Download Post modern marketing and more Study notes Marketing Theory in PDF only on Docsity!
Postmodern marketing:
everything must go!
Grand opening offer
What on earth does ‘postmodern’ mean? A very good question, and one that is not easily answered, because the word, many believe, is as meaningless as it is ubiquitous. It is a word that has been applied to everything from making love (over the Internet, by means of teledildonic body suits) to making war (as in the Gulf or Kosovo, where virtual attacks are mounted and western casualties avoided at all costs). What’s worse, the word has attracted the anoraks of this world, like legendary moths to a proverbial flame, all determined to define the indefinable. The inevitable upshot of this mission to explain the postmodern is a massive, rapidly growing and almost unreadable mound of books, articles and anthologies. The shelves of our libraries and bookshops literally groan under the weight of texts with ‘postmodern’ in the title; the A to Z of academic disciplines
- from accountancy to zoology – has been infiltrated by postmodern fanatics, and many academic careers have been made, or unmade, on the back of this infuriating intellectual beast (Appignanesi and Garratt, 1995; Best and Kellner, 2001; Cala´s and Smircich, 1997; Crews, 2001; Ward, 1997). Indeed, so pervasive is the discourse on the postmodern (and so pervasive is the discourse on the discourse.. .), that post- modernism has become one of the dominant organizing concepts – if it is a concept – across the social and human sciences. Granted, com- paratively few people in each academic dis- cipline espouse a postmodernist position, albeit many more are involved in the wider pro/con debate. Some subject areas, moreover, are further down the postmodern road than others (in org. studies, for instance, it is fairly well established, whereas in marketing and consumer research it remains the preserve of the fighting few). Be that as it may, the very omnipresence of postmodernism is deeply ironic, since it is opposed to universal modes of thought and sets great store by difference, diversity, singularity and so on. For post- modernists, however, this ubiquity of the unique is not a major problem, because con- tradiction, inconsistency and paradox are themselves characteristic features of the post- modern. They are to be celebrated not con- demned, flaunted not faulted, encouraged not excoriated. The real irony of the postmodern is much, much closer to home, insofar as many sociolo- gists, anthropologists, literary theorists and cultural studies specialists consider marketing
Postmodern marketing: everything 1 and consumption to be central to the post- modern condition (e.g. Bocock, 1993; Falk and Campbell, 1997; Featherstone, 1991; Warde, 2002). Consumer behaviour, global brands, advertising campaigns, department stores, regional malls, positioning strategies and the entire apparatus of marketing are widely con- sidered to be part and parcel of the post- modern. Yet postmodern perspectives remain comparatively rare within the academic mar- keting community. Indeed, the ultimate irony is that the analyses of marketing artefacts undertaken by non-marketers are often supe- rior, more insightful and much more in keep- ing with our paradoxical postmodern times than those which derive from the positivistic, model-building, law-abiding, information-pro- cessing, truth-seeking marketing scientists who continue to hold sway in our field (Brown, 1996, 2002).
No down payment
Perhaps the best way of getting to grips with the postmodern is to recognize that the very word is multifaceted. It is a signifier with many signifieds, a portmanteau or umbrella term, an ever-expanding linguistic universe, if you will. However, for the synoptic purposes of the present chapter, four forms of the formulation can be set forth (see Brown 1995, 1998a).
Postmodernism
For many commentators, postmodernism is primarily an aesthetic movement, a revolt against the once shocking, subsequently tamed ‘modern’ movement of the early- to mid- twentieth century. (In fact, some reserve the term ‘postmodernism’ for developments in the cultural sphere.) To cite but three exam- ples: in architecture, PoMo is characterized by the eschewal of the austere, unembellished, ‘glass box’ International Style of Le Corbusier and Mies van der Rohe, and a return to inviting, ornamented, mix ‘n’ matched, ver- nacular or pseudo-vernacular forms, as found in the work of Venturi, Portman and Jencks. In literature, likewise, the spare, experimental, and, as often as not, inaccessible writings of the giants of high modernism – Joyce, Proust, Eliot etc. – have given way to the parodic, reader-friendly vulgarities of Martin Amis, Will Self and Bret Easton Ellis. In popular music, moreover, the ‘modern’ era of The Beatles, Rolling Stones, Beach Boys and Bob Dylan (albeit there is some debate over the existence of modernist pop/rock), has sun- dered into a multiplicity of modalities – house, jungle, techno, rap, roots, world, drum ‘n’ bass, speed garage and the like – many of which are parasitic upon (sampling, scratch), pastiches of (the tribute group phenomenon) or cross-pollinated with extant musical forms (alt.county, nu¨ -metal, neo-disco etc.).
