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Taking Consumer Culture Seriously

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 September 2014

Vincent J. Miller
Vincent J. Miller*
Affiliation:
Georgetown University
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Abstract

Theological reflection on the problem of consumerism is often guided by the implicit assumption that beliefs and values are the principal causal factors within human action and culture. As a result, the most common tactic for countering consumerism is to contrast its premises and values with those of the gospel. Such an approach comes naturally to theology, a discipline in which the importance of belief is foundational. This approach is inadequate for addressing the problem of consumerism, however, because it overlooks its most fundamental challenge: the commodification of culture. The most pernicious effects of consumerism are manifest not by changes in the “content” of beliefs but in their underlying form. Religious and ethical beliefs are commodified—reduced to objects of exchange and consumption, to shallow, interchangeable commodities. Drawing from the extensive scholarship on the commodification of culture, this essay explores the effects of consumerism upon religious belief and practice. Guided by this analysis it will attempt to reconceive tactics for countering consumerism's negative effects.

Type
Articles
Information
Horizons , Volume 27 , Issue 2 , Fall 2000 , pp. 276 - 295
Copyright
Copyright © The College Theology Society 2000

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References

1 Paul, John II, “World Day of Peace Message,” January 1, 1999, 2.Google Scholar This is not to say that John Paul's writings lack a thicker conception of culture. Clearly deeper cultural concerns are manifest in his many writings, especially in his social encyclicals. Nevertheless, a tendency to think of culture primarily in terms of beliefs, premises and values—either consonant with or in contradiction to—the Christian gospel is present throughout his writings. Even John Kavanaugh's more extensive reflections on consumerism and the “Commodity Form” of life takes this approach. He contrasts a vast repertoire of consumer values with the Christian values of the “Personal Form” of life. See Following Christ in a Consumer Society: The Spirituality of Cultural Resistance, rev. ed. (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1991).Google Scholar Note that Kavanaugh's use of the term “form” differs from that developed in this essay.

2 Paul, John II, “World Day of Peace Address,” 2.Google Scholar

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4 For a more extended discussion of Foucault that includes citations of the critical literature on this topic see Miller, Vincent J., “History or Geography? Gadamer, Foucault and Theologies of Tradition” in Macy, Gary, ed., Theology and the New Histories (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1999), 56–85.Google Scholar

5 Foucault noted, “when I read … the thesis, ‘Knowledge is power,’ or ‘Power is knowledge,’ I begin to laugh, since studying their relation is precisely my problem. If they were identical, I would not have to study them and I would be spared a lot of fatigue as a result. The very fact that I pose the question of their relation proves clearly that I do not identify them.” “Critical Theory/Intellectual History” in Kritzman, Lawrence D., ed., Politics, Philosophy, Culture, (New York: Routledge, 1988), 43. Emphasis original.Google Scholar

6 The example of Morris is valuable because of its provocative ambiguity. His combination of prophetic denunciation of the destructiveness of industrial capitalism with romantic retrievals of medieval craft traditions and aesthetic sensuality render him perennially attractive to Catholics with counter-cultural convictions. Nevertheless, as the biographer Fiona MacCarthy notes, Morris the proprietor never managed to operate his own factories according to his ideals (e.g., his influential essay “A Factory as it Might Be” in MacCarthy, Fiona, ed., William Morris: A Life for Our Time [London: Faber and Faber, 1994], xviii).Google Scholar Such a criticism is easy enough to level against any visionary actively involved with the world, let alone a person of such prodigious activity as Morris. It retains force insofar as his establishment customers continued to find both his products and nostalgic romanticism desirable even if they despised his partisan politics.

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9 Kavanaugh's analysis is particularly forceful in the regard. See Following Christ in a Consumer Culture, 38-53 and passim.

10 This insight was utilized in Gaudium et Spes, 35 and reiterated by Paul VI in Populorum Progressio, 14. John Paul II has employed it repeatedly, e.g., Redemptor Hominis, 16; Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, 28; Centesimus Annus, 36.

