Search results

Authenticity is a key issue in any study of subcultures or groups who define themselves as alternative. I will discuss three different stages of research about ‘alternative’ women, with interviews conducted in the late 1990s, and then return interviews with some of the original participants in 2010 and 2018. At all three stages of data collection, the participants were at pains to place themselves as distanced or marginalized from the mainstream, by choice, articulated in various ways. At the same time, they placed themselves as being authentic or at the centre, with people they termed as part-timers, newbies, tourists and weekenders existing on the periphery and at the margins. How do they measure their place in the hierarchy, and whose hierarchy is it? The chapter asks, what is authenticity in alternative subcultures, why is it so important that such marginalized groups are authentic (to themselves, as well as to outsiders), and how do they achieve it. The chapter also explores how ageing and gender impacts on the participants’ identities as alternative women.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects that local interpretation and the glocalisation of the Australian Hip Hop culture have on the consumption practices of members, exploring the reasons for such effects, and drawing marketing implications.

Three principal methods of ethnographic research were used: participant observation, informal conversations, and semi‐structured in‐depth interviews.

The findings suggest that symbolic representation within the Australian Hip Hop culture takes the form of consumption of brands congruent with the values of authenticity and self‐expression at the core of the Australian Hip Hop culture. Many mass‐produced Hip Hop brands originating in the USA were not perceived as authentic as their meanings were associated with commercialisation and artificiality by cultural members. Furthermore, members of the Australian Hip Hop culture appear to express authenticity by being true to themselves, refusing to imitate African‐American Hip Hop style and rejecting what they perceived as “black” Hip Hop brands. Finally, members of the Australian Hip Hop culture also represented their geographical place via consumption, and used symbolic consumption as a form of subcultural capital.

This paper fills a gap in the literature by providing a detailed analysis on the effects of interpretation and the glocalisation of the Australian Hip Hop culture on consumption.

Purpose – To extend understanding of the rituals and practices of alcohol consumption through a focus on the consumption object (the Dirty Pint) as a central actant in the practices of extreme alcohol consumption.

Design/methodology/approach – Seventeen paired and group interviews were conducted with young consumers (aged 16–18). An Actor-Network Theory (ANT)-inspired approach to data analysis was used in conjunction with Bourdieu's key concepts of habitus, field and capital to present a detailed understanding of the practices and rituals of extreme alcohol consumption.

Findings – The same consumption object takes on a very different role and has different forms of agency, depending on the social space (field) in which it is embedded. The Dirty Pint acts differently within different social spaces or sub-fields of the field of adolescence, particularly when combined with individual subjects of differing habitus to produce an object+subject hybrid.

Social implications – Paying attention to all the relevant actants (both human and non-human) involved in the practice of alcohol consumption could lead to more novel and relevant alcohol-harm reduction strategies or campaigns that young people can both relate to and take more seriously.

Originality/value of paper – We stress the need to grant greater agency to objects in studying consumption practices and identity enactment and contribute to the literature on identity by extending Gergen's (2009) ‘relational being’, conceiving of the self as embedded in both inter-subjective and inter-objective interactions and relationships (Latour, 1996).

Bourdieu clearly articulates how cultural capital works at the macro-level and how it leads to the reproduction and legitimation of inequality. He is less clear about other levels of analysis. We address this gap by drawing on social psychological theories and by suggesting that cultural capital is best treated as a multi-level concept – with “cultural capital” produced at the macro-level, “subcultural capital” produced at the meso-level, and “multicultural capital” produced at the micro-level. We illustrate with an exploratory analysis of an advertising agency in Eastern Europe, thereby highlighting legitimacy processes occurring among its departments and personnel.

Purpose: This chapter seeks to understand ethnic identification among second-generation consumers by drawing upon the lived experiences of British Indian migrants in England.

Methodology/Approach: The authors analyze interviews with middle-class, Hindu, second-generation British Indian women through Bourdieu’s key concepts of capital, field, habitus, and distinction.

Findings: Through resources such as Bollywood cinema, and Indian schools for language, music, and dance, second-generation consumers acquire, use and (re) produce situationally prized subcultural capital for distinction from other ethnic consumers and members of the white majority group. Ethnicity is central to second-generation consumers’ identity projects, and their everyday social interactions. Ethnicity is considered in uplifting and empowering terms, and first-generation consumers play a key role in reinforcing this belief.

Research Limitations/Implications: Due to our small sample size, limited by class, religion, and gender, the findings of this chapter might not be generalizable to the wider population. Instead, they can be used to develop new theoretical ways of understanding ethnicity in multicultural settings with long-established migrant populations.

Social Implications: Ethnicity can play a central and positive role in the everyday lives of second-generation consumers. By investigating this further, we can improve our understanding of contemporary, multicultural societies.

Originality/Value of Paper: Prior work in consumer research has focused on understanding first-generation migrant consumers through the lens of acculturation, and foregrounding experiences of stigma and tension. Instead, the authors foreground the positive and uplifting lived experiences of second-generation consumers in relation to their ethnicity. This chapter extends the literature on second-generation ethnic consumer identity work.

The purpose of this paper is to understand how food is used to create identity and community for gamers during core rituals. These meanings are to be explored within the broader context of subcultural experience in an investigation of the motives and the self‐concept dynamics underlying this symbolic consumer behaviour.

This paper uses an interpretive research strategy and adopts a multi‐method ethnographic approach that includes: netnography: multiple, in‐depth, ethnographic interviews; and prolonged participant observation. Interview informants are young Irish subcultural members aged between 18 and 23. Data analysis proceeds according to a constant comparative method.

The findings suggest that the social gaming ritual, when intersected with food, is closely linked to issues of identity, community, fantasy and escape, gustatory rebellion and prolonged hedonism. Commensality during the core social gaming ritual contributes to a sense of communitas, while the “junk” nature of the shared food products helps to manufacture the hedonism of the event. The social ritual then is sovereign and bound by its own subcultural parameters, which oppose mainstream culture's norms and dietary regulations. From its role in helping to create a Utopian and rebellious experience, food is then leveraged as part of the gamers' collective identity. Practitioner implications of the results are discussed.

This paper investigates contemporary food consumption behaviour within a postmodern community. The main contribution pertains to providing an insight into a previously neglected group of food consumers.