《嘉莉妹妹》中的消费文化研究

论文总字数：37854字

摘 要

本论文立足消费社会中物化的人物关系对美国著名作家西奥多.德莱塞的《嘉莉妹妹》这部小说进行解读，本论文将由三部分组成。

论文第一章讨论物质消费在消费社会的三个方面:服装、住宅、饭店。在消费社会中,消费文化颠覆了传统社会工作，取代了对常见的基本生活用品的渴望。一个稳定的家庭和稳定社会关系对物质，服务和娱乐的东西变得贪得无厌。受消费意识形态的驱使,人们尝试购买，消费主义成为了通过购买产品支持他们的自我崭新形象的一种方式。消费显示了人们的身份、社会地位、财富等。消费传达出更多的信息，不仅仅是商品本身。因此,消费可以满足人们的虚荣心。

论文第二章消费文化中的拜金主义。《嘉莉妹妹》创作背景是在19世纪的美国。从1870年到1900年,美国经历了一个经济转型,在这个期间工业经济变得成熟,大型企业快速扩张,大规模农业进行发展。来自欧洲南部和东部,亚洲、墨西哥和中美洲移民空前激增,是这个时期增长这个增长和发展不可或缺的因素转型确实带来了很多繁荣,但这同时这意味着下层阶级的贫穷。美国生活在19世纪的产业工人过着非常困难的生活。他们经常工资底,但却长时间工作在不健康和危险的工作环境中。因此,巨大的经济差距刺激了美国社会的拜金主义。拜金主义把金钱价值看作最高价值、一切价值都要服从于金钱价值的思想观念和行为。拜金主义认为金钱不仅万能，而且是衡量一切行为的标准。拜金主义了过于强调金钱,导致了人们唯利是图和精神空虚本章讨论了嘉莉和汉森的两种不同的生活方式,杜洛埃享乐的生活方式, 赫斯特伍德的消费家庭,这些都来展示他们的拜金主义,尽管他们来自不同的社会阶层。

论文第三章从亲情，友情，爱情讨论了《嘉莉妹妹》中。在消费社会中我们不仅消费物质层面的东西也消费人际关系。在消费社会中所有的事情都是以金钱衡量。传统的人际关系受到很大挑战，人们变得越来越冷漠。

总之，本论文采用文化分析的方法着重描述消费文化特征在小说中的具体体现。通过《嘉莉妹妹》在消费文化语境下分析，本论文最终得出结论:作为商品化社会的积极参与者，德莱塞成功描述了一个消费意识形态影响下基于交换法则的纯粹商品化世界。该小说生动描绘了19世纪末美国商品化社会真实而生动的画面。《嘉莉妹妹》可视为一部展示消费文化真实和显著特征的现代都市小说。

关键词:《嘉莉妹妹》; 消费文化; 物质消费; 拜金主义; 冷漠的人际关系

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements i

Abstract ii

摘要 .iv

Table of Contents v

Introduction 1

Chapter One Material Consumption in Sister Carrie 4

1.1 Clothes 4

1.2 Residence 5

1.3 Restaurants 6

Chapter Two Money Worship in the Consumer Culture 10

2.1 Carrie and the Hansons'lifestyles 10

2.2 Drouet Pursuing for Pleasure Lifestyle 11

2.3 Hustwood's Consuming Family 12

Chapter Three Alienation of Human Psychology Relationship in Sister Carrie 7

3.1 Kinship 7

3.2 Friendship 8

3.3 Love 9

Conclusion 14

Works Citied 15

Introduction

During the period of the early 20th century, Theodore Dreiser (1871-1945) is among the most important American novelists. Sister Carrie is Dreiser’s first novel that talks about a rural girl’s rise to material success. At first, Carrie is the mistress of Drouet and Hurstwood and treats men as ladders to win success. At last, Carrie becomes a well-known actress and gets the social status and wealth she desires. In Sister Carrie, Dreiser successfully describes the commercialized world built up on the basis of the law of exchange-value under the effect of newly developed consumption ideology. With no doubts, Sister Carrie is thought of as a mirror of early consumption society in the late nineteenth-century and can be seen as a modern metropolitan novel that illustrates the remarkable and distinct features of consumer culture. Theodore Dreiser is an active participant of consumer society and greatly affected by the rise of the new consumption ideology.

