Family identity construction: an interpretation of the Lunar New Year's Eve dinner consumption ritual

PurposeFamily dinner on Lunar New Year's Eve is the most important and most ritualized feast for families in China. It is the time for the entire family to reunite. Families gather together to reflect their past and talk about the future. Through the lens of consumer culture theories, this study explores how Chinese consumers construct family identity.Design/methodology/approachBased on constant comparative analysis of primary data including in-depth interviews and participant observation, and secondary data including historical archives, cultural tracing, documentary reports and essays, the authors deconstruct the consumption rituals of family dinner on Chinese Lunar New Year's Eve. The authors focus on four aspects, including participants, place, time and related activities, and analyze Chinese consumers' ritual experiences.FindingsThe authors’ findings show how young consumers construct and strengthen individual self-identity, relational identity and family identity in various ways through consumption and ritual practices during Chinese Lunar New Year celebration.Originality/valueThe study of family dinner on Lunar New Year's Eve helps the authors understand contemporary consumer culture in three aspects. First, it helps the authors understand the relationship between consumption and culture. Second, the study shows the changes and continuities of consumption rituals. Third, the research highlights the experience of “home” among contemporary Chinese consumers.

Neuromarketing: The Philosophy and Culture of Consumerism in Indonesia

Neuromarketing is a revolutionary idea, which combines several disciplines such as psychology, economics, and neuroscience. Indonesia as a developing country that has experienced a fairly rapid economic escalation in the past decade, with the potential for a consumer culture as well as a large purchasing capacity, is a viable market for the application of neuromarketing which is also developing in the world. This review aims to learn more about the idea of neuromarketing, its relation to consumerism culture, and its opportunities in the Indonesian market. For the relevance of the study, this review has also involved the field of neuroscience to discuss philosophical approaches from the use of the subconscious mind, consumerism culture, and the application of neuromarketing in Indonesia today which are known to have successfully utilized neuromarketing principles to boost their sales. However, this technique is not without challenges. In this study, we identified at least some problems, both related to ethics, effectiveness for primary products, to expensive research tools. However, despite these problems, we consider that the use of neuromarketing still has good potential to be applied more widely in Indonesia.

George IV’s Coronation as Festival

This article analyzes George IV’s coronation as a multisensory festive experience in order to understand the meanings of diamonds within British material culture in 1821. Reframing the coronation as a festival allows historical scholars to bridge the premodern/modern divide in early nineteenth-century historiography and demonstrates the ongoing centrality of festivals in consumer culture in the modern era. It also offers a vantage point from which to study sensory paradigm shifts and clashes that occurred in this context and evaluate diamonds in relation to other pieces of material culture outside of the confines of a formal marketplace. The article argues that the coronation shifted how diamonds were thought about in Britain, though this shift was subtle and deeply embedded in the turmoil of the moment. On a widespread scale, the event normalized the association of diamonds with monarchy, imperial power, and light, in ways that made diamonds seem like quotidian items. The article is based on accounts of the event in newspapers, periodicals, and official histories.

Literature Review - Dani Ploeger, Deserted Devices and Wasted Fences: Everyday Technologies in Extreme Circumstances

Deserted Devices and Wasted Fences is acaptivating critique on consumer culture and the role technology plays, and canplay, in our understanding of the world around us and ourselves. Dani Ploeger’scollection of essays offer a guided tour of items and memories, like a livingmemory box. These writings probe our relationships with devices and what they representin our culture; from mobile phones to projectors, from smart fences to strap-ondildos. Ploeger’s provocation unravels from the journey of a device; to theintertwining of the human and non-human technology, shifting gears to the symbolismand mythology of military and state devices of control, closing with thecultural interaction with architectural decisions made in urban landscapes.Although seemingly grand, and without a doubt ambitious, in subject matter,Ploeger evokes the tone of memoir, incorporating reflections of his travels andpersonal happenings, with philosophical and political deliberation; bringing inkey thinkers to ratify and expand his unique perspectives.