Conference Programme FULL (1)

Enhancing the consumer retail experience through augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR)
technologies.
Natasha Moorhouse
New technologies are rapidly changing the way we live our lives. The proliferation of the internet and mobile devices have
changed the way tourists and consumers search, select and purchase goods and services due to the ability to shop from
anywhere at any time. However, if high-street stores are to remain sustainable, it is crucial for retailers to entice tourists
and consumers back in-store through the creation of valuable experiences. Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality
(VR) are two emergent technologies that have the power to change the lives of tourists and consumers by providing
innovative, memorable and personalised experiences. However, further research is needed to provide empirical evidence
for retailers in support of technology adoption and strategic implementation. Interviews will be held with tourists and
consumers of a tourism retailer in Manchester. The findings will be analysed by template analysis, to identify emergent
constructs in the context of new technology (AR and VR) environment. The emergent constructs will be used to modify
The Retail Environment framework (McGoldrick, 2002). Then, the modification will be validated through a large-scale
survey. This will contribute to knowledge by creating a new typology, to understand how technology can be used to
enhance tourists and consumer retail experiences. This will benefit both tourism and retail sectors, allowing organisations
to differentiate from competitors, and demonstrating the benefits of investing in the development of an effective AR and
VR strategy to positively change the lives of tourists and consumers.
Changing Lives: Death and Affirmation in the Extreme Communities of Fight Club (1996)
Rachid M’Rabty
Bataille and Blanchot referred to death as not necessarily the end of life, but an annihilation of the philosophical
parameters or boundaries that limit ourselves in society. 1 Similarly, an awareness of and confrontation with death
(whether literal or abstract) is the constant which mediates Fight Club’s radical engagement with the contemporary
world. 2 A crucial text articulating the discontent that is felt at the turn of the century, Fight Club challenges the negative
effects of postmodern culture and foregrounds anxieties that resonate today.
This paper demonstrates how Fight Club paints a satirical spectacle wherein previously alienated and withdrawn
individuals may come together in the face of death and cultural trauma. Secondly, this paper demonstrates how an
engagement with metaphysical destruction and communal extremity are validated as life-affirming/changing possibilities,
and a critical tactic against contemporary neoliberal culture.
Extending pertinent criticisms of contemporary cultural cynicism and nihilism, 3 this paper shows how Fight Club cuts at
the problem of being alive in contemporary societies through disobedient and life-changing processes of negation and
direct challenge of the system itself. Throughout, I show how Fight Club’s communities — formed in response to sociocultural
anxieties — demonstrate a clear engagement with death and destruction as a channel to establish new bonds
with others and a sense of agency/freedom over lives that had little sense of authentic direction previously. Consequently,
this paper concludes that the novel someway validates self-destructive outsider communities: highlighting their possibility
as abstract models for a rebellious society fighting against the problematic hegemony of late-capitalism and cultural
postmodernism.