her thesis title is
Reconceptualization of the Contemporary Theory of Reading Digital Contents . She also works as a Managing Director
at OMD Media Serbia. She is co-author of the book Knowledge for doing successful business I, II and series of articles
in an e-magazin Bussiness monthly.
Abstract:
New media convergence culture has introduced significant changes to the traditional ways in which we
understand terms of reading and reception. Reading strategies are no longer products of a reader’s own
intentions, or the author’s. Dominant producers of the new media texts (I call them digitexts) become
cybertexts as ergodic machines (how Aarseth defined them). Not only do cybertext machines produce
digitexts and their reading strategies, they also produce the new media reader. This means that in the
reading process, which is understood in Escaprit’s terms as global cultural consumpition, the reader
oneself becomes a commodified construct, a merchandise which can be bought and sold and obviously
nowhere more than in the on-line advertising industry, guided by Google’s Page Rank algorythm.
I call this new media reader commodified due to the fact that the basic purpose of producing readers in
new media surroundings, especially on the Internet is for them to be converted into clicks, exposures,
demographic data, transformed into merchandise. Every time one clicks on a link or checks the ’like’ box
on Facebook, one is transferring one’s own piece of intelligence and feeding it into cybertext, which then
uses thusly acummulated intelligence for its own profit and benefit, basically exploiting the product of the
new media reader’s work. This is the phaenomenon I mark as mass intelligence – the non-critical and
arbitrary global gathering and accumulation of human knowledge, by offering readers mass-interests
texts which they can read, to which they can react, comment them or hyperlink them with the sole
purpose of making these readers quantifiable goods and therefore able to be added material value in the
form of price. As opposed to collective intelligence, mass intelligence is not a productive force it is a
commodity.
Christian Eismann
“Consumers@Work”: Self-awareness and emancipation in web 2.0 environments
Institution: Institute of Sociology, Chemnitz University of Technology, German
E-mail: [email protected]
Christian Eismann is research assistant and Ph.D. candidate at the chair of Industrial Sociology at the Chemnitz
University of Technology. Before he became a member of this research team he graduated in Sociology, Economics
and Political Sciences and worked at the department of economics at the Chemnitz University of Technology.
Abstract:
The amount of Web 2.0 internet sites has remarkably increased in recent years. On the one hand, this
development provides new opportunities to firms that now can better integrate consumer needs into
internal production processes. But on the other hand, consumers more and more ask for participation and
individualization. In order to meet these demands, the company must take a moderating function more
often (e.g. through providing an appropriate environment) and has to elaborate strategies for coping with
this new challenge. As a result, the role relations between producers and consumers are blurring.
For this, some empirical findings from the ongoing research project “consumers@work”, which is funded
by the German Research Foundation (DFG), will be presented. The aim of this project is to investigate the
new modes of Web 2.0 mediated consumer integration taking place in the company’s internal business
processes and secondly, to analyse the concrete practice of the contributing customers; for instance their
motives, participation strategies and the integration of their activities in their daily lives. This change is
examined from the sociological perspective of consumer work. Consumers spend time and effort in
customizing products, in participating on creativity contests (speculative work) or in generating content,
and thereby they provide valuable information for the company – often without noteworthy or with little
financial reward. From an economic point of view, consumers invest resources to contribute to the value
chain of the firm. On the other side, the consumers – as some kind of service providers – become more
and more influential and with this to an important comparative advantage (but also a disadvantage) for
companies. This significant trend of the customer’s emancipation and self-awareness will be underpinned
by qualitative and quantitative data. Beyond that, this shift of both producer and consumer roles indicates
the necessity to reconsider about current concepts of service systems.
12.00 – 13.00 | Consumption and Media, part 2
Marcin Adamczak
Multiplexes as the Limes of “Global Hollywood”
Institution: Institute of Cultural Studies, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznań, Poland
E-mail: [email protected]
Marcin Adamczak received his Ph.D. at Cultural Studies Institute at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań on the
basis of the doctoral dissertation Artistic strategies in Polish cinema after 1989 in the frame of changes in
contemporary audiovisual culture. After that he studied also Film and Television Production at National Film,
Televison and Theatre School in Łódź. His research interests are economical aspects of contemporary cinema, film
production, profitability of film market, cultural studies and popular culture and social aspects of aesthetics. He is
currently working on monography of „global Hollywood” reality.
Abstract:
The paper will deal with multiplexization presented in broader perspective of economic, political and
cultural processes related to globalization, which transformed the consumer culture and film culture after
1980. Among them, the most prominent seems to be creation of powerful media conglomerates,
significant increase in film budgets, especially P&A budgets, and growing dominance of “global
Hollywood” at international film market. Multiplexization was an important part of those changes. It
brought a redefinition and transformation of social “cinema going” practice and experiences of viewer
participating in a film show. It could be termed after the phrase of Toby Miller “the reprise of vaudeville
bill”, when watching movies is connected with a set of other social practices, like shopping and resting
after a whole week of work in realities of late capitalist societies. It is both on the “micro” level of
reception and on the “macro” level of cultural progamming where “going to movies” was interwoven with
a net of other consumer practices. This is clearly seen by fluid embodiment of cinemas into the
architecutre of shopping centers, where cinemas aren’t even separated from commercial space by any
kind of gates, but are create the common consumer-cultural space with shops and restaurants.
It also seems like a shift in “the map” of cultural space from “high culture” zone achived in 1960s to “low
culture” (folk culture) in Pierre Bourdieu’s terms from Distinction. It contributed to the emergance of two
separate “cienematographic systems” (art-houses and traditional cinemas along with multiplexes)
situated in separate institutional and discourse contexts and related with separate types of reception
expectations and gratification. In this way multiplexes are the material and symbolic signs of the reign of
“global Hollywood”, setting its limes. Beyond that it is just a fragmented world of small and individual
national cinematographies and the increasingly disappearing auteur model.
Ken-fang Lee
Cultural Consumerism: How travel writings help to sell a place
Institution: Graduate Institute of Translation and Interpretation, National Taiwan Normal University,
Taiwan
E-mail: [email protected]
Ken-fang Lee graduated Ph.D. studies at University of Sussex. She is a director of Graduate Institute of Translation
and Interpretation at National Taiwan Normal University. Her research interests are women´s travel narratives,
cultural theory, cultural politics and travel writing. For example, she is author of papers about west literature in
Taiwan culture. Her latest paper is called Translation and Representation of Self-help Bestsellers for Improving
Relationships in Taiwan (issued in Guang Yi: Lingual, Literacy and Cultural Translation, No. 3).
Abstract:
Travel writing has been an interesting genre for a very long time but only starts to gain academic interests
in recent decades. As Peter Hulme suggests, it has emerged as “a key theme in humanities and social
sciences” (1997: i). One of the reasons for its unprecedented critical attention is that global flows become
more frequent, be it of people, finance or information. The development of the mass tourism, the spread
of guest workers, various diasporic groups and immigrants all contribute to the concerns about travel and
movement, which help to draw more scholars to take travel writing as a genre more seriously.