Sister Carrie is considered as “immoral” and many publishers refuse to publish this novel. Harper Brothers, the first publisher of the novel, rejects it for the reason that they think it is not “sufficiently delicate to depict without offense to the reader the continued illicit relations of the heroine” (Riggo 48). The novel languishes for years in a paper limbo. However, it finally wins great success. Norris is an adviser for Doubleday publishing house “is much taken by the narrative” and thinks that it is “the best novel I have read since I have been reading for the firm.” (Riggo 53). Sister Carrie has been studied by a large member of American critics since its publication. Many studies have been conducted on Dreiser’s works like Helen Dreiser’s My Life with Dreiser (1951); F.O.Matthiessen’s Theodore Dreiser (1951), an inestimable critical biography of Dreiser and his novels; The Stature of Theodore Dreiser (1955), critical essays offering biographical and critical comments on Dreiser’s works; Doctorow's An Introduction to Sister Carrie (1958); Robert Elias’ Letters of Theodore Dreiser (1959); James Farrell's Theodore Dreiser (1962); Charles Shapiro's Theodore Dreiser: Our Bitter Patriot (1962); Richard Lehan’s Theodore Dreiser (1971); William Frohock’s Theodore Dreiser (1972); Lawrence E. Hussman’s Dreiser and His Fiction: a Twentieth-century Quest (1983). During the period of the 1980s, critics begin to study Dreiser from new perspectives, such as feminism, Freudian psychological analysis, and post-structuralism. Studies of these angles include: Gogol Miriam’s Theodore Dreiser: Beyond Naturalism, which is the first collection of academic articles on Dreiser to appear since 1971; Rachel Bowlby’s Just Looking: Consumer Culture in Dreiser, Gissing and Zola; Louis J. Zanine’s Mechanism and Mysticism-The Influence of Science on the Thought and Work of Theodore Dreiser. In the recent time, Critics have employed a new angle of consumer culture to do research on Sister Carrie and turn their attention to the novel’s striking depictions of the city life, viewing Sister Carrie as a major text of urban modernity, describing endangered city life infused with both co-modification and consumption in American society.

In China, Sister Carrie arouses many researches among the intellectual circles. Qu Qiubai writes articles to introduce Dreiser to the Chinese in the 1930’s. Sister Carrie draws great attention among Chinese critics since the year 1978 with the renaissance of foreign literature studies flourishing in China. Some most influential essays on Sister Carrie include Zhang Hezhen’s On Dreiser’s Morality: Considerations on Humanity in American Literature (1990); Wang Ganghua’s Sister Carrie Desire and Motivations (2002); Huang Kaihong’s On American Dream in the Transitional Society: Sister Carrie’s Moral Tendency (2006). They try to study the novel from different angles such as realism, naturalism, feminism, post-structuralism and Freudian psychology and so on. Recently, consumer culture emerges because of the development of literary criticism and the change of historical context.

Carrie changes from innocence to materialization, highlighting the background and social value orientation. Our society is at the transitional period and is full of hedonism. We can find that many people in the present society are just like Carrie in the novel. Thus, studying Sister Carrie has practical significance. We can also see that Carrie experiences three life stages: materials, careers, spirit. Sister Carrie makes us think of the life meanings in the transitional period in the present society.