Postmodernity
A second thread in the tangled postmodern skein is drawn from the economic base, as opposed to the aesthetic superstructure. The world, according to this viewpoint, has entered a whole new, qualitatively different, historical epoch; an epoch of multinational, globalized, ever-more rapacious capitalism, where traditional ways of working, producing, consumption and exchange have changed, and changed utterly. Frequently described by the epithet ‘postmodernity’, this is the world of the world wide web, 24/7 day- trading, satel- lite television, soundbitten and spin-doctored politics, mobile phoneophilia, pick ‘n’ mix lifestyles, serial monogamy and relentless Mc- Donaldization. It is a world of ephemerality, instability, proliferation, hallucination and, above all, chaos. It is a world where the beating of a butterfly’s wings in South Amer- ica can cause a stock market crash in Hong Kong or swerve the ball into the net at Old Trafford. It is a world of unexpected, unpre- dictable, uncontrollable, unremitting, some would say unnecessary, upheaval.
1 The Marketing insouciant, self-referential (ads about ads), cross-referential
Postmodern marketing: everything 1 (ads that cite other cultural forms – soap operas, movies etc.) and made with staggeringly expen- sive, semi-cinematic production values. They not only presuppose a highly sophisticated, advertising- and marketing-literate audience, but work on the basic premise that advertising- inculcated images (cool, sexy, smart and the like) are the essence of the product offer. Products, in fact, are little more than the campaign’s tie-in merchandise, along with the videos, CDs, PR hoop-la and media coverage of the agency’s self- aggrandizing endeavours (Berger, 2001; David- son, 1992; Goldman and Papson, 1996). Consumers, too, are changing. As Chapter 6 explains, the certainties, uniformities and unambiguities of the modern era – where mass production produced mass marketing which produced mass consumption which produced mass production – are being trumped by the individualities, instabilities and fluidities of the postmodern epoch. Post- modernity is a place where there are no rules only choices, no fashion only fashions, the Joneses are kept well away from and anything not only goes but it has already left the building. It is a place where ‘one listens to reggae, watches a western, eats McDonald’s food for lunch and local cuisine for dinner, wears Paris perfume in Tokyo and retro clothes in Hong Kong’ (Lyotard, 1984, p. 76). It is a place where ‘we have literally shopped ‘til we dropped into our slumped, channel surf- ing, couch-potatoed position, with the remote control in one hand, a slice of pizza in the other and a six-pack of Australian lager between our prematurely swollen ankles’ (Brown et al ., 1997). It is a place where the world is no longer contained in William Blake’s grain of sand but stocked, bar-coded, date-stamped and on special offer at your local Sainsbury’s superstore or friendly neigh- bourhood category killer. It is a place, as the irascible novelist Will Self notes, where anti- capitalist, anti-globalization, anti-marketing protesters ‘take global airlines so that they can put on Gap clothes to throw rocks at Gap shops’ (Dugdale, 2001, p. 37).
Batteries not included
At a time when consumption is all the academic rage – as demonstrated by the outpouring of books by non-consumer researchers (e.g. Corri- gan, 1997; Edwards, 2000; Howes, 1996; Lury, 1996; Miles et al ., 2002; Miller, 1995; Nava et al ., 1997; Ritzer,
- – it is difficult to ‘step outside’ and comment meaningfully upon this market- ing maelstrom. The most cogent attempt to do so has been made by two prophets of the post- modern turn: A. Fuat Firat and Alladi Venkatesh (1995). In a lengthy article on the ‘re-enchant- ment of consumption’, they contend that post- modern marketing is characterized by five main themes: hyperreality , fragmentation , reversed pro- duction and consumption , decentred subjects and the juxtaposition of opposites (Table 2.1).
