Introduction to Sociology of Consumption

After clarifying the concept of "consumer society" and related concepts, such as "consumer culture" and "consumerism," we explain the origins, historical examples, and basic structure of consumer society in detail. Moreover, we discuss the various problems and phenomena that consumer society brings to human society and culture.

Lifestyle, social consciousness, capitalism, economy and society

As shown below, each class includes a PowerPoint lecture on a given theme.

To deepen students’ understanding of the course contents and help cultivate awareness of issues related to course themes, students are asked to write a response paper (not a learning summary, but a case study) for each class.

In the 15th class, students will work on a final essay to show their understanding of the course contents and discuss a case study on the themes covered in class.

Class 1: Basic concepts
Class 2: Historical cases
Class 3: Contemporary cases
Class 4: Desire and function
Class 5: Consumption promotion
Class 6: Innovation
Class 7: Problems in consumer society
Class 8: Human beings in consumer society
Class 9: Modern consumer culture: McDonaldification
Class 10: Postmodern consumer culture: Disneyification
Class 11: Post-postmodern consumer culture: Cultural and social consumption
Class 12: Risk socialization and consumer culture
Class 13: Informatization (ICT/digitalization) and consumer culture: Amazonification
Class 14: Consumer society and sustainability, final essay (submitted via eALPS)
Class 15: Future prospects, course survey

Syllabus (Japanese site only)