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Sturken And Cartwright's Commodity Analysis

1237 Words5 Pages

The main argument in this essay will be formed around a critical analysis of a commodity and the way in which it is sold in today’s typically capitalist consumer culture, which is manufactured through desire.
I will start of by defining key terms such as Marxism and Marxist theory (which consists of consumer culture, commodity advertising and commodity fetishism, use and exchange value, commodity sign and ideology) in order to develop an understanding that will aid in justifying my argument.
“Practices of Looking” by Sturken and Cartwright (2001), Ideology In Critical and Cultural Theory: Thematic Variations by Cavallaro (2001) and “Subjectivity in a bottle: Commodity Form and Advertising as Social Practice” by Goldman (1992) are readings …show more content…

Sturken and Cartwright (2001: 51) explain that “ideologies define ideas of how life should be”, in other words superstructures determine the ideology and impose this on the masses, who then live by and believe in these ideologies on a day to day basis. Karl Marx (referenced in Sturken & Cartwright 2001: 51) defined ideologies as a “kind of false consciousness” that the dominant powers persuaded the masses to believe in, giving way to capitalism. Marx’s (Sturken & Cartwright 2001: 51) theories about ideologies showed that people are forced in to being a part of an economic system despite their …show more content…

Thus it will create a social value to the object. For instance looking at a specific brand no one knows about the production of the clothing, but it is bought because of the brand identity.
Use and Exchange Value
Sturken and Cartwright (2001: 199) explained the Marxist critique of capitalism as “advertising to be a means to create demand for products, which makes people buy more than they really need”. Marxist theory analyzed a particular relationship between exchange value and use value in capitalism. “Exchange value refers to what a particular product costs in a given system of exchange. Us value refers to its use within that society” (Sturken and Cartwright 2001: 199).

“Marxist theory critiques the emphasis in capitalism on exchange over use value, in which things are valued not for what they really do but for what they’re worth in abstract, monetary terms” (Sturken and Cartwright 2001: 199). This means that if something takes twice as long to produce, it will be twice as expensive as something that would take one day to

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