Hyperreal
ity
Exemplified by the virtual worlds of cyber- space and the pseudo worlds of theme parks, hotels and heritage centres, hyperreality involves the creation of marketing environ- ments that are ‘more real than real’. The distinction between reality and fantasy is momentarily blurred, as in the back lot tour of ‘working’ movie studios in Universal City, Los Angeles. In certain respects, indeed, hyper- reality is superior to everyday mundane reality, since the aversive side of authentic consump- tion experiences – anti-tourist terrorism in Egypt, muggings in New York, dysentery in Delhi – magically disappears when such desti- nations are recreated in Las Vegas, Busch Gardens, Walt Disney World or the manifold variations on the theme park theme. Ironically, however, the perceived superiority of the fake is predicated upon an (often) unwarranted stereotype of reality, and the reality of the fake
- e.g. the queues in Disneyland – may be much worse than anything the average visitor would actually experience in Egypt, New
2 The Marketing
Table 2.1 Postmodern conditions and their main themes
Hyperreality Fragmentation Revers al of produ ction and consu mptio n Decentred subject Juxtaposition of opposites Reality as part of symbolic world and constructed rather than given Signifier/signified (structure) replaced by the notion of endless signifiers The emergence of symbolic and the spectacle as the basis of reality The idea that marketing is constantly involved in the creation of more real than real The blurring of the distinction between real and non-real Consumption experiences are multiple, disjointed Human subject has a divided self Terms such as ‘authentic self’ and ‘centered connections’ are questionable Lack of commitment to any (central) theme Abandonment of history, origin, and context Marketing is an activity that fragments consumption signs and environments and reconfigures them through style and fashion Fragmentation as the basis for the creation of body culture Postmodernism is basically a culture of consumption, while modernism represents a culture of production Abandonment of the notion that production creates value while consumption destroys it Sign value replaces exchange value as the basis of consumption Consumer paradox: Consumers are active producers of symbols and signs of consumption, as marketers are Consumers are also objects in the marketing process, while products become active agents
2 The Marketing The following modernist notions of the subject are called into question: Human subject as a self-knowing, independent agent Human subject as a cognitive subject Human subject as a unified subject Postmodernist notions of human subject: Human subject is historically and culturally constructed Language, not cognition, is the basis for subjectivity Instead of a cognitive subject, we have a communicative subject Authentic self is displaced by made- up self Rejection of modernist subject as a male subject Pastiche as the underlying principle of juxtaposition Consumption experiences are not meant to reconcile differences and paradoxes, but to allow them to exist freely Acknowledges that fragmentation, rather than unification, is the basis of consumption Source: adapted from Firat and Venkatesh (1995).
2 The Marketing the rest. In the words of leading marketing authority, Alan Mitchell (2001, p. 60): There is nothing wrong with trying to be scientific about marketing; in trying to under- stand cause and effect. And stimulus–response marketing has chalked up many successes. Nevertheless, it now faces rapidly diminishing returns. Consumers are becoming ‘marketing literate’. They know they are being stimulated and are developing a resistance to these stimuli, even learning to turn the tables. Consumers increasingly refuse to buy at full price, for example, knowing that a sale is just around the corner. They have fun ‘deconstructing’ advert- isements. The observed has started playing games with the observer. Buyers are starting to use the system for their own purposes, just as marketers attempted to use it for theirs.
Juxtaposition of opposites
Although it is well-nigh impossible to ‘target’ or ‘capture’ the inscrutable, amorphous, unpin- downable entity that is the postmodern con- sumer, it is still possible to engage with, appeal to, or successfully attract them. The key to this quasi-conversation is not ever more precise segmentation and positioning, but the exact opposite. An open, untargeted, ill-defined, imprecise approach, which leaves scope for imaginative consumer participation (e.g. ironic advertising treatments where the purpose, pitch or indeed ‘product’ is unclear), is typical of postmodern marketing. This sense of fluidity and porosity is achieved by pastiche, by bri- colage, by radical juxtaposition, by the mixing and matching of opposites, by combinations of contradictory styles, motifs and allusions, whether it be in the shimmering surfaces of pseudo-rococo postmodern buildings or the ceaseless cavalcade of contrasting images that are regularly encountered in commercial breaks, shop windows or roadside billboards. Occasionally, these succeed in exceeding the sum of their parts and combine to produce a sublime whole, an ephemeral spectacular, a fleeting moment of postmodern transcendence, as in Riverdance , Shrek or Kotler on Marketing. Well, okay, two out of three ain’t bad...