I argue that travel writing certainly plays a part in providing a way of looking/understanding before the
trip even starts or accompanying the visitor during the journey. What interests me is how travel writing as
a genre contributes to cultural consumption of a place and reversely, cultural tourism also appropriates
this genre to accumulate more symbolic capital for further expanding cultural-tourist industry.
This papers aims to look at how certain English travel literature and Taiwan’s local travel writers
represented France and, wittingly or unwittingly, help to sell France as a major tourist attraction. As most
of us probably have known, “France” as a signifier always brings to mind the image of “romance,” “taste,”
“elegance,” and “being civilized.” How travel writing as a cultural product prompts consumption of the
image of France and makes a certain destinies fashionable tourist spots is worth further examination.
Peter Mayle’s A Year in Provence, Stephen Clarke’s A Year in the Merde (both have Chinese translations in
Taiwan), Yao Chang’s Paris, Huang Su-chin’s A Year in France, and Yang Ya-ching’s Kiss, Paris would be
the selective texts for my focus of attention and comparison.
14.00 – 15.00 | Keynote Address
Kai-Uwe Hellmann
Fetishes of Consumption: Studies to a sociology of brands
Institution: IKM Berlin, Germany
E-mail: [email protected]
Kai-Uwe Hellmann is German sociologist and senior researcher at Berlin Institute of Technology. His research areas
include sociology of branding, advertisement and marketing research. In 2002 he has founded with Dominik Schrage
the AG Konsumsoziologie, an open forum for sociological research on consumption in Germany. Recently he organised
the conference Prosumer Revisited at Goethe University in Frankfurt.
Abstract:
Since Marx introduced the idea of commodity fetishism it attracts a lot of attention. Especially brands
were then intensively discussed as a prototype of commodity fetishes. Corresponding terms have been
icons, totems, myths etc., or the talking of magical or even sacral phenomena. Regarding this concurrent
background the question rises whether this habit within consumer research possesses any empirical
evidence. What are the facts which confirm this habit? Is it more than a pure spectacle brought to stage
only for the scientific community? Referring to the seminal article “The Sacred and the Profane in
Consumer Behavior: Theodicy on the Odyssey” from Russell W. Belk, Melanie Wallendorf and John F.
Sherry, Jr., 1989 published, which gives an excellent opportunity to study the analytical quality of this
argument, it shall be slightly criticized that the habit of fetishising brands lacks any reason as far as we do
not stay with the Thomas theorem “If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences”
alone. This criticism is based on a brief recourse to classical studies within the sociology of religion
(Durkheim, Luckmann, Otto etc.).
15.15 – 16.45 | Consumption and Social Distinction, part 1
Søren Askegaard  Dannie Kjeldgaard  Per Østergaard
‘Coldfeet Café’: A consumer culture of the mundane?
Søren Askegaard
Institution: Department of Marketing & Management, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
E-mail: [email protected]
Søren Askegaard is professor of marketing at University of Southern Denmark in Odense. He has a Masters Degree in
Social Sciences from Odense University, a post-graduate Diploma in Communication Studies from the Sorbonne
University, Paris and a Ph.D. in Business Studies from Odense University. His research interests generally lie in the
field of consumer behaviour analysis from a cultural perspective, including such topics as life styles, consumer
motivations, food culture, product imagery, branding, and globalization. He has published in numerous anthologies as
well as in journals such as among others Consumption, Markets, and Culture, European Journal of Marketing,
International Business Review, Journal of Consumer Research and Journal of Macromarketing, Qualitative Marketing
Research and Psychology and Marketing. He is also the co-author of a European textbook in consumer behaviour and
a founder of the university-business collaboration project Brand Base.
Dannie Kjeldgaard
Institution: Department of Marketing & Management, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
E-mail: [email protected]
Dannie Kjeldgaard is professor of Consumption Studies at the Department of Marketing and Management at the
University of Southern Denmark. In his work he analyses change processes of market-based glocalization in a
consumer culture theory perspective.
Per Østergaard
Institution: Department of Marketing & Management, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
E-mail: [email protected]
Per Østergaard is an Associate Professor at Department of Marketing & Management at University of Southern
Denmark. He has been visiting professor in USA and Germany. He is a member of editorial board of Journal of
Consumer Culture. His main field of interest is consumer culture theory.
Abstract:
“The everyday is platitude; but this banality is also what is most important” wrote Maurice Blanchot
(1987). Inconspicuous consumption experiences often belong in the doxa category of consumer practices,
generally neither particularly loved or hated by consumers but accepted in their taken-for-grantedness
(Wilk 1997). As such, they provide mundane experiences that are outside the experience economy but
nevertheless often constitutive for non-reflexive feelings of identification and attachment. This study
analyzes the cultural experience of consumption at the “pølsevogn” – the humble and inconspicuous open
air (mobile) hot dog stand typical in Danish street scenes, also nicknamed the “coldfeet café”; an
ambivalent designation referring not without affection to the café-like community and coziness that may
emerge among its customers and the owner of the establishment as well as to the inconveniences of this
primitive, outdoor fast food outlet.
Consuming at the pølsevogn is a classic urban food ritual dating back to 1921 when the first mobile hotdog stands were allowed in Denmark (Thomsen 1995). At the culmination of its penetration in the 1970s,
it had become a highly present part of the Danish “foodie cityscapes”, the ubiquity of food availability in
contemporary urban environments (Bell & Valentine 1997). This consumer experience is basically
classless: people of all social backgrounds can and will go there – often or occasionally. In all its mundane
simplicity, it is a widespread traditional routine and a convenience solution rather than a ritual (Marshall
2005) although, as we shall see, this might be changing. At the same time the pølsevogn is under threat
from global fast food culture and the number of serving places have gone down. The purpose of this paper
is to seize the moment and analyze this mundane consumption experience confronted with ‘the threat of
authentification’ by which it becomes part of a cultural canon of national heritage, and thereafter
disappears out of the mundane, non-reflexive universe of experiences. We are thus interested in the
process of emerging reflexivity and ‘musealization’ in a subpopulation of high cultural capital consumers
and the extent to which media coverage of this reflexivity changes the perspective of ordinary consumers.
Data collection for this project includes videographic as well as interview-based and observational data.
Ivan Chorvát
Leisure and Holiday Activities in Slovakia: Differences and distinctions
Institution: The University Research Institute, Matej Bel University, Banská Bystrica, Slovakia
E-mail: [email protected]
Ivan Chorvát received Ph.D. in Sociology at Institute for Sociology of the Slovak Academy of Sciences in Bratislava,
where he worked as a research assistant (in the “Family Team”) too. He has many experiences from abroad (The
University of Oxford, The University of Lancaster, Charles University Prague, The George Washington University…). He
is a member of Editorial Board of Sociální studia (Social Studies) journal, published by the Faculty of Social Studies of
Masaryk University in Brno and Sociológia – Slovak Sociological Review journal published by the Institute of Sociology
of the Slovak Academy of Sciences in Bratislava.
