Conspicuous Consumption: an Analysis of Class, Family, and Spending Habits
Conspicuous Consumption: An Analysis of Class, Family, and Spending Habits
The topic I will explore in this paper is conspicuous consumption, and its relationship to our present day class system. Merriam-Webster defines conspicuous consumption as follows: "lavish or wasteful spending thought to enhance social prestige". After reading the definition, there were a number of factors that made me immediately drawn to this topic. Naturally, many of the issues pertaining to the family deals primarily on person to person relationships (e.g. "diversity in couples, divorce, the consequences of gender roles", etc.), yet this issue seemed to provide a different angle on the problems evident in modern day families (as well as their dynamics). I have always believed consumerism, i.e. the things we buy and why we buy them, to be a very important and relatively overlooked subject in relation to inter-family relationships.
Being as we have all been found guilty of buying things we don't need, or trying to represent ourselves with our purchases, there are an endless amount of social factors associated with this topic. It is the patterns of some of these social factors that I am going to explore in this paper. My main focus, however, will be that of class; the effect ones class has on an individual’s conspicuous spending, as well as an individuals’ perceived method of social stratification in response to other individuals’ class and spending habits. I will also scrutinize said classes’ opinion of the state of the modern day family, and how it relates to trends in spending.
I.)Background My main reference point while gathering background information was, naturally, Thorstein Veblen’s book "The Theory of the Leisure Class". Written in 1899, “Theory” is a socio-economic work that discusses a so-called “Leisure class”, and its relation to the working class and social stratification. According to this sociological theory, Veblen believes there is a separate working and leisure
The topic I will explore in this paper is conspicuous consumption, and its relationship to our present day class system. Merriam-Webster defines conspicuous consumption as follows: "lavish or wasteful spending thought to enhance social prestige". After reading the definition, there were a number of factors that made me immediately drawn to this topic. Naturally, many of the issues pertaining to the family deals primarily on person to person relationships (e.g. "diversity in couples, divorce, the consequences of gender roles", etc.), yet this issue seemed to provide a different angle on the problems evident in modern day families (as well as their dynamics). I have always believed consumerism, i.e. the things we buy and why we buy them, to be a very important and relatively overlooked subject in relation to inter-family relationships.
Being as we have all been found guilty of buying things we don't need, or trying to represent ourselves with our purchases, there are an endless amount of social factors associated with this topic. It is the patterns of some of these social factors that I am going to explore in this paper. My main focus, however, will be that of class; the effect ones class has on an individual’s conspicuous spending, as well as an individuals’ perceived method of social stratification in response to other individuals’ class and spending habits. I will also scrutinize said classes’ opinion of the state of the modern day family, and how it relates to trends in spending.
I.)Background My main reference point while gathering background information was, naturally, Thorstein Veblen’s book "The Theory of the Leisure Class". Written in 1899, “Theory” is a socio-economic work that discusses a so-called “Leisure class”, and its relation to the working class and social stratification. According to this sociological theory, Veblen believes there is a separate working and leisure
Cited: 1Veblen, Thorstein. 1899. The Theory of the Leisure class. NY: Macmillan Company 2Goffman, Erving. 1959. Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. Carden City, NY: Double Day Anchor Books 3Wallace, Ruth and Wolf, Alison. 2006. Contemporary Sociological Theory: Expanding the Classical Tradition. 6thEd. NJ: Prentice Hall. 4 Frank, Robert H.1999.Luxury Fever: Why Money Fails to Satisfy in an Era of Excess. The Free Press