Limited time only
While few would deny that Firat and Venkatesh have done much to explain the postmodern marketing condition, their analysis is not with- out its weaknesses. Many commentators would contest their inventory of overarching themes and, indeed, the very idea itself of identifiable overarching themes. Little is accomplished by reciting such shortcomings. It is sufficient to note that all manner of alternative takes on postmodern marketing are now available and all sorts of signature ‘themes’ have been sug- gested. Cova (1996), for example, considers it to be about the ‘co-creation of meaning’. Thomp- son (2000) regards ‘reflexivity’ as the be all and end all. O’Donohoe (1997) draws attention to the importance of ‘intertextuality’. And Sherry (1998) sets great store by PoMo’s preoccupation with ‘place’. The important point, however, is not that any of these readings is ‘right’ or ‘wrong’, but that postmodern marketing is itself plurivalent and open to multiple, highly personal, often irreconcilable interpretations. For my own part, I reckon that retrospection is the defining feature of the present postmodern epoch and acerbic comedian George Carlin concurs (Table 2.2). The merest glance across the marketing landscape reveals that retro goods and services are all around. Old- fashioned brands, such as Atari, Airstream and Action Man, have been adroitly revived and success- fully relaunched. Ostensibly extinct trade char- acters, like Mr Whipple, Morris the Cat and Charlie the Tuna, are cavorting on the super- market shelves once more. Ancient commercials are being rebroadcast (Ovaltine, Alka-Seltzer); time- worn slogans are being resuscitated (Brit- ney Spears sings ‘Come Alive’ for Pepsi); and long-established products are being
2 The Marketing repackaged in their original, eye-catching liveries (Blue Nun, Sun Maid raisins). Even motor cars and washing
2 The Marketing customer-orientation for a marketing philoso- phy predicated on imagination, creativity and rule breaking. It refuses to truck with the guru du jour and goes back to the marketing giants of yesteryear – Wroe Alderson, Ralph Breyer, Melvin Copeland and all the rest. It not only ignores the latest marketing best-seller but seeks inspiration instead in anthologies of recycled, reheated and rehashed articles by scholarly back-scratchers (two plugs and a gratuitous insult in one paragraph; must be a record!).
One careful owner
The retro marketing revolution is all very well, but the postmodern paradigm of which it is part poses a very important question for mar- keting and consumer researchers. Namely, how is it possible to understand, represent or describe postmodern marketing phenomena, when postmodernism challenges the very premises of conventional research? The logic, order, rationality and model-building mod- alities of the modernist research tradition seem singularly inappropriate when addressing postmodern concerns. Now, this is not to suggest that established tools and techniques cannot be applied to postmodern artefacts and occurrences. There are any number of essen- tially modernist portrayals of the postmodern marketing condition (what is it?, what are its principal characteristics?, what can we ‘do’ with it?). Yet the relevance of such approaches remains moot. Is it really possible to capture the exuberance, the flamboyance, the incongruity, the energy, the playfulness of postmodern consumption in a standard, all-too-standard research report? On the surface, this may seem like a comparatively trivial matter – if we jazz up our reports and use expressive language, everything will be okay – but it goes to the very heart of why we do what we do, how we do it and who we do it for. The decision facing marketing, as it has faced other academic disciplines grappling with postmodern incursions, is whether we should strive to be postmodern marketing researchers or researchers of postmodern marketing. The former implies that the modalities of post- modernism should be imported into marketing research, that we should endeavour to ‘walk the talk’, to be postmodern in our publications, presentations and what have you. The latter intimates that researchers should confine them- selves to applying proven tools and techniques to the brave old world of postmodern market- ing. Just because the market has changed, or is supposed to have changed, it does not neces- sarily follow that tried and trusted methods of marketing research must change as well. Although this choice is nothing if not clear- cut, a moment’s reflection reveals it to be deeply divisive at best and potentially ruinous at worst. After all, if one group of marketing researchers works in a postmodern mode, a mode that is unlike anything that has gone before, it is fated to ‘fail’ when conventional standards of assessment are applied. Post- modern marketing research cannot meet the criteria – rigour, reliability, trustworthiness and so on – that are