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place. 30 Don Slater defines consumer culture as a culture
of consumption:
“The notion of ‘consumer culture’ implies that, in the modern
world, core social practices and cultural values, ideas, aspirations
and identities are defined and oriented in relation to consumption
rather than to other social dimensions such as work or
citizenship, religious cosmology or military role.” 31
One such core social practice connected to consumption
today is the ritual. The ritual has the important social function
of making relations stable and visible. A function that has not
changed in consumer culture. Rituals not only stabilise our relation
to consumption they stabilise social relationships as well.
Cosmologies are the sum of those principles and terms that are
holy to society. 32 Lévi-Strauss analysed many such cosmologies
in tribal societies. When we look at his diagrams, we see, for
example, heaven, earth and water as the axes of the cosmos. 33
The social structure is organised by these powerful elements and
represents various rules of coexistence. Categories of life and
death have their contemporary equivalents in the diagrams of
consumer research – in terms of cheap and expensive. However,
the order of things continues to be meaningful, even though
the link to elementary experiences has been lost over time. A
diagram for analysing soap, for example, is divided into four
quadrants: price and design, ideology and premium quality,
split by a vertical axis showing symbolic and functional values,
and the horizontal axis represents materialistic and spiritual
qualities. 34 The soaps are now positioned according to price and
design. Above the horizontal line is the handmade soap, which
smells of apple and the soap used by film stars. Below the line,
we find the soap with real moisturising cream. In the lower
left quadrant, we find the soap, which is sold in a double pack
at a bargain price. Welcome to the commodity cosmos! The
consumer society has learned to live within these quadrants.
The choice of commodities defines our position in the universe
of target groups. We are free to choose what we want: the smell
of apples or none at all, a nice packaging or a cheap look: we
30 Geertz (1973:144).
31 Slater (2003:24).
32 Tambiah (1979:121).
33 For example, the diagram of the Winnebagos in Lévi-Strauss (1977:153).
34 Karmasin (1998:214).
Consumer Beliefs
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