Abstract:
The paper focuses on the consumption of leisure activities in contemporary Slovakia (in a comparative
perspective). After changes in 1989 post-communist societies have become consumer societies, in this
matter resembling their Western counterparts and consumption of goods became also a crucial factor in
the differentiation of the Slovak society. The 1990s were characterized by a more intensive working effort
of various segments of population (two jobs, working overtime, working on weekends) in order to
increase their social status through spending and consumption of goods. Nowadays, after successful
economic reforms in 1998 – 2006 that contributed towards better standard of living for general
population in Slovakia, it seems that a value of work has been weakened. In order to validate this
presumption, in January - February 2010 we conducted a sociological research mapping leisure and
vacation activities and preferences of the Slovak population and their changes in a last couple of years. At
the present time the data have been processed, analysed and compared with the 2007 ISSP Leisure Time
& Sports module covering 34 countries (including Slovakia). In the conference paper we should be able to
state whether Gilles Lipovetsky´s description of a trend towards social appreciation of happiness,
entertainment and leisure is also valid for the Slovak population (or some of its segments).
15.15 – 16.45 | Marketing Communication and Culture, part 1
Salim Murad
Marketing the Ethnic Stereotypes: Controversy you cannot resist
Institution: Department of Social Sciences, University of South Bohemia, Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Since September 2000, Salim Murad has been a Lecturer in Political Science at the Pedagogical Faculty of the
University of South Bohemia in České Budějovice. He also lectures at New York University, Prague. He graduated in
Political Science at Masaryk University, Brno. As a Visiting Fellow at the Refugee Studies Centre by University of
Oxford he made research entitled the Issue of Asylum in the Czech Republic: From the Fall of Communism to Access
to the EU.
Abstract:
The presentation will focus on ethical aspects of using stereotypes in imaging of minorities in the Czech
advertising. The world of Czech advertising gives many opportunities for analyzing this theme. After a
general introduction summarizing the issue of using stereotypical portraying of minorities in the field of
Czech advertising, mainly from the frequency point of view, we will mention the Ethical Code of the Czech
Advertising Industry in respect to our matter and then the presentation will focus especially on using of
stereotypes as a pointing gun, as a goal-directed tool in the Buzz Marketing. When the controversial
advertisement and the interest of media serves to the aim of designedly used mass media for delivery of
the promotional message to the target group and thus saves the money which would be otherwise needed
in a conservative ad campaign.
In detail will be presented two case studies, both using (misusing) the image of the Roma. First one will be
the negative ad campaign for Volvo – Nothing for me darling- and the second example will be the one
using techniques of new marketing of designed attention of the media – the campaign I should have
studied better, which was ordered by an internet site offering educational training courses. Which is
regarding the use of Roma as a means of the orchestrated controversy and the missus (or alleged misuse)
of Roma in the campaign sadly paradoxical. To the success of the campaign also consequently contributed
the Minister for Human Rights and Minorities of the Government of the Czech Republic Mr. Michal Kocáb
(among others) with his critical statements denouncing the use of Roma. But could he do otherwise but to
“act“ as the Ad company which had created the whole concept actually decided for him?
Martin Fafejta
Masculinity in the TV Advertisements
Institution: Department of Sociology and Adult Education, Palacký University Olomouc, Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Martin Fafejta graduated his Ph.D. studies at Department of Sociology and Adult Education, Palacký University
Olomouc in 2000 with thesis on Postmodernism, Feminism and Politics. Currently, he works as assistant professor at
the same institution. His field of interests is sex, gender and sexuality, feminism and political science. In 2004 he
issued book Úvod do sociologie pohlaví a sexuality (Introduction to the sociology of sex and sexuality), which is based
on the position of social constructivism.
Abstract:
The paper is based on the qualitative content analysis of selected TV ads presented in the primetime on
the four Czech TV stations (ČT1 a ČT2, Nova, Prima). The analysis asks to what extent and in which ways
the TV ads confirm or doubt gender stereotypes (or confirm and doubt them at the same time). It focuses
on the depiction of men with different gendered products (cars, cosmetics, washing powders etc.). It also
analyses representation of male mutual relationships, relations of men to children and women in different
social situations and environments (e.g. occupation, entertaining, family).
According to researches, TV ads mostly reproduce gender stereotypes, since the stress on the “old good”
traditions has a big market potential. However, it does not mean that men in the ads are represented in a
uniform way. Men perceive (and are influenced by) advertisements differently than women (as researches
demonstrate), so it is likely that men are represented differently in the ads focused on men and in the ads
focused on women: on the one hand, men depicted as the strong and dominant authorities, experts,
heroes, conquerors, seducers etc., on the other, men needing care and help of women.
However, the image of men in TV ads may also doubt the gender stereotypes: first, it is a way how to
convince men to buy products traditionally not identified with masculinity (and thus to attract new
consumers), second, there is a certain advertising potential of the non-stereotypical ads (since they
disrupt expectations and it is easier to remember them), and third, the concepts of masculinity are
changing and masculinity is now more and more coupled with the idea of care – both the care for others
(e.g. fatherhood), and the care for himself (cosmetics and health products).
Nazli Alimen & Figen Yesilada
Homosexuality (in) Fashion? Turkish consumers’ evaluation of print fashion
advertisements depicting homosexual imagery
Nazli Alimen
Institution: Graduate School of Social Sciences, Izmir University of Economics, Izmir, Turkey
E-mail: [email protected]
Nazli Alimen received her BA degree in Clothes Industry and Fashion Design from Gazi University in 2001, MA degree
in Brand Management from Istituto Marangoni in 2004, and MBA degree from Izmir University of Economics in 2008.
Having worked in visual merchandising and public relations departments of several companies, she started to pursue
her Ph.D. degree in marketing at Izmir University of Economics in September 2008. Her interest areas are
anticonsumption, postmodernism, and consumer culture.
Figen Yesilada
Institution: Department of Business Administration, Near East University, Nicosia, Cyprus
E-mail: [email protected]
Figen Yesilada earned a Ph.D. degree in Business Administration from Dokuz Eylül University, Institute of Social
Sciences. She has taught in the departments of Business Administration at Dokuz Eylül University, Izmir University of
Economic and now she is assistant professor in the Department of Business Administration at the Faculty of
Economics and Administrative Sciences, Near East University. In European Journal of Economics, Finance and
Administrative Sciences she issued a study about (Turkish) consumer behavior Decision Making Styles of Young
Turkish Consumers (2007, with Alican Kavas).
