Lydia Martens

Consumption and the Problem of Variety: Cultural Omnivorousness, Social Distinction and Dining Out

In the light of the work of Pierre Bourdieu, this paper begins by reviewing an argument that Western populations no longer recognise any fixed cultural hierarchy and that, instead, individuals seek knowledge of an increasingly wide variety of aesthetically equivalent cultural genres. Contrasting versions of this argument are isolated. Data concerning the frequency of use of different commercial sources of meals and the social characteristics of customers using different types of restaurant in England are examined. An attempt is made to infer the social and symbolic significance of variety of experience and, in particular, of familiarity with diverse ethnic cuisines. The findings are interpreted in terms of the complex role of consumption in personal assurance, communicative competence and social distinction. It is maintained that the pursuit of variety of consumer experience is a feature of particular social groups and that some specific component practices express social distinction.

Bringing Children (and Parents) into the Sociology of Consumption Towards a Theoretical and Empirical Agenda

The sociology of consumption pays relatively little detailed and systematic theoretical attention to children, while the sociology of childhood tends to view children’s consumption through what can be called the ‘production of consumption’ approach. This is surprising given the range of empirical and theoretical debate in the sociology of consumption, where ‘mode of consumption’,‘consumption as aesthetics’ and ‘material culture’ represent a further three approaches. By bringing together the sociologies of childhood and consumption, a framework for empirical research is advanced. Four inter-related themes are suggested: learning to consume; lifestyle and identity formation; children’s engagements with material culture; and the parent-child relationship. It is argued that such a framework offers scope to further understandings of how cultures of consumption impact on children, children and parents, and construct notions of childhood. A focus on children’s consumption also represents an opportunity to clarify key processes of influential theories of social change.

Applying practice theory to the study of consumption: Theoretical and methodological considerations:

In the context of continuing debate in social theory and philosophy about the structure-agency problematic, recent years have seen scholars (re)turn to this theoretical complexity through so-called theories of social practices. Practice theories are a set of cultural and philosophical accounts that focus on the conditions surrounding the practical carrying out of social life. It has roots in the philosophy of Heidegger and Wittgenstein and social scientific roots in the work of early Bourdieu, early Giddens, late Foucault and Butler. Their insights have recently become fused in a composite philosophical ontology of practices developed by Theodore Schatzki (1996, 2002) and colleagues (Schatzki et al., 2001). Together with the useful theoretical mapping provided by Reckwitz (2002) – who sketches practice theory as an ideal type, drawing out its peculiarities through a contrast with theoretical narratives in the broader domain of ‘cultural theories’ – it could be argued that practice theories have come to occupy salient theoretical space across the social sciences and humanities. When Reckwitz (2002) drafted his overview, the principles of these perspectives had already made inroads in ‘science studies, gender studies and organizational studies’ (p. 257). In recent years, this has spread to include anthropology, cultural studies, design studies, environment and

Social Differentiation and the Market for Eating Out in the UK

Abstract Data collected under the ESRC Research Programme `The Nations Diet: The Social Science of Food Choice’ offer an opportunity for detailed analysis of British eating-out habits. 1001 respondents in Bristol, London and Preston reported on their use of various types of eating-out venue. We find evidence of considerable market segmentation. The eating-out product is significantly differentiated, with `ethnic’ venues appealing to certain social groups for particular reasons. The paper uses logistic regression to distinguish the factors affecting the probability of exposure to each type of restaurant. Age, earnings and household income are important but vary in their specific effects. We find additional, independent effects of locality, occupational class, education, and ethnicity. We describe and recommend logistic regression as an analytic technique for explaining differential participation in the selection between different types of places to eat out.

Eating out and the commercialisation of mental life

This paper reflects on a sociological study of eating out in the UK. After a brief resume of the study and its main empirical findings it addresses questions about the relationship between social scientific and other forms of practical knowledge about consumption. In the context of a process referred to as the commercialisation of mental life, the paper isolates a number of features which distinguish sociological from market research approaches to the topic. It is argued that too determined a practical focus to the study of consumer behaviour is likely to compromise understanding.

Learning to consume : consuming to learn : children at the interface between consumption and education.

The market as educator has become firmly lodged at the centre of popular and scholarly debate commenting on the nexus between children, consumption and education/learning. In this paper, I appreciate this scholarly debate from the point of view of the sociology of consumption. The latter has been relatively silent on children’s consumption and education, focusing instead on adult learning. Nevertheless, I here draw on that sociology to forward an argument that favours consideration of a broader range of social relationships and cultural and contextual influences. I outline two models on the network of relationships that inform children’s consumption, and illustrate, through a discussion of Chin’s Purchasing Power, how children’s consumption‐related learning may originate from outside the market. The paper finishes with a plea for more research that focuses on children and the domestic contexts of consumption.