11 Patten, Simon Nelson, The New Basis of Civilization (Cambridge, MA: John Harvard Library, 1968 [1907]), 54Google Scholar, as quoted in Lears, T. J. Jackson, No Place of Grace: Antimodernism and the Transformation of American Culture, 1880–1920 (New York: Pantheon, 1981), 215.Google Scholar

12 An essay from the late 1960s on Sunday rest offers an example of the reflex association of sacramentality and consumption. Seeking a positive portrayal of Sunday shopping, the author associated it with the Paschal mystery celebrated in the Sunday liturgy: “may not a leisurely shopping tour be … a way of celebrating [a] share in Christ's victory over the difficulties of human existence?” See Kiesling, Christopher O.P., “Sunday Rest: A New Approach,” The Homiletic and Pastoral Review 68 (November 1967). 113–21, at 121.Google Scholar I thank Sandra Yocum-Mize for the reference.

13 Lefebvre, Henri, Everyday Life in the Modern World (New York: Harper and Row, 1971)Google Scholar and Critique of Everyday Life (London: Verso, 1991).Google Scholar

14 The example also illuminates the gender differentials in the effects of commodification and the spectacle. The construction of women as an object of the male gaze is deeply ensconced in the western artistic tradition. See Berger, John, Ways of Seeing (London: Penguin, 1972), 63.Google Scholar In a seminal essay in film studies, Laura Mulvey explored the question of gender and spectacle using psychoanalytic theory. She equated the very perspective of cinema with the pleasures of the male gaze and Freudian “scopophilia.” See Mulvey, , “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema” in Mulvey, Laura, ed., Visual and Other Pleasures (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989), 14–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Gertrud Koch notes a striking correspondence between the rise in pornography in England and the ascendancy of Taylorism in industrial production. She attributes this to the transformations in consciousness and perception brought about by the modernization of work habits. See Koch, Gertrud, “The body's shadow realm” in Gibson, Pamela Church and Gibson, Roma, eds., Dirty Looks: Women, Pornography, Power (London: British Film Institute, 1993), 31.Google Scholar

15 Debord, Guy, Society of the Spectacle (Detroit: Black and Red, 1983), 42, 44.Google Scholar

16 See, for example, Baudrillard, Jean, Simulation and Simulacra (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1994).Google Scholar

17 Those who lament the eclipse of easily identifiable crass consumption by more subtle aesthetics need not fear. Maxim has spun-off a second magazine: Maxim Stuff. It builds upon the formula of its predecessor that found success by discarding the cultural pretensions of Esquire and GQ and providing just enough clothing for its models to avoid the stigma of other “men's magazines.” Embracing objectification with brio, Stuff complements the requisite photo spreads of rising supermodels with enthusiastic reviews of cars, electronic gadgetry, extreme sports and adventure travel. According to its promotional literature, Stuff is “For every guy who never gets enough … sex, gear, laughs, thrills, madness.”

18 The widespread horror at animal sacrifice expressed in the demonization of religions which practice such, is interesting to consider in light of this disconnect between consumption and destruction. It is a thoroughly odd phobia in a country that slaughters literally billions of animals a year. This dynamic is allied with the commodity abstraction so deeply ensconced in our relationship to food. The boneless, skinless chicken breast is paradigmatic. All evidence of the refractory alterity of the animal whose life has been taken to further our own is erased. What remains presents itself only as a glistening, coral-toned raw material, ready for our creative use. No evidence of the necessary destruction remains to confront us beyond an occasional stray tendon.

19 For an extended account of this form of consumption, see Leiss, William, The Limits to Satisfaction (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1976).Google Scholar

20 Adorno, Theodor and Horkheimer, Max, The Dialectic of Enlightenment (New York. Herder and Herder, 1972).Google Scholar

21 Jameson, Fredric, Postmodernism, or the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1990), 19;Google Scholar and Jameson, , “Postmodernism and Consumer Society” in Foster, Hal, ed., The Anti-Aesthetic: Essays on Postmodern Culture (Seattle: Bay Press, 1983), 117.Google Scholar

22 Clearly other factors fuel nostalgia, for example, the longing for the sexual era before AIDS is manifest in Boogie Nights and Studio 54.

