The Unmanageable Consumer by Yiannis Gabriel

The Unmanageable Consumer by Yiannis Gabriel

Examining the key Western traditions of thinking about and being a consumer, this 20th Anniversary Edition continues to explore 10 consumer models and encourages analysis of contemporary consumerism.

The Unmanageable Consumer has long been one of my favorite books in the sociology of consumptionThis long overdue third edition has updated and revised the basic argument in many ways. Most importantly, it now offers a new chapter on the consumer as worker or, more generally, the prosumer. It also takes into account the fact that consumption, better hyper-consumption, is not only still with us, but if anything it is accelerating. The continued increase in hyper-consumption and the rapidly changing nature of consumption/prosumption, as well as their relationship to one another, make this edition more relevant than ever. Assign it to your classes (I have… and will again) and read it for your edification.

-- George Ritzer
This is a remarkable and important book. The new edition updates consumer cultural studies to take into account austerity politics and the economic crisis, and the impact these have had on how we think about and experience everyday practices of shopping and consuming. The authors also build on and maintain the lively and challenging argument from the previous volumes which sees the consumer as an unstable space for a multiplicity of often contradictory responses which can unsettle the various strategies on the part of contemporary capitalism to have us buy more. The volume by Gabriel and Lang will be of great value to Masters students and undergraduates as well faculty across a range of humanities and social science courses. -- Angela McRobbie
The book exemplifies how social science should be: engaged, insightful, imaginative, scholarly and highly socially and politically relevant. Strongly recommended to students, academics as well as all people interested in understanding our time and themselves in an age of consumerism and false promises. This is a book that almost everyone would benefit from reading. -- Mats Alvesson
This book is essential reading for anyone interested in understanding one of the most complex and multifaceted concepts of our time: the idea of the consumer. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
-- Mark Tadajewski
Through ten diverse and intriguing "portraits" of the consumer, the authors have somehow combined academic rigour with topical insights and appropriately provocative challenges. In all sorts of ways, The Unmanageable Consumer is a surprising delight! -- Jonathon Porritt
Engagement with this book should certainly be encouraged across the disciplines. This is because despite the books’ social-scientific tone and academic relevance, the authors continue to balance their account of the tightly coiled interrelations of the [discussed] themes and phenomena with a pertinent yet accessible unpacking of how their complex formation is central to consumerism’s ongoing and intensified centrality to the narratives in and of our everyday lives. -- Peter Watt, Department of Management, York St John University

Yiannis Gabriel is Professor of Organizational Theory at Bath University. Yiannis has a degree in Mechanical Engineering from Imperial College London and a PhD in Sociology from the University of California, Berkeley.   Yiannis is well known for his work into organizational storytelling and narratives, leadership, management learning and the culture and politics of contemporary consumption. He has used stories as a way of studying numerous social and organizational phenomena including leader-follower relations, group dynamics and fantasies, nostalgia, insults and apologies. He has also carried out extensive research on the psychoanalysis of organizations.   Yiannis is founder and coordinator of the Organizational Storytelling Seminar series, now in its fourteenth year (See http://www.organizational-storytelling.org.uk/), the author of nine books and numerous articles. He is elected to the board of EGOS and is currently Senior Editor of Organization Studies. His enduring fascination as a researcher lies in what he describes as the unmanageable qualities of life in and out of organizations. Tim Lang has been Professor of Food Policy at City University′s Centre for Food Policy since 2002. With a PhD in Social Psychology from Leeds University he became a hill farmer in Lancashire, North of England, in the 1970s. Over the last four decades he has engaged in public and academic research and debate about food policy: what sort of food system do we want? What do we mean by progress? He has written and co-written 10 books and many reports and papers on the trends, problems and policy frameworks in the food system. A constant theme is how public health, environment, social justice and consumer rights do and don’t connect. Besides his academic work, he has been an advisor to many bodies including the World Health Organisation, the EU Environment Commissioner, the Mayor of London and many civil society organisations. He was the UK Government’s Sustainable Development Commissioner for food and land use in 2006-11. All this enquiry and engagement spawned and retains his keen interest in the issues analysed in The Unmanageable Consumer.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9781446298527
ISBN 10	1446298523
Title	The Unmanageable Consumer
Author	Yiannis Gabriel
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	Sage Publications Ltd
Year published	2015-10-05
Number of pages	280
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.