Abstract:
Print advertising could be considered as a family album of the society consisting of pictures
demonstrating “the way we would like to see ourselves” (Belk and Pollay, 1985: 888). Advertisements both
reflect and influence the society such as how we think about masculinity and femininity through activities
attached to masculine (e.g. shaving, driving fast cars) and feminine (e.g. applying makeup, doing the
laundry) characteristics. Similarly, various roles, i.e. sex stereotypes (e.g. biological criteria – breasts and
genitals), decorative (e.g. modelling jewellery), and gender stereotypes (e.g. seductive postures), have
been used as advertising appeals. Whereas images in media are mostly heterosexist oriented, in recent
years, homosexual imagery has been used in advertising to attract homosexual customers via
communication channels targeting them. However, the use of homosexual imagery in fashion
advertisements is widespread that they are apparent in general public, for example magazines and
billboards. Yet, what are consumers’ attitudes towards those advertisements? Is there any difference in
their attitudes towards advertisements using male or female homosexual imagery? Does the intensity of
the homosexual imagery – from most explicit to tenuous – have an effect on their awareness and
attitudes? Our aim is to reveal consumers’ attitudes towards advertisements with homosexual imagery in
a country, Turkey, where homosexuality is generally unacceptable. For the purpose of this paper, seven
print advertisements of well-known fashion companies depicting either lesbian or gay imagery at various
levels were evaluated by 182 respondents. The results of t-test and ANOVA showed that attitudes differ
significantly according to gender, age, education, tolerance level toward homosexuals, and fashion
involvement level of consumers in addition to the intensity of homosexual imagery, and depiction of
either male or female homosexuality in advertisements.
Belk, Russell W. – Richard W. Pollay. 1985. “Images of Ourselves: The Good Life in Twentieth Century
Advertising”, Journal of Consumer Research, 11, 887–897.
17.15 – 18.15 | Consumption and Social Distinction, part 2
Maria Dabringer
"Consuming Cities": On the social and political meaning of food and consumption
in the urban contexts of Quito, Ecuador
Institution: Department for Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Vienna, Austria
E-mail: [email protected]
Maria Dabringer studied Cultural and Social Antropology, History and Hispanic and she graduated doctoral studies of
Philosophy and Natural Sciences. She is social and cultural anthropologist, facilitator and adult educator. Her
interests and research areas are urban anthropology, anthropology of food, consumption and material culture,
socioscientific methodologies and didactics, development studies, feminist studies. She focuses on region of Latin
America (Ecuador and the Andean Region).
Abstract:
Consuming is usually treated as a component of economic performance. This contribution proposes a
broader understanding of consumption, allowing the consideration of additional social dimensions. By
using the example of Quito – the Andean capital of Ecuador – cities will be discussed as strategic nodes of
globalised consumption processes with their local impacts. Here, effects of globalisation and postfordist
dynamics become visible: Migration processes, high availability of commodities and a high differentiated
food system that satisfies (basic)
needs of different pressure groups cause cities to be of interest to social scientists, especially food
anthropologists. Consumption patterns of different ethnic, social, religious and other Gross and their
valuation within urban societies show the complexity of different life-styles in the urban contexts of the
Andes. Places (street food, supermarkets, etc.), practices (festivals, ceremonies, etc.) and unique urban
areas (public spaces, museums, etc.) are of high anthropological interest because an analysis makes
visible the differences/similarities between and within selected target groups expressed by consumption
habits.
Based on ethnographic data (collected while several socialscientific research periods between 1999 and
2006) the contribution wants to highlight a multidimesional view of consumption which should provide an
understanding that is not reduced to the economy, but allows for social significance, political relevance
and individual variability.
Zuzana Chytková
Marketplace as a Site of Domination and Resistance: Romanian women in Italy and
their negotiation of place within the dominated space
Institution: The Marketing Department, The University of Economics in Prague, Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Zuzana Chytková has studied economy and management at Brno University of Technology and marketing and market
research at University of Pisa in Italy, where she obtained also her Ph.D. in 2010. Her research interest lie in consumer
culture theory and in the relationship between gender and consumer behavior. She wrote the book Volkswagen
Clients’ Purchase Behavior in Czech Republic and Italy (VDM Verlag 2008).
Abstract:
In empirical contexts, in which the marketplace (and the society) is immature due to the recency of the
immigration phenomenon, legitimate ethnic identity positions may not be offered to the immigrants and
the market becomes a dominated space. It is a question, then, if the immigrants in such setting can use
the marketplace offerings to construct hybrid ethnic identities, or if they are constrained to their “place”
by the dominating discourses.
To answer the above question, I studied the way disadvantaged immigrant women use the marketplaceoriginated symbolic resources to negotiate the subjectivities/places ascribed to them within the
dominant spaces. I concentrated on the practices of everyday life, namely cooking, as a means of
resistance. Drawing on De Certeau’s notion of consumption practices as “tactics” through which the
“weak” appropriate the dominant “spaces”, I showed how the immigrant women draw on the discourse of
the “enterprising consumer” in its gendered alternative of the “modern just-do-it woman” and by doing
so, they re-interpret the subject position of immigrant assigned to them.
The research shows that even when the “space” and the immigrants’ “place” within it are constituted as a
hegemonic structure by the dominating group, the consumers are still able to make use of the symbolic
resources offered by the marketplace to negotiate such identity positions. Further, it is illustrated how,
with the growing cultural capital in terms of consumer culture knowledge and education, the immigrants
benefit of the marketplace symbolic resources in a more nuanced way, making use of the little
multiethnic offer the market provides in the construction of a cosmopolitan identity that allows them to
take a reflexive distance from the dominated subjectivity assigned to them.
17.15 – 18.15 | Marketing Communication and Culture, part 2
Tomáš Hrivnák & Kateřina Gillárová
Digging for the Past: The particular Czech retromarketing story
Tomáš Hrivnák
Institution: Idealisti, Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Tomáš Hrivnák is a brand therapist and co‐owner at Idealisti, a brand consultancy based in Prague, the Czech
Republic. In the last years he worked in advertising and marketing where he held a number of creative and managerial
positions – from copywriter and executive creative director of MARK/BBDO to the director of strategic planning at
Euro RSCG. Tomáš Hrivnák has an MA in English literature from Comenius University in Bratislava, Slovakia and
Edinburgh University in Scotland.
Kateřina Gillárová
Institution: Idealisti, Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Kateřina Gillárová is a marketing researcher in the consultancy company Idealisti. She has several years of experience
in advertising and social research. Currently, her focus is on ethnographic research and its implementation in
marketing practice. Kateřina is also a Ph.D. student at the Institute of Sociology, Charles University in Prague. In her
doctoral thesis, she maps the communication practices of the social groups of teenagers. She gives lectures at both
Charles and Metropolitan University in Prague.
Abstract:
Our retro eshop was open from nostalgia and desire to share with you the beautiful and forever young
home accessories, which have not run out of mode, and the time have shaped it into an attractive form.
Retroobchod (http://www.retroobchod.cz/o-nas)
Not only so called timeless products have withstood the storm of hyper‐competition. It seems like almost
everything dating back to the 20th century is seen as cool and trendy. Retro‐marketing is all around us, be
it retro‐products like Botas shoes, retro‐scapes, such as Botas Concept Store with its 66 Gallery, or retro‐
advertising campaigns like the one from Kofola. Nowadays, Retro Marketing, or Flashback Branding, is on
the rise and is reaching Generation Y just as well as Generation WE.
