Consumption caught in the cash nexus.

During the last thirty years, ‘consumption’ has become a major topic in the study of contemporary culture within anthropology, psychology and sociology. For many authors it has become central to understanding the nature of material culture in the modern world but this paper argues that the concept is, in British writing at least, too concerned with its economic origins in the selling and buying of consumer goods or commodities. It is argued that to understand material culture as determined through the monetary exchange for things - the cash nexus - leads to an inadequate sociological understanding of the social relations with objects. The work of Jean Baudrillard is used both to critique the concept of consumption as it leads to a focus on advertising, choice, money and shopping and to point to a more sociologically adequate approach to material culture that explores objects in a system of models and series, ‘atmosphere’, functionality, biography, interaction and mediation

Dark London: Dimensions and characteristics of dark tourism supply in the UK capital

This paper will investigate the characteristics of the supply of dark tourism in London, UK through an examination of the identified main dark sites in London, UK. Our methodology is based on web analysis of the presence of marketed and non-marketed dark tourist sites in London, their web visitation, the level of their commercialisation and the characteristics which place them in the various scales as categorised in current literature, notably Stone (2006). We identified that London offers a much more entertainment focussed tourism experience rather than accurate historical and authentic sites which utilised major aspects of dark tourism for purposes such as commemoration or remembrance. The authors found this surprising given London’s long and often dark history

A monument to the player: Preserving a landscape of socio-cultural capital in the transitional MMORPG

This is the pre-print version of the Article. The official published version can be accessed from the links below - Copyright @ 2012 Taylor & Francis LtdMassively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) produce dynamic socio-ludic worlds that nurture both culture and gameplay to shape experiences. Despite the persistent nature of these games, however, the virtual spaces that anchor these worlds may not always be able to exist in perpetuity. Encouraging a community to migrate from one space to another is a challenge now facing some game developers. This paper examines the case of Guild Wars® and its “Hall of Monuments”, a feature that bridges the accomplishments of players from the current game to the forthcoming sequel. Two factor analyses describe the perspectives of 105 and 187 self-selected participants. The results reveal four factors affecting attitudes towards the feature, but they do not strongly correlate with existing motivational frameworks, and significant differences were found between different cultures within the game. This informs a discussion about the implications and facilitation of such transitions, investigating themes of capital, value perception and assumptive worlds. It is concluded that the way subcultures produce meaning needs to be considered when attempting to preserve the socio-cultural landscape

Digital play and the actualisation of the consumer imagination

In this article, the authors consider emerging consumer practices in digital virtual spaces. Building on constructions of consumer behavior as both a sense-making activity and a resource for the construction of daydreams, as well as anthropological readings of performance, the authors speculate that many performances during digital play are products of consumer fantasy. The authors develop an interpretation of the relationship between the real and the virtual that is better equipped to understand the movement between consumer daydreams and those practices actualized in the material and now also in digital virtual reality. The authors argue that digital virtual performances present opportunities for liminoid transformations through inversions, speculations, and playfulness acted out in aesthetic dramas. To illustrate, the authors consider specific examples of the theatrical productions available to consumers in digital spaces, highlighting the consumer imagination that feeds them, the performances they produce, and the potential for transformation in consumer-players

Anti-Nirvana: crime, culture and instrumentalism in the age of insecurity

‘Anti-Nirvana’ explores the relationship between consumer culture, media and criminal motivations. It has appeared consistently on the list of the top-ten most-read articles in this award-winning international journal, and it mounts a serious neo-Freudian challenge to the predominant naturalistic notion of ‘resistance’ at the heart of liberal criminology and media studies. It is also cited in the Oxford Handbook of Criminology and other criminology texts as a persuasive argument in support of the theory that criminality amongst young people is strongly linked to the acquisitive values of consumerism and the images of possessive individualism that dominate mass media

The employee as 'Dish of the Day’:human resource management and the ethics of consumption

This article examines the ethical implications of the growing integration of consumption into the heart of the employment relationship. Human resource management (HRM) practices increasingly draw upon the values and practices of consumption, constructing employees as the ‘consumers’ of ‘cafeteria-style’ benefits and development opportunities. However, at the same time employees are expected to market themselves as items to be consumed on a corporate menu. In relation to this simultaneous position of consumer/consumed, the employee is expected to actively engage in the commodification of themselves, performing an appropriate organizational identity as a necessary part of being a successful employee. This article argues that the relationship between HRM and the simultaneously consuming/consumed employee affects the conditions of possibility for ethical relations within organizational life. It is argued that the underlying ‘ethos’ for the integration of consumption values into HRM practices encourages a self-reflecting, self-absorbed subject, drawing upon a narrow view of individualised autonomy and choice. Referring to Levinas’ perspective that the primary ethical relation is that of responsibility and openness to the Other, it is concluded that these HRM practices affect the possibility for ethical being

Dreaming of drams: Authenticity in Scottish whisky tourism as an expression of unresolved Habermasian rationalities

In this paper, the production of whisky tourism at both independently owned and corporately owned distilleries in Scotland is explored by focusing on four examples (Arran, Glengoyne, Glenturret and Bruichladdich). In particular, claims of authenticity and Scottishness of Scottish whiskies through commercial materials, case studies, website-forum discussions and 'independent' writing about such whisky are analysed. It is argued that the globalisation and commodification of whisky and whisky tourism, and the communicative backlash to these trends typified by the search for authenticity, is representative of a Habermasian struggle between two irreconcilable rationalities. This paper will demonstrate that the meaning and purpose of leisure can be understood through such explorations of the tension between the instrumentality of commodification and the freedom of individuals to locate their own leisure lives in the lifeworld that remains. © 2011 Taylor & Francis

Breaking Open the Black Boxes: media archaeology, anarchaeology and media materiality

An essay on the emergent methodology of media archaeology, in relation to the material turn in approaches to digital media. In particular, this article advocates taking up Siegfried Zielinski's concept of 'anarchaeology', but in a different sense to the way it was originally proposed, in order to emphasise the political potentials of a media (an)archaeological methodological approach