Open University (Salford University) Dayschool presentation on Consumption by Dr Craig Hammond - DD102 Manchester Cluster (Saturday 7th March 2015)

1. DD102 – Dayschool 1
(2015)
“Consumed”
Dr Craig Hammond

2. The Consumer Society

4. Social Class

5. The 1979 Thatcher
Conservative Government
“We want self-
interested,
wealth-driven
individuals …
entrepreneurs”

6. The absence/removal of “society”
… cohesive communities, solid bonds along lines of work,
leisure, social class, community
A vortex of individualisation
Old, structural securities & identities
removed
What do we do with this freedom?

7. Consuming …
• Zygmunt Bauman points out that contemporary consumer
society is organised around certain freedoms:
• ‘Freedom’:
– ‘to choose how to satisfy individual desires’ (via the medium of
the consumer market)
• As a consequence, individual ‘freedom’ has become
privatised and commodified – a development which in turn
fuel’s increasing consumption
• Identity, meaning, belonging itself becomes based on the
processes and products of consumption

8. Thorstein Veblen: Conspicuous
Consumption

9. Seduced
Repressed
• Zygmunt
Bauman

11. What defines who ‘you’ are?
Are there any aspects of your life ‘free’
from consumption?