Retro marketing is about using nostalgia to make a contemporary product more attractive and desirable.
Marketing has been borrowing from and romancing the past every time the society becomes upset,
stressed, and insecure about its future, and therefore seek solid, guaranteed, and known truths – in one
word, authenticity. People want authenticity. Not only in our post‐communist situation people associate
the past with authenticity. From there it follows that attaching one’s product to the past makes it
authentic. The more legitimate the link is the better the outcome. People become extremely hungry for
the kind of products and services they grew up with when “times were so much simpler, cheaper and
better”.
This desire for “getting back to the paradise” has become even more important in the Czech Republic. The
early years after the 1989 revolution were dominated by the ideology built on the values of personal
freedom, democracy and liberal capitalism with the idea of free market. The old order (socialism) was
seen as evil (in the political as well as moral sense), and as such was constantly negated. Later, on the
verge of the millenium the Czech and Slovak societies underwent a sort of “democracy and capitalism
hangover”. People realized that the Western ideological import has not been a panacea for all the ills of
the newly formed society. The drive for individual achievement has been replaced with the longing to
belong and the search for the “old order”. The Czech and Slovak societies were trying “to remember
themselves”, their roots and sources of their identity. So called “retro‐brands” came in handy: among
others Kofola, Botas, or Jesenka. Other brands, which kept the position of cultural outsiders and thus were
not connected to the Czech society and culture, gradually lost its relevance to more “culturally
customized” surrogates. In our paper we will show how the retro trend is articulated successfully in the
Czech advertising and marketing discourse and what are its cultural sources.
Per Østergaard & Judy Hermansen
Brand Meaning in the Age of the Critical Reflexive Consumer: A Greimasian
semiotic square analysis
Per Østergaard
Institution: Department of Marketing & Management, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
E-mail: [email protected]
Per Østergaard is an Associate Professor at Department of Marketing & Management at University of Southern
Denmark. He has been visiting professor in USA and Germany. He is a member of editorial board of Journal of
Consumer Culture. His main field of interest is consumer culture theory.
Judy Hermansen
Institution: Department of Marketing & Management, Universtity of Southern Denmark, Denmark
E-mail: [email protected]
Judy Hermansen has a Master degree in literature and has been in the advertising industry for more than 20 years.
Now she is taking a Ph.D. in consumption studies. SHe focuses on semiotics of advertising in consumer culture.
Abstract:
This is a study of consumer resistance and branding. The conceptual foundation of consumer resistance
literature is mainly based on critical theory from the Frankfurt School (Horkheimer and Adorno 1972).
Instead we perceive the critical reflexive consumer as caught in a dilemma, since this consumer lives in a
consumer culture where commodities act as essential tools in the identity construction. Holt (2002) also
addresses this issue (using other tools) and shows how current consumer resistance literature is not able
to fully understand how brands work today. We analyze the dilemma by using the Greimasian semiotic
square (e.g., Greimas 1987) and show how the critical reflexive consumer is caught in a logical tension
between branding and anti-branding. The analysis uncovers how the underlying logical structure of this
antagonistic consumer identity ironically offers possibilities to “solve” the dilemma for nonprofit anti
consumption organizations as well as profit based brands. The semiotic square is applied on two brands:
Adbusters’ Blackspot sneakers and a cigarette brand with no name from the Mac Baren company. It
demonstrates how Blackspot has to undertake a logical negation of its anti-branding position as a
prerequisite to act as a brand, while Mac Baren has to perform the opposite move from a traditional
branding position to anti-branding simulation. Ironically the Adbuster strategy is consistent with
traditional branding techniques while Mac Baren applies creative avant-garde branding in a mode of
expression that is much more on a par with the critical reflexive segment and leads to a comparison
between branding and art - an issue that is also addressed by Holt (2002).
Important outcome are discussions of similarities between art and branding, of brand consumption in a
mature consumer society and of perspectives on brand management for traditional firms and nonprofit
organizations.
Lesson unrealized
Roberta Sassatelli
Consumption and Social Distinction
Institution: University of Milan
E-mail: [email protected]
Roberta Sassatelli is associate professor of Cultural Sociology at the Department of Social and Political Studies at the
University of Milan. Roberta Sassatelli is currently engaged in a large research project funded by the Italian Council for
the Social Sciences (CSS) on Consumption and the Middle Class, addressing the contribution of consumption to the
constitution of a middle-class social identity in Italy. She also works on the politics of consumption, with particular
attention to the development and scope of alternative consumer practices. She is the author of the book Consumer
Culture: History, Theory and Politics (London: Sage, 2007) explaining the cultural and institutional history of how we
have come to understand ourselves as consumers in a consumer society.
Abstract:
The first sociologists to concern themselves with consumption identified the logic of distinction as the
principle which dominates contemporary consumption. From this point of view, the consumer is
interested in getting and using objects which can serve as positional goods or status symbols,
demonstrating and possibly bettering their position in the social structure, marking social hierarchies and
boundaries. Fashion, a phenomenon that became evermore important in the great metropolises of the
end of the 19th century, seems to be an exemplar of modern consumption practices. It was indicated as an
efficient – and only superficially innocuous – device to constantly mark the boundaries of those who know
and can afford the latest thing, and those who are instead destined to follow the changes in the tastes of
others. More recently some important anthropological and sociological studies have attempted to roundout this theoretical outline. These studies have delved deeper into the aspects of conflict between
consumers, and their capacity to use goods not only according to distinctive and demonstrative logics, but
also in ways that are broadly speaking communicative, adumbrating the creation, maintenance and
modification of interpersonal relationships. two seminal studies on consumption were published: Pierre
Bourdieu’s Distinction [1984, orig. 1979] and The World of Goods by Mary Douglas and Baron Isherwood
[1979]. These rich and complex works both start by considering that objects serve as a material support
for interaction as well as symbolic indicators in making the world intelligible. Goods are conceived as
material elements through which social actors reproduce the cultural meanings which structure social
space. In turn, social actors learn to prefer certain objects according to their particular socio-cultural
location and through their often un-reflexive, still distinctive or oppositional choices, testify to and
reproduce their socio-cultural location. We may consider that it is largely in response to Bourdieu and
Douglas’s studies that a sociology of consumption as a specialised branch of sociological knowledge has
consolidated. The broad and rich literature which has been produced in the last two decades now
accounts for the diversity of the processes collected under the banner of consumption. Thanks to an
increasing awareness of such diversity, we have moved from goods being recognised as a language, to
considering how such a language is spoken in practice. Even today though, distinction, has been
recognized as an important logic of consumption – being both consciously pursued and embodied in deep
individual dispositions of taste. What is being increasingly studied is the extent to which we may consider
that there is a strong correspondence between individual disposition of taste and class dispositions, the
role of other master-identity related dispositions (gender, ethnicity) and, what is more, the generative
roles of specific worlds, fields or institutions of consumption in the mediation of taste and material
culture (Sassatelli 2007).
