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Consumerism Study

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Your assignment: Pick something that has recently been commercialized (turned into something we can buy & sell), and write a 1000-1500 word essay explaining how the consumerization of that thing has changed how we think about it.

Vote on the best academic essay title in the class

• Last year, in the middle of an economic crisis, Americans spent an average of $431 for Christmas presents. Has the meaning of Christmas (or Valentine’s Day, or Halloween) changed because of buying and selling?
• Magazines like US Weekly and In Touch provide us endless details of celebrities' lives. Have magazines turned real people into things we consume like popcorn or movies?
• Facebook ads share what your friends have bought on eBay, Amazon, and other sites. Have our lives become billboards?

The above all have something to do with commodification (turning a person or idea or event into an object we can buy or sell). When something is commodified, its meaning and significance change. Holidays, celebrities, friends—they all play a different role in our lives. Your job in this essay is not to argue this is bad or good, but to explore how consumerization changes how we think about our world.

Step 1: Pick one of the below topics, read the assigned article, and start doing research on the topic.
The Consumerization of…
• College. “Can this Campus Be Bought?” (81)
• Babies. “The Market for a Yale Woman’s Eggs (190)
• Homosexuality. “The End of Gay Culture” (381)
• The Female Body. “Scenes from the Exhibitionist” (233)
• Torture & Terrorism. “Whatever it Takes” (252)
• Cars. “Reptile Dreams” (471)
• Country Music. “An Ode to Country Music from a Black Dixie Chick” (421)

Step 2: Write an essay analyzing:
1) How it has been packaged, presented, and who it is marketed to (you might, for instance, analyze a cooking show and explore how the act of cooking in a show like “Hell's Kitchen” is marketed to make cooking appealing).

2) Why consumerism more generally appeals to us as a society, using scholarly research (try searching databases for “consumerism,” “commodification,” “reification”). You might compare American lifestyle to that of other countries. You might speculate whether capitalism requires a comsumerist mindset, or whether there are alternatives.

3) How the commodification of this thing has changed Americans' view of it, and what this might mean for the future of this thing.