Routledge Research in Consumer Culture

This series explores how and why consumers engage with goods, services, and experiences. In drawing attention to the complex relationship between marketplace resources and consumers’ lived experiences, the series highlights the varied and vast ways in which people consume market-mediated culture. The series offers a critical discussion of consumption meanings, practices, discourses, and ideologies that both shape and are shaped by consumer culture.

In recognising the breadth of consumer culture research, a key value of the series is diversity and the series promotes research on a wide range of consumption phenomena and contexts. The series pushes the boundaries of consumer culture research and is open to topics and contexts not highly featured in academic outlets. This includes research that challenges normalised understandings of consumption from Western consumers in favour of understanding cultural variation and more localised consumption traditions.

Another key value of the series is the promotion of socially relevant topics. Many contemporary global challenges – e.g., poverty, sustainability, inequality, the cost-of-living crisis - are impacted by consumption, meaning that consumer researchers are ideally positioned to contribute to critical societal debates. The series explores how practices related to acquisition, consumption and disposal can both exacerbate and support solutions to social challenges.

If you have an idea for series, please contact Commissioning Editor Alex Atkinson ([email protected]) for more information.