SATURDAY 9/10
9.00 – 10.00 | Keynote Address
Kate Soper
Beyond Consumerism: The critique of consumption, democracy, and the politics of
prosperity
Institution: Institute for the Study of European Transformations (ISET), London Metropolitan University,
UK
E-mail: [email protected]
Kate Soper is British philosopher and the author of and contributor to over a dozen books on feminism and
continental philosophy, addressing the works of Jean-Paul Sartre, Karl Marx and Simone de Beauvoir, among others.
Kate Soper has taught philosophy and critical theory at London Metropolitan University since 1987 and is a Professor
in the Department of Humanities, Arts and Languages. She has also been involved in several environmental and peace
movements in both the United Kingdom and the rest of Europe and some of her work addresses ecological issues. Her
current research interests include: theory of needs and consumption, environmental philosophy and aesthetics of
nature, gender and philosophy, feminism and enlightenment, cultural theory.
Abstract:
The market driven ‘consumerist’ lifestyle has long been defended and promoted as an agent of ‘freedom
and democracy’ and the advancement of generally progressive agendas on race, gender and sexuality.
But it is also widely condemned for its social exploitation, and now increasingly for its environmental
destruction and unsustainability. Affluent societies are thus entering upon a cultural moment of
unprecedented disquiet about unchecked consumption. The upshot is the emergence of consumer culture
as a site of new forms of democratic concern, political engagement, and cultural representation.
The paper will argue that in addition to the environmental and ethical reasons for this new concern, there
is the evidence of growing disaffection over the negative legacy of the ‘consumerist’ lifestyle for
consumers themselves. The ‘alternative hedonism’ implicit in these forms of consumer ambivalence will
be analysed with a view to disentangling its outlook on human needs and fulfilment from both earlier
leftwing critiques of commodification and from postmodernist celebrations of consumer culture as a
resource of ‘identity politics’ and self-styling. ‘Alternative hedonism’ is presented in this context as the
impulse behind a new ‘political imaginary’ that could help us to move towards a fairer, environmentally
sustainable and more enjoyable future. How, the paper will ask, can this new outlook on the ‘politics of
prosperity’ be best promoted and represented; and how might consumption now come to function as a
pressure point for the relay of political changes needed to secure a sustainable economy.
10.15 – 11.15 | Critique of Consumer Society I, part 1
Alan Bradshaw
Consumption: Reclaiming critique
Institution: Department of Management, Royal Holloway University of London, UK
E-mail: [email protected]
Alan Bradshaw received Postgraduate Diploma in Classic Consumer Theory at the University of Southern Denmark
and Doctorate in Philosophy at the Dublin Institute of Technology (based on doctoral dissertation The
Commodification of Music: Theorising Musicians). He is Senior Lecturer in Marketing at Royal Holloway, where he is
teaching the Consumer Behaviour course. His reseach interests are the configuration of consumption, markets and
culture and its attendant consuming subject and the condition of music and the aesthetic spirit within markets. He is
member of the Editorial Review Board of the International Journal of Arts Marketing, Associate Editor for the Journal
of Macromarketing and Co-chair of the European Conference for the Association of Consumer Research which was
held in July 2010 in Royal Holloway. Alan Bradshaw was nominated for this year’s Association for Consumer Research
Early Career Award for Contributions to Consumer Research.
Abstract:
At a time when there is a rising discourse of the consumer society and deepening awareness of
consumerist values and their implications for sustainable living, there exists in academia a counter-trend
that renders critiques of consumption difficult. As the consumer and democratic subject converge within
neo-liberal discourse, there is an identifiable tendency to avoid a critique of consumption for fear of being
accused of a moralistic and arrogant condemnation of the micro-practices of other people. Most notably,
the Adornian culture industry is habitually dismissed as elitist, over-pessimistic and failing to account for
the actual richness of people’s living experience and engagement with a rich consumer culture (for
example see Miklitsch’s Roll Over Adorno). As noted within empirical fields such as anthropology (see
Miller, 2010) and consumer culture theory (2005), studies of people’s actual engagement and interdependencies with material objects seem more likely to conclude that consumers are more active,
agentic and less alienated than previously imagined as they reflexively engage with and often de-code and
subvert marketing messages (Cova, Kozinets & Shankar, 2007). Meanwhile such popular press analyses as
Heath & Potter’s Rebel Sell (2005) or Brooks’ Bobos in Paradise (2001) also serve to undermine critiques
by revealing how they become re-routed according to a logic of production. Hence a lacuna emerges
between contemporary empirical analysis of consumer culture and the legacy of political philosophy
traditions from the 19th and 20th century.
This papers considers the challenge of maintaining a Marxian critique of consumer culture in the light of
such empirical studies and reflects upon how a sustained and defendable analysis can prevail.
Arnould, Eric & Thompson, Craig. 2005. Consumer Culture Theory: Twenty Years of Research. Journal of
Consumer Research. Vol 31(March), 868–882.
Cova, Bernard, Kozinets, Robert & Shankar, Avi. 2007. Consumer Tribes. London: Butterworth-Heinemann.
Miller, Daniel. 2009. Stuff. London: Polity Press.
Denisa Kasl Kollmannová
Critique of Marketing: Creating the ethics and educating the marketing literacy
Institution: Department of Marketing Communication and Public Relations, Charles University Prague,
Czech Republic
E-mail: [email protected]
Denisa Kasl Kollmannová involved in PR practice and media in Czech Republic (Euro, Týden, Hospodářské noviny etc.)
and she worked as a PR Manager of Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs or Vice-dean for PR at the Faculty of Social
Sciences at Charles University in Prague. She graduated Charles University in Prague (Media Communication, 2004)
and Tokyo University of Foreign Studies (Intercultural Communication, 2006). She is currently finishing her Ph.D. in
Media representation and PR presentation of Private life of Czech Politicians.
Abstract:
Marketing communication, marketing management, PR and advertising became the keywords in business
and society in the Czech Republic in the past decade. Those fields have skyrocketed as most-wanted jobs
and carriers. Many universities and colleges are offering the study programs of marketing and related
topics and professionals are wanted on many job positions. However, there´s a lack of discussion about
the ethics of marketing, critique of marketing and about the enormous social and personal responsibility
which is carried along the decision-making process of marketing professionals. The study of ethics and
critique of marketing is not sufficient in many ways: not only for the consumers who lack basic knowledge
about possible risks and consequences of rising consumption and hedonism, but also for marketing
students and professionals who are already involved in the process. One of the few examples of education
in this field is a semestral Course of Critique of Marketing Communication and PR lectured at the
Department of MC and PR at the Charles University in Prague. The aim of this article is to present the
importance of critique of marketing communication and it´s education for the development of society,
define the field of critique and show main points of consumer culture criticism in the past decade in
Czech Republic (such as adbusting and culture jamming activities of Podebal, Český sen, Guma Guar etc.).
