Week 1
Monday
March 31

Introductions: The Consuming Society
Consuming Trends
Vigil
Another Vigil
Dove Soap: Anti-AD

View: Part 1
Century of the Self: Happiness Machines
Wikipedia on Documentary, Century of Self
Pod: Paper 1
Pod: Topics for Research Paper

Pod: Wrap Up of Week One--with comment particularly on the topic of resistance to advertising.
Read and Discuss:"Propaganda," 1-15 and "Why the Self is Empty," 15-27 in reader.
Freud Museum, London
Freud Archives
Here's Looking At You or: Zip Code Consumer Analysis

From One Dimensional Man, Herbert Marcuse:

1: The New Forms of Control

A comfortable, smooth, reasonable, democratic unfree­dom prevails in advanced industrial civilization, a token of technical progress. Indeed, what could be more rational than the suppression of individuality in the mechanization of socially necessary but painful performances; the concentration of individual enterprises in more effective, more productive corporations;the regulation of free competition among unequally equipped economic subjects; the curtail­ment of prerogatives and national sovereignties which impede the international organization of resources. That this technological order also involves a political and intellectual coordination may be a regrettable and yet promising devel­opment.

The rights and liberties which were such vital factors in the origins at earlier stages of industrial society , yield to a higher stage of this society: they are losing their traditional rationale and content. Freedom of thought, speech, and conscience were—just as free enterprise, which they served to promote and protect—essentially critical ideas, designed to replace an obsolescent material and intellectual culture by a more productive and rational one. Once institutionalized, these rights and liberties shared the fate of the society of which they had become an integral part. The achievement cancels the premises.

To the degree to which freedom from want, the con­ crete substance of all freedom, is becoming a real possibility, the liberties which pertain to a state of lower productivity are losing their former content. Independence of thought, autonomy, and the right to political opposition are being deprived of their basic critical function in a society which seems increasingly capable of satisfying the needs of the individuals through the way in which it is organized. Such a society may justly demand acceptance of its principles and institutions, and reduce the opposition to the discussion and promotion of alternative policies within the status quo. In this respect, it seems to make little difference whether the increasing satisfaction of needs is accomplished by an authoritarian or a non-authoritarian system. Under the conditions of a rising standard of living, non-conformity with the system itself appears to be socially useless, and the more so when it entails tangible economic and political disadvantages and threatens the smooth operation of the whole. Indeed, at least in so far as the necessities of life are involved, there seems to be no reason why the production and distribution of goods and services should proceed through the competi­tive concurrence of individual liberties.

Freedom of enterprise was from the beginning not altogether a blessing. As the liberty to work or to starve, it spelled toil, insecurity, and fear for the vast majority of the population. If the individual were no longer compelled to prove himself on the market, as a free economic subject, the disappearance of this kind of freedom would be one of the greatest achievements of civilization. The technological proc­ esses of mechanization and standardization might release individual energy into a yet uncharted realm of freedom beyond necessity. The very structure of human existence would be altered; the individual would be liberated from the work world's imposing upon him alien needs and alien pos­ sibilities. The individual would be free to exert autonomy over a life that would be his own.

Blog Entry: The Empty Self. Click here.

Marx on Money (1844) sounds strangely familiar:

That which is for me through the medium of money — that for which I can pay (i.e., which money can buy) — that am I myself, the possessor of the money. The extent of the power of money is the extent of my power. Money’s properties are my — the possessor’s — properties and essential powers. Thus, what I am and am capable of is by no means determined by my individuality. I am ugly, but I can buy for myself the most beautiful of women. Therefore I am not ugly, for the effect of ugliness — its deterrent power — is nullified by money. I, according to my individual characteristics, am lame, but money furnishes me with twenty-four feet. Therefore I am not lame. I am bad, dishonest, unscrupulous, stupid; but money is honoured, and hence its possessor. Money is the supreme good, therefore its possessor is good. Money, besides, saves me the trouble of being dishonest: I am therefore presumed honest. I am brainless, but money is the real brain of all things and how then should its possessor be brainless? Besides, he can buy clever people for himself, and is he who has a power over the clever not more clever than the clever? Do not I, who thanks to money am capable of all that the human heart longs for, possess all human capacities? Does not my money, therefore, transform all my incapacities into their contrary?

