Shopping for identity

Articulations of Gender, Race and Class by Critical Consumers

Bibliographic Data

ID2980598
AuthorsKaela Jubas (0000-0002-2852-8267, University of Calgary, corresponding author)
Year2011
Volume17
Issue3
Pages321-335
Publication date2011-05-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueSocial Identities (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1350-4630 • E-ISSN: 1363-0296
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/13504630.2011.570972
OpenAlexW2004003124
LanguageEN
Citations received2
References cited23

This article discusses a study which explored shopping as a process of incidental adult learning about consumption, globalization and citizenship among self-identified critical shoppers in Vancouver, Canada. The author focuses on participants' comments about social identity, especially in terms of gender, race and class. Reflecting current concerns, many participants noted that the environment and (un)fair trade influenced their shopping practices, and helped them understand themselves in the context of a ‘multicultural’ society and a ‘globalized’ world. This article borrows from the jargon of municipal recycling programs, part of a critical consumption discourse, in outlining how participants' comments seem to ‘reduce,’ ‘reuse,’ and/or ‘recycle’ hegemonic notions of gender, race and class. Working from a neo-Gramscian perspective, the author uses this metaphor to explore both the tendency to reiterate an understanding of gender, race and class as essentialized characteristics and attempt to resist that simplistic understanding

Aesthetics · Citizenship · Epistemology · Globalization · Hegemony · Linguistics · Metaphor · Multiculturalism · Netnography · Pedagogy · Political science · Politics · Social media · Social science · Sociology · Cultural Industries and Urban Development · Fashion and Cultural Textiles · Gender Studies · Law · Migration, Ethnicity, and Economy

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