The Advertising and Consumer Culture Reader

Commercial breaks, radio spots, product placements, billboards, pop-up ads—we sometimes take for granted how much advertising surrounds us in our daily lives. We may find ads funny, odd, or even disturbing, but we rarely stop to consider their deeper meaning or function within society.

What, exactly, does advertising do? How and why do ads influence us? How does the advertising industry influence our media? These are just a few of the many important questions addressed in The Advertising and Consumer Culture Reader—an incisive, provocative collection that assembles twenty-seven of the most important scholarly writings on advertising and consumer culture to date.

The classic and contemporary essays gathered here explore the past, present, and future of advertising—from the early days of print to the World Wide Web and beyond. These selections offer historical, sociological, critical, cultural, and political-economic lenses to explore a wide range of topics—from consumer activism to globalization to the role of ads in the political process. Together, these key readings chart the past, present, and future of advertising, while also examining the effects of advertising and consumer culture upon individuals, society, cultures, and the world at large.

Designed for use in courses, the collection begins with a general introduction that orients students to thinking critically about advertising and consumer culture. Section and chapter introductions offer valuable historical and critical context, while review questions after each reading will spark classroom debates and challenge students’ understanding of key concepts.

Joseph Turow is Robert Lewis Shayon Professor of Communication at the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School for Communication. He has authored eight books, edited five books, and written more than 100 articles on mass media industries. Most recently, he is author of the third edition of his textbook Media Today: An Introduction to Mass Communication and co-editor of the companion volume Key Readings in Media Today: Mass Communication in Contexts, both published by Routledge.

Matthew P. McAllister is Associate Professor of Communications at Pennsylvania State University. He is author of The Commercialization of American Culture: New Advertising, Control and Democracy and co-editor of Comics and Ideology and Film and Comic Books.