Dreiser wants to show these themes in the novel: the surface temptation of the city, its harsh economy and social rise and fall, roles played by clothes, residence and other items of conspicuous consumption. Economy plays the leading part in this novel. Theodore Dreiser shows a world of American capitalism at the end of the 19^th century. Conspicuous consumption, individual desire, unbearable poverty and class have confliction because of the extensive descriptions of department stores and working conditions in factory. America also developed rapidly in economy and produced numerous goods in this period. It changed from a production-oriented society to a consumption-oriented one because of the development of industrialization and urbanization. American society emphasizes on consumption and propagandized for it with great efforts; Therefore, American experienced great changes in social life and culture value orientation under the effect of consumer culture. Consumer culture highly promotes sensual pleasure. Individuals would attach special meanings to different goods according to their will，thus bringing themselves enjoyment and pleasures．

Chapter one Consumption of Material Goods in Sister Carrie

In the consumer society, consumer culture overturns the traditional social workings by replacing the common and normal desire for a basic supply of life’s necessities, a solid family tie and stable social relationships with a shallow and insatiable craving for material things, services and recreational stuffs. Driven by the consumption ideology, people try to use spending and materialism as a way to become a new person by buying products which support their self-image. Consumption shows people’s identity, social status, wealth and so on. Consumption conveys more information than the commodity itself. Thus, consumption can meet people’s vanity of showing-off.

1.1 Clothes

Clothing is one of the most important symbols of consumption culture and consumption level and is also an outer manifestation of people’s indeed minds. The pursuit of high-end clothing is the product of consumer culture and is also the direct reflection of commercialization and materialization in the consumer society. People all have strong desire to show their identity and status through clothing. In Sister Carrie, the Protagonist Carrie is crazy about great colorful costumes. High-grade clothing can not only make her feel warm and become more beautiful, but also can reflect her social status and identity. When Carrie first met Drouet on the train to Chicago, she noticed that there was a large economic gap between Drouet and her from the comparison of their dresses, “Her own plain blue dress, with its black cotton tape trimmings, now seemed to her shabby. She felt the worn state of her shoes” (Dreiser 12). In contrast, Drouet apparently wears quite well, “The whole suit was rather tight-fitting, and was finished off with heavy-soled tan shoes; highly polished, and the gray fedora hat” (Dreiser 10). Therefore, Carrie estimates that Drouet has a good economic position and is among the upper class of the society, “The purse, the shiny tan shoes, the smart new suit, and the air with which he did things, build up for her a dim world of fortune, of which he was the center.” (Dreiser 14)

Carrie’s first experiences in the department store also stimulate her interests and desires for the material world. At first, she feels a little embarrassed to accept money from Drouet when he first gives her $20 to buy some fancy clothes. However, she is accustomed to using Drouet’s money to buy fancy clothes for herself in a short time. Drouet is able to meet her material satisfaction, which is also the reason why she could be his mistress. As for Carrie, the pursuit of clothing is not only her basic life needs, but also her conspicuousness of others. In the fiction, Dreiser also has a plot about the clothing show in New York, which expresses people’s enthusiastic pursuit of clothing. In the exhibit, Carrie’s mood is complex. On the one hand, she can be exposed to the most fashionable crowds and the most impressive events. On the other hand, she can not join the ranks in a real sense, just watching the so-called splendid clothing show. However, she wants to become one of upper-class people one day.

Thus, we can conclude that people’s images and social status at that time are closely related to pursuing clothes and fashion. Clothing is the symbol of social status and wealth.

1.2 Residence

In the novel Sister Carrie, the house is an obvious and important sign of the personal social status. The residence can tell others how rich the owner is and represents the owner’s social positions. In the fiction, Dreiser has comparatively detailed description of the main characters’ housing situations. The novel describes Hanson’s crude and shabby apartment at the beginning, Carrie’s luxurious Wellington Hotel in the end, Hurstwood’s elite housing in Chicago and his miserable place costing 15 cents per day in New York. The changes of main characters’ residence reflect the changes of their economic situations in different periods. In addition, the location, the environment, the decorations of the housing are also symbols of their material capabilities. In the novel, the rise of Carrie’s status is not just the changes of her dress and eating conditions, but also the changes of her living environments and conditions. At the end of the novel, Carrie becomes a famous actress and is arranged to live in the Wellington hotel that is among the most advanced, highest- level hotels in that period in New York. Carrie has the biggest satisfaction to live in this luxurious hotel and she feels at the top of the society. In contrast, Hurstwood is on the streets and ends his life in extreme despair.

Thus, the luxury of housing is the symbol of wealth and high social status and an important sign to distinguish people in the American commercialization of the consumer society.