10.15 – 11.15 | Critique of Consumer Society II, part 1
Samuel Lincoln Bezerra Lins
Life Satisfaction: Impulsive buying behavior and gender
Institution: University of Porto, Portugal
E-mail: [email protected]
Samuel is a Ph.D. student in Psychology at University of Porto (from September 2010). Samuel Bezerra Lins has a
Master´s in Social Psychology from Federal University of Paraíba, Brazil. From September 2003, he is a member of the
Research Group on Political Behavior linked to National Counsel of Technological and Scientific Develoment from
Brazil.
Abstract:
The purpose of this research is to verify the relation between impulse buying and life satisfaction. Impulse
buying behavior is linked with making unplanned purchase on the presence of sudden emotional
stimulus, mixed with of exciting and pleasure feelings, and a huge desire to buy. A questionnaire
containing all the measures used in present study was managed via web to 214 Brazilian students from
the Federal University of Paraiba (103 male; 111 female), with mean age of 22 years (SD=22; min=16 and
max=36). As evaluation instruments, two scales were used: I) Consumer Buying Impulsivity Scale (CBIS).
The CBIS contains five factors: 1) Irresistible urge to buy; 2) Positive buying emotion; 3) Mood
management; 4) Cognitive Deliberation; 5) Disregard for the Future. II) 5-item Satisfaction with the life
Scale (SWLS). A multiple linear regression (stepwise method) was performed to examine how the 5factors CBIS associate with life satisfaction. The results indicate [R=0,210; F(1,212)=9,595; p<0,002] that
only Cognitive Deliberation Factor is positively associated with life satisfaction (â=0,210; t=3,098;
p<0,002). Later on a test-t was performed to compare means by gender in CBIS and SWLS. Results show
that women are more satisfied with life (t=2,191; df=207; p<0,03) and more impulsivity to buy (t=4,010,
df=212, p<0,000). In the light of these results, and knowing that men and women show their process
information differently, and have differently influences on purchase decision, was hypothesized that
gender predicts this relation better (impulse buying and life satisfaction), this hypothesis was tested with
two regression analyses comparing gender. It was founded a similar results for men [R=0,232;
F(1,101)=5,725; p<0,019)], only ‘Cognitive Deliberation” factor presents with stronger prediction power
(â=0,232; t=2,393; p<0,019). For women, none factor emerged. This study shows that male participants
used more cognition to buy, and this lifestyle consumer behavior has relation with life satisfaction.
Petr Jehlička  Joe Smith
Shelf Life: Postsocialism, food self-provisioning and the politics of sustainable
consumption in Czechia
Petr Jehlička
Institution: Department of Geography, The Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
E-mail: [email protected]
Petr Jehlička is a lecturer in Environmental Geography at the Open University. His research focuses on environmental
governance and environmental politics in Central and Eastern Europe. The governance strand of his work explored the
”Europeanization” of environmental governance in new EU member states and the implications of eastern
enlargement of the EU for future directions of European environmental policy. Most recently, these interests have
evolved into exploration of the ambiguous and hybrid nature of post-socialist environmentalism that requires
culturally specific analyses of socialist and pre-socialist historical developments. The current project in this area is the
politics of sustainable consumption which he is working on jointly with Joe Smith.
Joe Smith
Institution: Department of Geography, The Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
E-mail: [email protected]
Joe Smith is is a social scientist specialising in environmental policy and politics and has written books on climate
change, quality of life, the green movement and the media and global environmental issues. He is Co-Director of the
Cambridge Media and Environment Programme which, since 1996, has run seminars on environmental change and
development issues for senior media decision makers, mainly from BBC News and Vision. Joe Smith is initiator of
Interdependence Day and he is also leading an ambitious ten-year project Creative Climate, which will capture the
human stories of ingenuity and imagination in response to environmental change 2010-2020.
Abstract:
The last three decades have been marked by the growing salience of food as a political and scholarly
concern. While market-based alternative food systems have been heralded for their potential to promote
environmental sustainability, the benefits of non-market practices such as household food selfprovisioning and barter have been assumed rather than being the focus of research. In the western
context, both types of food consumption have positive connotations. Although food self-provisioning in
European post-socialist societies is a more wide-spread practice than in western societies, it has been on
the periphery of research. The existing literature has conceptualised them as ‘coping strategies’ or as a
legacy of irregular supply of goods in the state socialist era. Drawing on empirical research in the Czech
Republic, we are proposing a novel approach to the phenomenon of household food production in postsocialist societies as a practice compliant with principles of sustainability. First, we highlight the large
extent and social inclusivity of food self-provisioning in the Czech society to demonstrate how postsocialist societies are a repository of a rich set of sustainability-compliant consumption practices in
relation to food systems. Second, we show that international and domestic policy actors in these societies
have ignored these alternative, socially inclusive and environmentally effective practices in favour of far
less effective market-based sustainability oriented food systems. The paper promotes a more integrated
view of non-market and market approaches in the pursuit of more sustainable food systems.
11:30 – 12:30 | Critique of Consumer Society I, part 2
Güncel Önkal
Consuming Practices against Humanity: A Thoreauvian approach
Institution: Department of Philosophy, Faculty of Literature, Atatürk University, Erzurum,Turkey
E-mail: [email protected]
Güncel Önkal is currently working as a research assistant at the Department of Philosophy, Atatürk University,
Erzurum, Turkey. His MA thesis is on Thoreau’s philosophy of natural life and civil disobedience. He is one of the
members of Thoreau society in Turkey. His PhD dissertation is on William Paley’s Natural Theology. His main interests
in philosophy are environmental ethics, Christian natural theology, intercultural theology and philosophy, and social
epistemology.
Abstract:
Henry David Thoreau’s (1817-1862) life theme was to survive in a great harmony with nature. In this sense
he is one of the leading figures of environmental ethics regarding the concept of “conservation”.
Thoreau’s individualism based on deep ecology corresponds to the realities of his age in when America’s
industrialization process tragically began and dominated citizens’ civil life. The first samples of
consuming society created the concept of citizen in accordance with the principles of economy.
Thoreau’s main warning for us is not to become tools of our tools. The civilized lifestyle is an illusion since
it detaches us from our real nature. In the Thoreauvian criticism nature is not wilderness rather we are a
part of it. Therefore, Thoreauvian approach reminds us that there is a difference between consuming
within nature and against nature. The unlimited false needs of mankind should require a responsibility
against limited natural resources.
In this paper, my aim is to discuss the instrumental value of consuming against the intrinsic value of
nature’s limited sources in a Thoreauvian approach. Additionally, I will reconsider the roots of consuming
culture between the value of consuming in philosophy and in environmental ethics. Thoreau’s moral
vision teaches us that the Self is the carrier of awareness and Self is derived from the preservation of
individualistic autonomy and holistic conceptualization of nature. However, today our Selves are under
attack of technological domination and false needs of daily life. If the ethical crises of industrialization are
evident in terms of consuming, then philosophy should play a critical role in the values of consuming
practices. My analysis will underline the conceptualization of modern consuming culture which is in need
of a new interpretation of social versus individual, artificial versus natural, civilized versus authentic,
modifying versus accepting, over-consuming versus basic needs.
