Write an Essay That Outlines the View That a Consumer Society Is a Divided Society.

The development of consumerism during the "Thatcher" years since developed in several directions it reflecting the changing interest of different subgroups over time it resulted in the diversity of aims and practice.

* Try to make your points more concise. I had a hard time understanding what the main point of each paragraph was.

Whenever I go to Stop & Shop, I tend to take interest in the thousands of products that surround me as I walk down an aisle. The wafting aroma of freshly baked pastries and the sight of cold soft drinks are just some of the things that trigger my appetite for food. Most often, I find myself buying more than what I originally planned on. That’s exactly what the layout of a supermarket tries to make consumers do. Marion Nestle argues in her article, “The Supermarket: Prime Real Estate”, how supermarkets employ clever tactics such as product layout in order to make consumers spend as much money as possible. She covers fundamental rules that stores employ in order to keep customers in aisles for the longest time, a series of cognitive studies that stores perform on customers, and examples of how supermarkets encourage customers to buy more product. Overall, Nestle’s insight into how supermarkets manipulate people into spending extra money has made me a more savvy consumer and I feel if more people were to read her article, then they can avoid some of the supermarket’s marketing tactics as well.

It seems to most that those who have money have it all. They should buy all the unnecessary “junk” that one might find pleasure in owning, take everything for granted and view lower-class individuals as a group of wanna-bes. Think again. S.E. Hinton’s novel The Outsiders, very important propositions are portrayed through the writing techniques which link to another piece of writing “Poverty and Wealth” written by Ella Wheeler Wilcox. Just because you have everything, doesn’t mean you understand it's worth. Different classes have different experiences, allowing elaboration on the different characters.

“It’s not what you own its what people think you own” (Ewen 183). Consumerism is fueling today’s “middle class”. Stewart Ewen’s “Chosen People” goes into detail about the rise of the materialistic middle class.

Consequently, inequality is shown persisting over time and that ‘people’s social lives in the way that they are made and remade are not static’ (Staples,M. 2014 Pg 39).As Bauman questions, is everyone allowed equal access to our consumer society? stating “increased affluence means there are greater numbers who have access to the trappings of a consumer lifestyle” but ‘there are some groups who are excluded from consuming based on income, those being the poor, homeless, migrants and other groups, this being a characteristic pattern of inequality in our contemporary consumer society’ he classes people in two ways that of the ‘Seduced’ those people participating in our consumer society and the ‘Repressed’ those people who are unable

Activity 4. Review the following paragraph from an essay. Add transitions, where necessary (it is the first paragraph of the main body). Use phrases from Appendix D.

Shopping has become a daily activity which happens a billion times in America and around the world. We cannot imagine how our lives would be affected if shopping was suddenly stopped. Malcolm Gladwell and Anne Norton both write articles about two sides of modern day shopping: how consumers have impacted the retail industry and how the industry influences consumers. In the article " The Science of Shopping," Malcolm Gladwell, a well-known writer and journalist, analyzes the shopping behaviors of customers and how retailers can lure customers; while Anne Norton, a professor of political science at the University of Pennsylvania, in

Section 3: The next two sections are artifacts (for an Argumentative Essay) from two different students (one student that reads below grade level, another that reads at grade level).

The term consumer society goes beyond the mere act of shopping and the functional use of goods with contemporary

Hunger for luxury items and people’s strife for the brands and items they associate with being beyond reach is paramount for this system. It is this drive for items one can’t have that the author feels is one of the benefits of consumerism. He declares, “…the aspiration of the poor to

Consumerism is damaging to our society, in our North American society consumerism is often portrayed to be a negative aspect of people’s lives. However, one can also argue positive effects that result from consumerism, or emphasize on the negative effects of consumerism and how it can be a constraining force in one’s own life. Consumerism is an idea of an economic policy that the market is shaped by the choice of the consumer and continues to emerge to shape the world’s mass markets. Some of the negative effects of consumerism that many critics may argue and that will be further emphasized on are the overexploitation of consumerism which has lead to economic poverty, and increase

Whoever said money can’t buy happiness? Today, the argument can be made that happiness and consumerism are directly linked. It is fair to say that happiness is a relative term for different people. However, the obtaining of new and shiny things has become such a part of everyday life, that it provides happiness when people are purchasing something new, and causes sadness when no buying is taking place. For many, it seems to be a protective coating against the harsh realities of everyday stresses from a job, or family life.

Agreeing with Shields (1992), the presumption of shopping no longer included the concepts of utility and need and rather transformed consumption into a cultural event predominated by the emphasis on providing a pleasurable experience by regarding shopping as a leisure activity, thereby demarcating the shoppers among the ones who found pleasure in it and those who did not. It became a significant marker for understanding identities through a series of socially constructed and subjective experiences, while simultaneously peeling the complex layers of the psychological ideologies of desire and want.

Today, people consume for pleasure. The act of consuming goods may allow one to fit in, feel confident, or participate socially in shopping culture. Consumerism has become a universal behaviour amongst most people and groups. According to Sharon Boden, consumption is affected by both external and internal constraints and expectations (150). I argue that consumerism and consumption is no longer an accurate indicator of a person’s actual status and wealth. As a society, we have increased accessibility to commodities and experiences. For example, driving a Mercedes-Benz is no longer a symbol of being wealthy or belonging to the upper class. Leases or loans have brought such luxuries to a broader spectrum of social