23 See Taylor, Timothy Dean, Global Pop: World Music, World Markets (New York: Routledge, 1997).Google Scholar

24 Koller, Frank, ‘“Return to Innocence’ features Ami Singer,” All Things Considered, NPR (June 21, 1996).Google Scholar

25 Moby, “Natural Blues,” Play (V2 Records, 1999). Printed on the back of the CD case: “Warning: Unauthorized reproduction of this recording is prohibited by federal law and is subject to criminal prosecution.” Hall and seven other singers sampled by Moby can be found on Sounds of the South (Atlantic, 1961).Google Scholar The Lomax family, currently attempting to locate heirs of the various artists, disputes that it has been reimbursed for the use of the material from the album, which, in addition to the royalties on album sales, also includes payments for use of the song in numerous national ad campaigns. See Leiby, Richard, “For Blues Artists, A Sad Refrain: Forgotten Musicians Reap nothing from Moby's Sampler of Their Songs,” The Washington Post, August 9, 2000, p. C1.Google Scholar

26 Moby's album illustrates the excruciating ambiguities of cultural appropriation. The problems with the race and class politics of this song notwithstanding, the music is provocative and moving. Although it derives most of its power from samples of Lomax's collection and contemporary black artists, Moby's compositions are clearly artful. He has spoken of how moved he was upon encountering this music, and his compositions manifest this. His meditative techno compositions—both part of the sampling songs and independent compositions—suggest there is much deserving serious consideration in the ritual practice of club dancing for which it is produced. Undeniably, similar “misappropriations” are often at work in retrievals within mainstream religious traditions. Reflections on the profundity of his work inevitably collide with its commercial exploitation. Used on television programs such as “Dawson's Creek,” “Party of Five” and “Veronica's Closet,” emphasis is inevitably given to the sampled music. The spiritual appeal of the album coincides with commercial appeal in a way that confirms the argument of this essay. Every song on the album was eventually licensed for use in a television commercial. (Harrington, Richard, “Moby Songs: 1993–1998 Elektra,” Washington Post, October 27, 2000, N14.)Google Scholar “Natural Blues” was used as part of a Calvin Klein campaign. “Find my Baby,” a song which samples Boy Blue (a.k.a. Roland Hayes) singing the plaintive refrain of “Joe Lee's Rock,” a classic blues meditation on infidelity, provided the soundtrack for an American Express commercial featuring Tiger Woods golfing through Manhattan.

27 Bergeron, Katherine, “The Virtual Sacred,” New Republic 212 (February 7, 1995): 29–34Google Scholar Note as well Bergeron's observation that it is likely many purchasers never actually played the album.

28 Tom Beaudoin notes, however, that such “virtual liturgies” can have a critical function when compared with their “real” counterparts. Do the liturgies currently practised in contemporary religious communities make significantly more demands on participants? See Beaudoin, Tom, Virtual Faith: The Irreverent Spiritual Quest of Generation X (San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 1998), 39.Google Scholar

29 This is not to say that all retrievals of this period must function this way. Like any historical period, the preconciliar era likely offers resources relevant to the contemporary moment. Clearly some neo-traditionalist retrievals function in such a way. See, for example, William Portier's assertion that the retrieval of pre-conciliar practices and dress among contemporary seminarians is not adequately described as “conservative.” Rather, this retrieval provides the material for a Catholic form of Evangelical visible witness. “In Defense of Mt. Saint Mary's: They are evangelical, not conservative,” Commonweal 77 (February 11, 2000): 31–33.Google Scholar

30 Massa, Mark, Catholics and American Culture: Fulton Sheen, Dorothy Day and the Notre Dame Football Team (New York: Crossroad, 1999), 55, 56.Google Scholar For a critique of the contemporary spiritual author Thomas Moore in terms of consumerism and shallow practice, see Jones, L. Gregory, “A Thirst for God or Consumer Spirituality? Cultivating Disciplined Practices of Being Engaged by God” in Jones, L. Gregory and Buckley, James J., eds., Spirituality and Social Embodiment (Oxford: Blackwell, 1997), 3–28.Google Scholar

31 Michael Budde criticizes this lack of critical awareness in terms of “sacramental liberalism” that reads Catholic optimism concerning nature and grace onto human culture and an “evangelization fixation” that encourages an instrumental conception of media infrastructures. See Budde, , The (Magic) Kingdom of God: Christianity and Global Culture Industries (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1997), 98–103.Google Scholar

32 Mother Teresa was abstract in all the ways necessary for her to function as an icon for concern for the poor. She avoided structural analyses of the problem of poverty, redirecting such questions to individual sufferers and charitable acts. This seemingly practical focus on the concrete provided just the type of abstraction necessary for a corn-modified symbol. She took no stands against the economic systems that produced the poverty she sought to alleviate and, thus, could function as a symbol of abstract concern for the poor by those whose personal “success” depended on advancing a system that was itself the cause of much poverty.

