Consumer Rites: The Buying and Selling of American Holidays
by Leigh Eric Schmidt
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Description
Reexamining the story of holidays in the United States, Leigh Schmidt shows that commercial appropriations of these occasions were actually as religious in form as they were secular. The new rituals of America's holiday bazaar offered a luxuriant merger of the holy and the profane - a heady blend of fashion and faith, merchandising and gift giving, profits and sentiments. In this richly illustrated book that captures both the blessings and ballyhoo of American holiday observances from the show more mid-eighteenth century through the twentieth, the author offers a reassessment of the "consumer rites" that various social critics have long decried for their spiritual emptiness and banal sentimentality. Schmidt uses everything from diaries to manuals on church decoration and window display to show in bright detail the ways people have prepared for and celebrated specific holidays - such as going Christmas shopping, making love tokens, choosing Easter bonnets, sending flowers to Mom, or buying ties for Dad. He demonstrates, in particular, how women took the lead as holiday consumers, shaping warm-hearted celebrations of home and family through their intricate engagement with the marketplace. Bringing together the history of business, religion, and gender, this book offers a fascinating cultural history of an endlessly debated marvel - the commercialization of American holidays. show lessTags
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Member Reviews
Slow to start but an interesting book about the commercialization of holidays. I just assumed that holidays like Christmas and Valentine's Day have been around for ever, so it was interesting to read about how fabricated they are by consumerism (even from the very start). I heard about this book in Bitch Magazine as they analyzed the gendered differences between Mother's and Father's Day, and this book does provide an interesting discussion on that as well.
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155 works; 1 member
Author Information
8+ Works 407 Members
Leigh Eric Schmidt is a professor in the Department of Religion at Princeton University.
Common Knowledge
- Original publication date
- 1995
- Dedication
- To my parents
Roger and Ann Schmidt - First words
- In a Family Circus cartoon that a colleague passed along to me a couple of years ago, two little boys are in a shopping mall surveying various Easter commodities - baskets, candies, rabbits, eggs, and other novelties o... (show all)f the season.
- Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)But, as with the candy of All Fools' Day, farce, play, and ingenuity remain.
Classifications
- Genres
- Nonfiction, Sociology, History, Economics, Religion & Spirituality, General Nonfiction
- DDC/MDS
- 394.2 — Society, government, & culture Customs, etiquette & folklore General customs Special Occasions
- LCC
- GT4986 .A1 .S35 — Geography, Anthropology and Recreation Manners and customs (General) Manners and customs (General) Customs relative to public and social life
- BISAC
Statistics
- Members
- 78
- Popularity
- 407,034
- Reviews
- 1
- Rating
- (3.60)
- Languages
- English
- Media
- Paper
- ISBNs
- 2