Practice 'in Talk' and Talk 'as Practice': Dish Washing and the Reach of Language

The aim of this paper is to open up debate about the methodological implications of adopting practice theory in social research. Practice theory has become a much used analytical framework for researchers working on the question ‘what we do’ in relation to a diverse set of contemporary concerns, but discussion on the epistemological implications has thus far been limited. By looking at interview talk on dish washing through a practice-theoretical lens grounded in Schatzkis (1996, 2002) ontology of practices, I set out to examine how language and talk form a resource and an obstruction when we want to think about mundane practices in scholarly ways. My concern is located within the broader questioning of qualitative interviews in debate in the social sciences. Acknowledging that interviews are ‘distinctive forms of social action’ (Atkinson & Coffey 2003), I move on to consider how talk about washing up in interviews conveys the interaction between two practices; those of talking as the salient embodied practice wielded by human beings in interaction with each other, and dish washing as an integrated cleaning practice common in domestic kitchens. The analysis suggests that our qualitative interviews stimulated talk on the teleo-affective qualities of dish-washing. Rules and principles also appeared in the talk in specific ways. However, the talk was not so good for gaining understanding of the activity of dish washing. In conclusion, I argue that the standard qualitative interview brings out the human-to-human interactional concerns of practices, but that different research contexts need to be developed and employed for gaining greater understanding of the performance (or activity) of the practice of dish washing.

“The Unbearable Lightness of Cleaning”: Representations of Domestic Practice and Products in Good Housekeeping Magazine (UK): 1951–2001

In this paper we begin to open the black box that constitutes the organisation of domestic cleaning and consumption in the latter half of the twentieth century. We focus specifically on change and continuity in the manner in which cleaning practices and cleaning products are represented in the UK womans magazine Good Housekeeping, in the late modern period. After a discussion of the modern history of cleanliness, we proceed with a rationale for why this magazine was chosen for our analysis, followed by a summary of our methodology. We then argue that three phases of representation may be delineated in the time period we investigated. The first phase, which is apparent in the 1951 and 1961 issues, we have named “pride in domestic practice” and it covers a period when, what we call “the womens lobby”, speaks in a uniform voice about the tasks of the housewife and the purpose of domestic cleaning. The second phase, manifest in the 1971 and 1981 issues, is termed “domestic dreaming”, and it heralds a period when Good Housekeeping calls its readership to dream about the potentials of a transformed consumer culture. The third phase, which is evident in some respects in 1981, but which is more clearly present in 1991 and 2001, we have called “modern advising in a late modern world”. During this period, Good Housekeeping settles into a new role as a modern advisor of cleaning products and practices within the context of a world that poses significant complexities. Our discussion also focuses on how three values of cleanliness; that associated with germs, aesthetics and efficiency/ease are present in the magazine. Our analysis is contextualised in relation to the cultural silencing of cleanliness in this period and related to social and cultural changes associated with feminism and consumer culture.

Gender and the eating out experience

Reports research findings on the gendered character of the eating out experience, from a study of eating out in England. Investigates two main areas: food tastes and authority relations within consumer groups. Describes how gender differences in food tastes when eating out are subtle. Shows that food tastes alter according to where the eating is done; food preferences and choices differ when people eat out as opposed to when they eat in. These trends are similar for men and women. Further investigates aspects of eating out decision taking and shows that gendered conduct does exist, but the extent of it varies depending on the composition of the company.

Researching habits: advances in linguistic and embodied research practice

The articles in this special issue have one thing in common: all engage with the epistemological and methodological concerns of researching habits, routines and practices. However, in developing their papers, the authors bring to the fore a diverse range of theoretical perspectives and research questions, located in different disciplinary concerns and interests, though all engaging theories of practice, which vary in their focus and emphasis (Reckwitz, 2002; Warde, 2005; Whatmore, 2002). The pluralities in theoretical perspective on which scholars draw inform different ways of thinking. These connect with epistemological questions on the relationship between language, text, words and discourse on the one hand, and an embodied being in the world on the other hand. They provide interesting but also profound challenges for our practices of knowing. The aim of this special issue is to highlight advances in linguistic and embodied research practice because, as we see it, this stresses a number of salient co-manifestations within and across social science disciplines. These points to debate about the ontology of habits, routines and practices at the level of theory and philosophy, to methodological debate and reflection in social science research and to curiosity in a changing set of research questions that follows on from this. We have actively stimulated what may seem a substantial diversity between the papers in this special issue because this offers different inroads into (a) acknowledging the current centrality of scholarly questioning in social science in which the focus is on habits, routines and practices, and (b) understanding the differences and commonalities across discipline-specific trajectories and rationales for moving in this direction and (c) thinking about the epistemological and methodological consequences of such shifts. There can be little doubt that one reason why recent years have seen a growing international and cross-disciplinary interest in ‘practices’ and the formation and salience of routines and habits is the connection with applied research contexts. This has been engaged to examine fundamental socio-cultural questions relating for instance to sustainability agendas, workplace health and safety and more generally, into policy-related questions with an emphasis on ‘behaviour’ and ‘behavioural change’. These initiatives find resonance in research interest and practice in resource intensive and neo liberal economies in the world. Conceived of in this way