Values And Consumption In Mary Douglas's The Uses Of Goods

The historical exploration of material culture includes examining modes of consumption, the meaning and life of objects, as well as actively “reading” material objects as historical texts. Alternative to the “simple maxim that supply creates its own demand,” historians have examined the way consumption is generated, motivations for different objects’ mobility within social hierarchies and cultures, ideas of fashion and fashionability, and definitions and limits of consumption (Vickery, 274-75). Mary Douglas, in “The Uses of Goods,” discusses consumption and the way in which objects reflect the culture and context of their production but also are subject to change. Douglas’ redefining of consumption, consumption being a sort of universal frame

Cattle, religious paintings, or linens all have a sort of subsistence factor which is doubled with the social relationships that can be examined. For Vickery, Elizabeth Shackleton’s consumption of linens, furnishings, and other commodities not only provides the Shackleton with the necessities of clothing and furniture but also presents their social status. Vickery, attempting to overturn the negative association of “a woman’s decorative dependence, the gilding on the patriarchal cage,” highlights how Shackleton’s consumption choices give her a sort of power and validity within an oppressive society (274). McDannell, similarly, argues how religious goods, though less obvious than linens or cattle, have a substance nature for the health of the religious consumer. These objects, such as a parlour organ or images of religious iconography, enable people to “see, hear, and touch God” (McDannell, 1). They sustain a personal connection with God while showing their connection with certain high “Art,” despite often being copies, and possible emulation of upper-class art consumption. For Douglas this is problematic. Douglas asserts that commodities should be treated as a “nonverbal medium for the human creative faculty” (Douglas 41). Are commodities and material possessions simply mediums in which to understand human creativity? What about commissioned art or objects? Is there

Historian’s still argue the practical aspect of consumption; Europeans traded items with the Indigenous populations for moccasins in the 1700s because they were the best available footwear for the environment in North America. The substance argument is useful for examining modes and motivations of consumption. Historians also use emulation, as seen in Vickery, prominently. The creation of different, often illegal textile workers in areas of Europe and Madrid for typically low-class consumption of goods similar to those of upper-classes affirms the argument of emulation. But is this conception of consumption too narrow? If you window-shop, some scholars have argued, you are consuming visually the items. It may be part of a counter-culture of capitalist consumption but it is consumption nonetheless. The production of advertisements, for example, is a type of consumption. You consume the image, even as early as the advertisements of Pears Soap, and often you are consuming the social or ideological message as well. How do you define the consumption of an item that has been bought and sold multiple times, acquiring new meaning each