accepted, indeed expected , by champions of established methods and used to judge the worth, the contribution, the success or otherwise of a particular piece of work. For many commentators, then, postmodern mar- keting research does not constitute ‘research’ as such (other terms, invariably pejorative, are usually applied). However, as academic careers depend upon the publication of research find- ings, the potential for internecine conflict is self- evident. True, the etiquette of intellectual discourse emphasizes mutual tolerance, open- ness to opposing points of view, the community of scholars and suchlike, but the practicalities of academic politics belie this placid facade. Insurgence, in-fighting and intolerance are the order of the day. Hell, they’ll be criticizing Shelby Hunt next! It would be excessive to imply that this latter-day postmodern dalliance has precipitated a civil war in the marketing academy – albeit
Postmodern marketing: everything 2 ‘civil’, in the sense of maintaining a semblance of scholarly decorum whilst slugging it out, describes the situation very well – but the PoMo fandango undoubtedly carries connotations of crisis, of uncertainty, of catastrophe, of intellec- tual meltdown. Indeed, almost every commenta- tor on the postmodern condition refers to this oppressive atmosphere of ‘crisis’. Denzin (1997), for instance, describes three contemporary crises facing the citadels of cerebration: ● crisis of representation, where established modes of depicting ‘reality’ (e.g. theories, metaphors, textual genres) are inadequate to the task; ● crisis of legitimacy, where conventional criteria for assessing research output (validity, reliability, objectivity etc.) leave a lot to be desired; and ● crisis of praxis, where academic contributions signally fail to contribute to the resolution, or even clarification, of practical problems. Although formulated with regard to the human sciences generally, these concerns are highly relevant to the state of late-twentieth-century marketing and consumer research. Our models are outmoded, our theories undertheorized, our laws lawless. Reliability is increasingly unreliable, the pursuit of reason unreasonable, and there are mounting objections to objectiv- ity. Practitioners often fail to see the point of scholarly endeavour, despite the enormous amount of energy it absorbs, and get absolutely nothing of worth from the principal journals. Except, of course, when postmodernists pub- lish therein.
This way up
The picture, however, is not completely bleak. The postmodern manoeuvre in marketing and consumer research, which has been in train for more than a decade, has brought benefits as well as costs. Scholarly conflict, remember, is not necessarily a ‘bad thing’. On the contrary, a host of thinkers, from Nietzsche to Feyerabend, has observed that conflict can be a force for the good, since it helps avoid intellectual disin- tegration, dilapidation and decline (Brown, 1998b; Collins, 1992). Be that as it may, perhaps the greatest benefit of this postmodern pirouette is that it led to dramatic changes in the methodology, domain and source material of marketing research (see Belk, 1991, 1995; Hirschman and Holbrook, 1992; Sherry, 1991). Methodolog- ically, it opened the door to an array of qualitative/interpretive research procedures predicated on hermeneutics, semiotics, phe- nomenology, ethnography and personal intro- spection, to name but the most prominent. In terms of domain, it focused attention on issues previously considered marginal to the mana- gerial mainstream of brand choice and shop- per behaviour (e.g. gift giving, compulsive consumption, obsessive collecting, grooming rituals, the meaning of personal possessions) and which has further encouraged researchers’ interest in the tangential, peripheral or hith- erto ignored (homelessness, drug addiction, prostitution, consumer resistance, conspicuous consumption in the developing world etc.). With regard to source material, moreover, it has given rise to the realization that meaningful insights into marketing and con- sumption can be obtained from ‘unorthodox’ sources like novels, movies, plays, poetry, newspaper columns, comedy routines and so forth. Few would deny that restaurant critic Jonathan Meades’ portrayal of the Hamburger Hades, colloquially known as Planet Holly- wood, is just as good, if not better, than anything currently available in the academic literature (Table 2.3). The outcome of the postmodern schism is summarized in Table 2.4, though it is important to reiterate that this rupture is not as clear-cut as the columns suggest. Truth to tell, modernist approaches remain very much in the academic ascendant, notwithstanding postmodernists’ brazen appropriation of the ‘cutting edge’
2 The Marketing Micro/Managerial Macro/Cultural Focus on buying Focus on consuming Emphasis on cognitions Emphasis on emotions American Multicultural Source: Belk (1995).
