American Fetish: Consumer Culture Encounters the Other
WOMGEN 1424
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Course Information
Description
Our consumer culture bombards us with images, logos, and representations of human difference; and this bombardment can shape and even manufacture consumer desires and attitudes. Have you ever wondered, for example, why computers and phones bearing an Apple logo seem to be “worth” more than other, similar products? Or why we’re willing to pay more for certain commodities – like blue jeans – that bear a recognizable label? What does it mean when sexuality, gender, race, ethnicity, and other constructs of human identity are used to market certain commodities?
As members of a “free market” economy, we often think of ourselves as autonomous agents in a marketplace of endless consumer choices. We might think the consumer choices we make are straightforward reflections of our rational considerations of cost for use value. Yet the billions spent each year on market research reveal that consumers often behave irrationally when faced with a choice of similar products that carry different logos. This course offers conceptual tools and historical context to help us respond in a perceptive and (self) critical manner to effects of the consumer culture(s) we all inhabit. The concept of the “fetish” has a rich past that we will spend time excavating in the interest of grasping its influence as a driver of consumer desire.
School
Faculty of Arts & Sciences
Credits
4
Cross Reg
Available for Harvard Cross Registration
Department
Women, Gender & Sexuality
Course Component
Seminar
Subject
Women, Gender & Sexuality
Grading Basis
FAS Letter Graded
General Education
N/A
Quantitative Reasoning with Data
N/A
Divisional Distribution
Social Sciences
Course Level
For Undergraduate and Graduate Students