33 In this regard, one might note the disconnect between John Paul II's romantic proclamations and his concrete policies; for example, his repeated condemnation of the sin of sexism (Mulieris Dignitatem; the confession of “sins against the dignity of women” in the March 18, 2000 ceremony of forgiveness, etc.) and the absence of concrete change in church policy to address the legacies and ongoing presence of sexism.

34 Lasch, Christopher, The Culture of Narcissism (New York: Norton, 1978).Google ScholarRieff, Philip introduced the notion a decade earlier in The Triumph of the Therapeutic: Uses of Faith after Freud (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1966).Google Scholar

35 Lears, T.J. Jackson, No Place of Grace, 303–7.Google Scholar Mark Vernon's discussion of Michel Foucault's persistent hesitance to identify as “gay” is interesting in this regard. See “ ‘I am not what I am’—Foucault, Christian asceticism and a ‘way out’ of sexuality” in Foucault, Michel, Religion and Culture: Michel Foucault, ed., Carrette, Jeremy (London: Routledge, 1999), 199–210.Google Scholar

36 de Certeau, Michel, The Practice of Everyday Life, Vol. 1, trans. Randal, Steven (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984), 36–37.Google Scholar For a brief introduction to the thought of Certeau see Miller, Vincent J. “Certeau” in Adam, A. K. M., ed. Handbook of Postmodern Biblical Interpretation (St. Louis: MO.: Chalice Press, 2000), 42–48.Google Scholar For a more extended theological appropriation of Certeau which employs this distinction, see Bauerschmidt, F. C., “The Abrahamic Voyage: Michel de Certeau and Theology,” Modern Theology 12/1(1996): 1–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

37 The notion of practice that I am employing lacks the teleological component proposed by thinkers such as Maclntyre, Alasdair, After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1984);Google ScholarMcClendon, James, Systematic Theology: Doctrine (Nashville: Abingdon, 1994);Google Scholar and Tilley, Terrence, The Wisdom of Religious Commitment (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 1995).Google Scholar In addition to the work of Certeau cited above, it is indebted to the Foucaultian perspective of Talal Asad who analyzes human practices and rituals in terms of the “historically distinctive disciplines and forces” which produce and legitimate them. “Anthropological Conceptions of Religion: Reflections on Geertz,” Man 18 [1983]: 251.Google Scholar For a theological appropriation of Asad's notions of practice and ritual see Mitchell, Nathan, Liturgy and the Social Sciences (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1999).Google Scholar For a discussion of various conceptions of practice relevant to the study of religion, see Mary McClintock Fulkerson, “Practice” in Adam, ed., The Handbook of Postmodern Biblical Interpretation. Performance theory is also interesting in this regard. See Bell, Catherine “Performance” in Taylor, Mark C., ed., Critical Terms for Religious Studies (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998), 205–24.Google Scholar

38 Margolick, David, Strange Fruit: Billie Holiday, Cafe Society, and an Early Cry for Civil Rights (New York: Running Press, 2000).Google Scholar One should note, however, Margolick's detailing of the ambiguities of Holiday's political convictions and the sexual undertones of her performance of the song. This does not, however, change its dominant reception as spectacle of atrocity.

39 Benjamin, Walter, “The Work of Art in an Age of Mechanical Reproduction” in Arendt, Hannah, ed., Illuminations (New York: Shocken, 1969).Google Scholar Mass reproduction does not necessarily lead to the diminishment of presence (although I believe it does in our culture). David Freedberg has argued convincingly that the mass production of woodcuts during the reformation era instilled images with greater presence by reinforcing visual conventions and recognizability (The Power of Images: Studies in the History and Theory of Response [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989], 177).Google Scholar

40 Michael Budde has argued for such a response from a communitarian perspective. He calls for an intensification of catechesis and formation in the Christian community and speaks of the church as a “perception clinic.” See Budde, , The (Magic) Kingdom of God (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1997), 126–50.Google Scholar I am in basic agreement with both his analysis and proposals but suspect that the postliberal framework of his analysis may miss the depth of the construction of perceptions and agency. An adequate contestation with consumerist perception requires a fundamental transformation of the consumer gaze (see above, note 14). The depth of the required transformation is better conveyed by reference to extended disciplined practices along the lines of the Spiritual Exercises or various forms Buddhist meditation than socialization and ongoing formation.

41 Slater, Don, Consumer Culture and Modernity (Oxford: Polity Press, 1997), 34.Google Scholar

42 Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life; and Fiske, John, Reading the Popular (Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1989).Google Scholar