ASOA05063U Z - Is not offered Spring 2016 - (Consumer Society: Theories of Consumption and anti-consumption lifestyle)

Volume 2015/2016
Education

BA/MA Elective course

Sociology students must be enrolled under MSc Curriculum 2005 or BSc Curriculum to take this course.

Specialiseringslinje (KA 2005): Kultursociologi

Content

The course will present a number of newer theories of the consumer society. Contemporary consumer society is very different than the consumer society that have seen grown forward in the post-world war period. Theories of the consumer society has earlier underlined how consumption became relevant as part of the construction of social identities in times where free-time and the (re)creative practices became more important. Such development has already been indicated by Max Weber and later strongly developed by Bourdieu with his focus on cultural capital. In the contemporary society consumption as phenomenon has however changed. The theories identify how we no longer only can identify  “consumption as choice” but face a situation where consumption can be seen as a pre-given situation that the individual must be able to navigate within. In using Zizeks words you, so to speak, need to enjoy! This means that sociology needs to reconstitute how concepts of consumption are central in the analysis of society. The course takes onset in Featherstone’s perspective of the aesthetic of consumption and its formation in lifestyles. Featherstone identifies consumer lifestyles in relation to post-modernity where the consumer good is partly transformed into a unstable signifier. Such more radical analysis of consumption has its limitations. We will however use this theoretical platform to investigate contemporary approaches of anti-consumption. Anti-consumption can take very different forms. We will focus on reading the latest international literature on ant consumption.

Learning Outcome

As central learning outcome the students must gain knowledge of newer sociological theories of consumption. Further, they must be able to use the theories in an analysis of an concrete subject. The term paper must reflect these skills by discussion of a case. It is however not expected that the students collect empirical material and/or make analysis of such.  

Mike Featherstone (2007) Consumer Culture and Postmodernism. (2th edition) plus academic journal articles. No reader will be made.     

The course will be a combination of lectures, discussion and workshops. In the workshops we will focus on the concrete cases that the students have chosen for their term papers. This means that the students very early (!) have to find an case for their papers. Within the class the students will be asked to find and present relevant academic journal articles. Halfway through the course students will be asked to hand in an synopsis.
5 ECTS:
Lectures: 14
Course preparation: 53,5
Exercises: 10
Project work: 30
Exam Preparation: 30
Total: 137,5
  • Category
  • Hours
  • Exam Preparation
  • 30
  • Exercises
  • 10
  • Lectures
  • 14
  • Preparation
  • 53,5
  • Project work
  • 30
  • Total
  • 137,5
Credit
5 ECTS
Type of assessment
Written assignment
Individual/group. See further details in the curriculum
Exam registration requirements

Please see the learning outcome.

Marking scale
7-point grading scale
Censorship form
No external censorship
Re-exam

Submission dates and time will be available at KUnet, www.kunet.dk. Exchange students and danish full degree guest students please see the homepage of Sociology; http://www.soc.ku.dk/english/education/exams/ and http://www.soc.ku.dk/uddannelser/meritstuderende/eksamen/

Criteria for exam assesment

Sociology students must be enrolled under MSc Curriculum 2005 or BSc Curriculum to take this exam.