Postmodern marketing: everything 2 mantle. Similarly, the preferred stance of post- modern marketing researchers is by no means consistent or devoid of internal discord. Although the postmodern/post-positivist/ interpretive/qualitative perspective (the terms themselves are indicative of intra-paradigmatic wrangling) is often depicted in a monolithic manner, albeit largely for political purposes of the ‘us against them’ variety, postmodernism itself is unreservedly pluralist. It is a veritable monolith of pluralism. Some ‘postmodern’ marketing researchers, for example, employ qualitative methods that are overwhelmingly ‘scientific’ in tenor (e.g. grounded theory), whereas others utilize proce- dures that hail from the liberal wing of the liberal arts (personal introspection). Some sur- mise that such research should be evaluated according to conventional, if adapted, assess- ment criteria (trustworthiness, reliability etc.), while others contend that entirely different measures (such as verisimilitude, defamiliariza- tion or resonance) are rather more appropriate. Some say that the vaguely voguish term ‘post- modern’ has been usurped by non-postmodern, self-serving marketing researchers, although all such attempts to palisade the unpalisadable are themselves contrary to the unconditional post- modern spirit. Some, indeed, say it is impossible to ‘do’ postmodern research, since the attendant crisis of representation renders all theoretical, methodological and textual representations untenable. The ‘purpose’ of postmodernism is simply to expose the shortcomings of modernist marketing research, not offer an actionable alternative (see Brown, 1998a).
Open other side
Irrespective of internal debates, it is not unrea- sonable to conclude that the postmodern fis- sure has opened up a significant intellectual space within the field of marketing scholarship. Perhaps the most obvious manifestation of this ‘space’ is the manner in which marketing scholarship is communicated. Traditional research reports and academic articles have been supplemented with works of poetry, drama, photoessays, videography, netnogra- phy, musical performances and many more (Stern, 1998). Conventional modes of academic discourse – unadorned, passive voiced, third personed, painfully pseudo- scientific prose – are being joined by exercises in ‘experimental’ writing, where exaggeration, alliteration and flights of rhetorical fancy are the order of the day. The success of such experiments is moot, admittedly, and many mainstream marketing scholars are understandably appalled by such egregious exhibitions of self-indulgence. If nothing else, however, they do draw attention to the fact that writing in a ‘scientific’ manner isn’t the only way of writing about marketing. There is no law that says marketing discourse must be as dry as dust, though a perusal of the principal academic journals might lead one to think otherwise. The postmodernists, then, are few in num- ber. But they have challenged the conventions of marketing scholarship and, while this might not seem like much, it is having a significant impact on mainstream marketing. Consider Market-Led Strategic Change , Nigel Piercy’s mega-selling, CIM-certified, every- home- should-have-one textbook. The first edition was written in a very conventional, straight-down- the-middle manner (Piercy, 1992). However, the reflexive, insouciant, self- referential tone of the second edition clearly shows the influence of postmodern modalities, as does the recently published third. True, Piercy goes out of his way to disparage postmodern precepts – alleg- ing that the libel laws, no less, prevent the venting of his scholarly spleen – nevertheless there is no question that his text has taken a postmodern turn, some would say for the worse (but not me, your honour). Pointing Piercy at the post is quite an achievement, most marketers would surely agree. Unfortunately, there’s a long line ahead of him. In this regard, perhaps the most striking thing about marketing’s postmodern apocalypse
2 The Marketing New Marketing is a challenge to the pseudo- scientific age of business. It is a great human, subjective enterprise. It is an art. New Marketing needs New Market Research. Old market research was largely there to objectify and to justify – to support conventions. New Marketing is here to challenge and seek the unconventional. Thus spake postmodernism. I think...