Christiane Turza
Stop Setting Me in Conflict! Advertising arouses desires we do not want
Institution: Münster University, Germany
E-mail: [email protected]
Christiane Turza has M.A. in philosophy. Her main fields of interest are philosophy of mind, philosophy of
neuroscience, metaphilosophy. In 2009 she attended traineeship in advertising and public relations at Wegener &
Rieke, GmbH, Münster. Since 2010 she is working on his doctoral dissertation theme Probleme der Werbeethik zur
moralishen Bewertung von Techniken und Effekten der Werbung.
Abstract:
Advertising sometimes creates and fosters desires (and lifestyles) that are unwanted. This is, as I will
argue, morally objectionable. In order to clarify the concept of an unwanted desire, I will discuss David
George’s theory of ‘preference pollution’. George says, with reference to Harry Frankfurt, that advertising
creates first-order desires that come into conflict with our second order desires. Advertising ‘pollutes our
preferences’, especially by taking advantage of natural impulses and human weaknesses. It is not part of
our folk morality that the resulting disadvantages (emotional conflicts, acts that we regret) can be
resented and have to be compensated. I will pursue this line of argument by developing the claim – put
forward by Mary Midgley (Midgley, 1995, s. 188) – that advertising is morally wrong because it sets us in
conflict with ourselves. Advertising does this in more than one way and I will try to explain and clarify
them. I will show that we have a right not to be deceived and harassed. For many people it is very difficult
to resist natural inclinations and desires that they consider bad for them or don’t want to deal with. Our
capacity for self-regulation has its limits. Advertisers and companies should respect these limits as Alan
Goldman has pointed out: “They should avoid creating irrational desires and fostering lifestyles to which
they and their consumers would not aspire in their more rational moments." (Goldman, 1983, s. 260)
11.30 – 12.30 | Critique of Consumer Society II, part 2
Dorthe Brogård Kristensen
Consumer Culture and Illness: Culture-bound syndromes revisited
Institution: Department of Marketing & Management, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
E-mail: [email protected]
Dorthe Brogård Kristensen is an assistant professor in consumption studies at the University of Southern Denmark in
Odense. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Copenhagen (2008) and a M.Sc. in medical anthropology from
University College London (1998). Her current research interests include food and health, medical pluralism,
transcultural psychiatry, globalization and indigenous peoples.
Abstract:
The purpose of the paper is twofold: firstly to present and reflect critically on the existing research on the
so-called “culture-bound syndromes” (Crandon 1983; Kleinman 1998; Simon & Hughes 198; Rubel 1964,
1964) in relation to consumer culture (Slater 1997). Secondly the paper will present some examples of
culture-bound syndromes, both from the classical literature as well from a current research on health
food among Danish consumers. In theory, culture-bound syndromes are those folk illnesses in which
alterations of behavior and experience figure prominently. By taking departure in a research on food
among Danish consumer, this paper argues, that the concept of culture-bound syndromes is of high
relevance to consumer culture theory. In the Danish context we see how anxiety in relation to food choice
is a salient feature among many consumer; e.g. preoccupation of getting health food (ortorexia) as well as
problematic relation to some food categories and products, in lay man terminology referred to as “sugar
addiction” and different kinds of allergies. The papers argues that this phenomena is very relevant to
consumer culture, as it serves to highlight why certain cultural frameworks seem to produce different
types of challenges and pathologies among consumers.
Simon Manyiwa
Impact of Persuasive Selling of Credit on Compulsive Consumers in Consumer
Culture
Institution: Marketing Department, Middlesex University Business School, London, UK
E-mail: [email protected]
Simon Manyiwa is Senior Lecturer in Marketing at Middlesex University. Simon´s research interests are in consumer
choice behaviour, consumer culture, consumer values, and social marketing. His work has been presented at CMC
conferences and published in the Journal of Consumer Behaviour. He also was a Lecturer at National University of
Science and Technology in Zimbabwe, at Granfield University and worked for the Ministry of Agriculture in Zimbabwe.
Abstract:
There has been a dramatic increase in personal debt in developed countries. The increased personal debt
is related to the rising use of credit cards, consumer cultures and materialist values in developed
countries. Credit cards are popular for their benefits of convenience and facilitation of immediate
gratification. However, the increasing reliance on credit cards has led to debt-related problems, such as
financial problems, depression, and social problems. Studies have shown that consumers with low self
esteem and high levels of compulsiveness are more likely to fall into unmanageable personal debt than
“normal” consumers. Credit companies are increasingly adopting aggressive methods of selling of credit
cards. Credit companies are increasingly using persuasive advertising and promotion of credit cards, such
as the intrusive Internet pop ups, unsolicited machine-operated evening telephone calls to home
numbers, unsolicited emails, and television adverts. To the best of our knowledge, no studies have been
carried out to determine the impact of these techniques of aggressive selling credit cards. The purpose of
this study was to determine the impact of aggressive selling of credit to consumers within the Western
consumer culture. In total, 304 usable questionnaires were collected: 150 through face to face interviews
in work places (university campuses) and mall intercepts, and 154 from online surveys. The results
indicated a high incidence of compulsiveness in the population. 22% of the surveyed population exhibited
symptoms of compulsiveness. The results also showed that compulsive consumers are more vulnerable to
persuasive messages for unsecured debt than non-compulsive consumers. On the basis of these results, it
is recommended that programmes designed to protect vulnerable consumers be implemented whilst
allowing genuine business of marketing credit in consumer cultures.
14.00 – 16.00 | Workshop
Moritz Gekeler
Design Thinking: A method to innovate systematically
Institution: HPI School of Design Thinking, Postdam, Germany
E-mail: [email protected]
For the past four years Moritz Gekeler has been working as a futurist for a big German car maker Daimler AG in Berlin.
He was in charge of a great variety of topics ranging from future material resource supply to innovation and design
research. Together with his colleagues he led several scenario and innovation workshops. He studied Design Thinking
at the HPI d-school in Potsdam and holds a degree in comparative literature, Italian and theatre studies. Presently he
is a lecturer at the HPI School of Design Thinking in Postdam and has co-founded the innovation and marketing
company Dark Horse Innovation in Berlin. In his Ph.D. thesis (State University of Design, Media and Arts Karlsruhe) he
focuses on the concept of sustainability in product communication.
Abstract:
The consumer culture of the late 20th century has been shaped by products and services that were
invented with a technological or business perspective in mind. After the development phase companies
paid lots of money to market researchers and advertisers in order to get people to buy these products. In
the 21st century, though, a paradigm shift is taking place: Nowadays companies have to learn to think
first about the people they want to please with their products and then develop solutions for them. Design
Thinking is a method that helps companies and other organisations create very innovative solutions that
fit to the needs and wants of their prospective customers. This method helps to keep the people in mind,
while developing products and services. The most innovative companies like Google use this method very
successfully and also in the social field it is being applied (e.g. by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation).
During the workshop you will get a first understanding of the design thinking process and how it can help
you to innovate in your field of operation.