This engaging book introduces key ideas and theorists of consumption in an accessible way. Case studies that describe familiar acts of consumption from areas of everyday life are used to ground relevant debates and ideas.

Has material civilization spun out of control, becoming too fast for our own well-being and that of the planet? This book confronts these anxieties and examines the changing rhythms and temporal organization of everyday life. How do people handle hurriedness, burn-out and stress? Are slower forms of consumption viable? This volume brings together international experts from geography, sociology, history, anthropology and philosophy. In case studies covering the United States, Asia and Europe, contributors follow routines and rhythms, their emotional and political dynamics and show how they are anchored in material culture and everyday practice. Running themes of the book are questions of coordination and disruption; cycles and seasons; and the interplay between power and freedom, and between material and natural forces. The result is a volume that brings studies of practice, temporality and material culture together to open up a new intellectual agenda.

Reviewing key contemporary issues and debates about consumption, this accessible textbook portrays and assesses the varied and complex intersections of consumption and everyday life. The rich and idiosyncratic nature of local consumption practices is illustrated through cases from different parts of the world. The contributors show the varying balance between constraint and creativity, links between consumption and production, and the patterns which shape access to symbolic and material resources.

Time pressure, speed and the desire for instant consumption pervade accounts of contemporary lives. Why is it that people feel pressed for time, in what ways have societies changed to create this condition, and with what implications? This book examines critical contentions in the field of time and society, ranging from the emergence and dominance of ‘clock time’ and time discipline, the time pressures associated with consumer culture, through to technological innovation and the acceleration of everyday lives. Through extensive analysis of empirical studies of the changing ways in which people organise and experience home, work, leisure, consumption and personal relationships, time pressure is shown to be a problem of the coordination and synchronization of activities. Appreciation of temporal rhythms – formed and reproduced through the organisation and performance of social practices – is necessary to tackle the challenges of coordination, and offers new avenues for analysing social issues such as sustainable consumption, health and well-being. This book is essential reading for all of those interested in social change, consumption and time, including researchers and students from across the social sciences.

Cultural consumption is one of the key activities of everyday life: it can say who we are or who we would like to be. This book explores cultural consumption from the postdisciplinary perspective of cultural studies. It provides a critical map of the field and brings together work on consumerculture in anthropology and sociology and work on media audiences within media studies and sociology.

Drawing upon anthropological, sociological and historical perspectives, this volume provides a unique insight into women’s domestic consumption. The contributors argue that domestic consumption represents an important lens through which to examine the everyday production and reproduction of socio-economic relations. Through a variety of case studies (such as gambling, wedding day consumption and bedroom décor), the essays explore and reconsider the nature of public and private spaces, and the subsequent nature of domestic space - often by challenging traditional notions of what constitutes ’the domestic’. The volume demonstrates the broad range of experiences that domestic consumption offers women and reveals some of the complex meanings and motivations underpinning women’s consumption practices.

By providing a survey of consumption and lifestyle in Hungary during the second half of the twentieth century, this book shows how common people lived during and after tumultuous regime changes. After an introduction covering the late 1930s, the study centers on the communist era, and goes on to describe changes in the post-communist period with its legacy of state socialism. Tibor Valuch poses a series of questions. Who could be called rich or poor and how did they live in the various periods? How did living, furnishings, clothing, income, and consumption mirror the structure of the society and its transformations? How could people accommodate their lifestyles to the political and social system? How specific to the regime was consumption after the communist takeover, and how did consumption habits change after the demise of state socialism? The answers, based on micro-histories, statistical data, population censuses and surveys help to understand the complexities of daily life, not only in Hungary, but also in other communist regimes in east-central Europe, with insights on their antecedents and afterlives.