Closing down sale
For many, ‘postmodern’ is the latest in a long line of pseudo-intellectual buzz-words that attain prominence for a moment, only to pass swiftly into merciful obscurity. However, post- modernism’s fifteen minutes of Warholesque fame seems to be dragging on a bit. Post- modern intrusions are evident across the entire spectrum of scholarly subject areas, marketing and consumer research among them. Indeed, the flotsam, jetsam and general detritus of consumer society are widely regarded, by non- business academics especially, as the very epitome of postmodernity. ‘Postmodern’, admittedly, is an umbrella term which shelters a number of closely related positions. These range from latter-day develop- ments in the aesthetic sphere, most notably the blurring of hitherto sacrosanct boundaries between high culture and low, to the re- emergence of counter-Enlightenment procliv- ities among para-intellectuals and academicians. The multifaceted character of postmodern- ity is equally apparent in marketing milieux. The phenomenon known as the postmodern consumer, which comprises gendered subject positions indulging in playful combinations of contrasting identities, roles and characters (each with its requisite regalia of consumables), is now an accepted, if under- investigated, socio-cultural artefact, as is the so-called ‘post- shopper’. The latter shops in a knowing, cynical, been-there-done-that- didn’t-buy-the- souvenirs manner or loiters in the mall looking at other consumers looking at them. For Firat
Postmodern marketing: everything 2 and Venkatesh, indeed, the essential character of postmodern marketing is captured in five main themes – hyperreality , fragmentation , reversed production and consumption , decentred subjects and juxtaposition of opposites – though these categories are not clear-cut and other commentators see things differently. Above and beyond empirical manifesta- tions of the postmodern impulse, the field of marketing and consumer research has been infiltrated by postmodern methodologies, epis- temologies, axiologies, ontologies, eschatolo- gies (any ologies you can think of, really). Although there is some debate over what actually constitutes postmodern marketing research, it is frequently associated with the qualitative or interpretive turn that was precip- itated by the Consumer Odyssey of the mid- 1980s and academics’ attendant interest in non- managerial concerns. Perhaps the clearest sign of ‘postmodernists at work’, however, is the convoluted, hyperbolic and utterly incom- prehensible language in which their arguments are couched, albeit their apparently boundless self-absorption is another distinctive textual trait. Does my brand look big in this? In fairness, the postmodernists’ linguistic excesses and apparent self-preoccupation serve a very important purpose. Their language mangling draws attention to the fact that ‘academic’ styles of writing are conventions not commandments, decided upon not decreed, an option not an order. But, hey, don’t take my word for it; check out the further reading below.
References
Appignanesi, R. an d Garratt, C.
Postmodernism fo r Beginners , Icon , Trumpington. Apple, M. (1984) Free Agents , Harper & Row, New York. Reprinted in McHale, B. (1992) Constructing Postmodernism , Routledge, Lon- don, pp. 38–41. Belk, R. W. (ed.) (1991) Highways and Buyways: Naturalistic Research from the Consumer Behav- ior Odyssey , Association for Consumer Research, Provo. Belk, R. W. (1995) Studies in the new con- sumer behaviour, in Miller, D. (ed.), Acknowledging Consumption , Routledge, Lon- don, pp. 58–95. Berger, W. (2001) Advertising Today , Phaidon, London. Best, S. and Kellner, D. (2001) The Postmodern Adventure , Guilford, New York. Bocock, R. (1993) Consumption , Routledge, London. Brown, S. (1995) Postmodern Marketing , Rout- ledge, London. Brown, S. (1996) Art or science?: fifty years of marketing debate, Journal of Marketing Man- agement , 12 (4), 243–267. Brown, S. (1998a) Postmodern Marketing Two: Telling Tales , ITBP, London. Brown, S. (1998b) Slacker scholarship and the well wrought turn, in Stern, B. B. (ed.), Representing Consumers , Routledge, London, pp. 365–383. Brown, S. (2001a) Marketing – The Retro Revolu- tion , Sage, London. Brown, S. (2001b) Torment your customers (they’ll love it), Harvard Business Review , 79 (9), 82–88. Brown, S. (2002) Art or science?: postmodern postscript, The Marketing Review , in press. Brown, S., Bell, J. and Carson, D. (1996) Apocaholics anoymous: looking back on the end of marketing, in Brown, S. et al. (eds), Marketing Apocalypse: Eschatology, Escapology and the Illusion of the End , Routledge, Lon- don, pp. 1–20. Brown, S., Bell, J. and Smithee, A. (1997) From genesis to revelation – introduction to the special issue, European Journal of Marketing , 31 (9/10), 632–638. Cala´s, M. B. and Smircich, L. (eds) (1997) Postmodern Management Theory , Ashgate, Dartmouth. Carlin, G. (1997) Brain Droppings , Hyperion, New York.