Six Ways to Make Friends:

Summary from Dale Carnegie's How to Win Friends and Influence People:

Six ways to make people like you

1. Become genuinely interested in other people.
2. Smile.
3. Remember that a person's name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language.
4. Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves.
5. Talk in terms of the other person's interests.
6. Make the other person feel important - and do it sincerely.

Blog Entry: First Paragraph(s) for Paper 1
Podcast: Response to First Paragraphs with an eye towards P1.
View Part 2: Century of the Self: The Engineering of Consent
Bernay: Excellent Site, Background Material
Podcast: Week 2 Wrap-up with a sort of overview of the development of the CS since WWI.

Wednesday
April 16

Read: "Introduction: Consumption, Narcissism, and Mass Culture," 22-38
View Part 3: Century of the Self: There is a Policeman Inside All Our Heads: He Must Be Destroyed

Carl's Juniors: fantasy land

Appeals to the Unconscious? Once again the Torch of Freedom, but all wet this time:

Week 4
Monday
April 21

Read: "Infantilizing Consumers: The Coming of Kidults," 39-56.
Blog Entry 5: Two More Paragraphs

"Few things are more significant than your relationship to your Michelin tires."

"If beef was meant to be frozen wouldn't cows be raised in Anarctica."

Edward Bernays
he pierced through the bewildered herds'
collective skull
translating subconscious needs
with the help of
his Uncle Freud's manifesto
Because of him, our primal drives
became profitable,
malleable, but foremost to
Bernay's parlay into history books,
lies in his money driven
mass manipulation
continuing to produce successive generations
of faithful consumers
consumed with the belief
that these tangible goods which Bernays force fed us
would actually, as advertised,
sustain us.

Stephanie B's little poem

View Part 4: Century of the Self: Eight People Sipping Wine in Kettering
More ads

Wednesday
April 23

Rough Draft of Paper 1 Due
Podcast Paper 1 Final Words
Reader Response Procedure
Another Vigil

Paper 1 due by 5 PM via email attachment.
Please note. My deadlines are flexible.
I would like to have as many papers as possible by the Friday deadline.
I know, though, this is midterms. In order to allow you to find the time you might need to do your best work, you may turn in your papers as late as Tuesday, April 29, by noon via email attachment with no markdown on the grade.
Please send your paper along as soon as you finish it.

Week 5
Monday
April 28

ebay
Smartwater again:
She's Gorgeous
Live the Fantasy!
Custom Cars

Please note: we will meet--not in our usual classroom--on this day but over in the computer lab called Language in Phelps. People can start research at that time and also run through the diverse resourses--data bases, electronic journals--in the library.

Consumer confidence

Bring examples of research materials you have gathered to class for discussion and analysis.
Do blog entry: URLs related to your research topic....
Reader Response Sheet for Research Proposal

Wednesday
May 14

Week 8
Monday
May 19

Wednesday
May 21

Wednesday
June 4

Friday
June 6

Research Paper Due by 5 PM via email attachment.

I will not be able to accept papers after Sunday, June 8, at noon via email attachment (except for extreme circumstances. If you experience these extreme circumstances, please email me asap) (also if you need a few more hours on Sunday, take them).

Basic Specifications for Research Paper

Paper should be 10 pages minimum.
Paper should reference a minimum of 8 citations.
Paper should have a works cited page.
Paper should employ consistently one of the primary citation styles (MLA, APA, Chicago).
No not included URL's for web pages within the text of the paper. Include them in the works cited page. Instructions for Web Sources MLA, APA .
Section headings may be employed but are not obligatory.
Images may be included, but will not count toward the ten page minimum.