1.3 Restaurants

Carrie and Drouet both shows great interests in having dinner in restaurants which are elegant because eating in such good environments shows their upper social class. At the time when Carrie loses her job and can’t go on with her living, she eats with Drouet in this kind of restaurant at the first time. The first experience to eat in the restaurant stirs up her desire to have a richer life.

“Half boiled spring chicken-seventy-five. Sirloin steak with mushroom-one twenty-five” (Dreiser, 1991: 54-55). Carrie thinks that Drouet must be a man and a reliable person because Drouet often eats in the best restaurants in Chicago. He often behaves decently in the luxurious restaurants and listens to some news about celebrities. He does not belong to the category. But here can make him feel like one of these celebrities. Similar to Drouet, Hurstwood also often comes here to have dinner. The place is full of information to him where he can also consolidate his relationships with the celebrities and promotes his social status. The second experience of Carrie to eat in an advanced restaurant is due to Vances’ invitation. The couple invites Carrie to have dinner in Sherry’s, a quite luxurious restaurant where the matter of expense limited to the moneyed or pleasure-loving class. She is attracted by the elegant atmosphere there and upper-class consumption. In Carrie’s eyes, the Vances are fortunate enough to live in this kind of luxurious way and she also realizes the economic gap between her and Mrs. Vance. From all these cases, we can find that people focus on self-realization in the high-end restaurants.

Chapter Two Money Worship in the Consumer Culture

Sister Carrie is set in America in the 1900s. From 1870 to 1900, the United States underwent an economic transformation marked by the maturing of the industrial economy, the rapid expansion of big business, the development of large-scale agriculture, and the rise of national labor unions and industrial conflict. Indispensible to this growth and development were an unprecedented surge in immigration arriving from Southern and Eastern Europe, from Asia, Mexico, and Central America. The transformation indeed resulted in prosperity for many, but meantime it meant virtual poverty for lower class people. American industrial workers lived a very difficult life in 19^th century. They often took low wages, but worked long hours in unhealthy and dangerous working conditions. Thus, the great economic gap stimulates the money worship in American society. Money worship regards money as the highest value, and all the thoughts and behaviors should submit to money. Money worship thinks that money is all-powerful and is a measure of all actions. Money worship lays too much emphasis on money so that people become money-oriented and spiritually empty. This chapter discusses Carrie and Hansons’ two different lifestyles, Drouet pleasure-seeking lifestyle, Hurstwood’s consuming family, which all reveal their money worship despite of their different class, race, gender, ethinicity and so on.

2.1 Comparing Carrie and the Hansons’ lifestyles

The Hansons can only afford the basic necessities for survival because of extreme poverty and have to spend long and harsh hours in the job. They agree that Carrie could live with them mainly because they can charge her of rents. When Carrie realizes the fact, their relationship ends. At the same time, Drouet flashes a spark of those fancy things, she recognizes at once that the lifestyle Hansons had embodies a lifestyle she must avoid. So Carrie is glad to move out from her sister’s flat.

Carrie and Hansons’ attitudes towards money are different and they represent two types of lifestyles. Carrie represents consumption lifestyle. To her, pleasure of life depend on money:“Ah, money, money, money! What a thing it was to have. How plenty of it would clear away all these troubles”(Dreiser 85). She desires for money all the time. In contrast, Minnie and Hanson prefer to save money and prepare for the future. Hanson is “of a clean, saving disposition, and had already paid a number of monthly installments on two lots far out on the West Side. His ambition was some day to build a house on them” (Dreiser 20). They refuse to go to theater for the reason that it is a waste of money and it is not beneficial for the future. There is a contrast between Minnie’s disagreement of theater and Carrie’s later success on stage as a famous actress. They live two different lifestyles. Minnie accepts the traditional life rules, which means wealth is built up slowly on continuous saving and long hours’ hard work. However, Carrie abandons the lifestyle because the slow accumulation of wealth can not meet her desire. She tries every means to elbow her way into the upper and wealthy world regardless of the traditional moral rules. Carrie has two immoral affairs with Drouet and Hurstwood on the way to her final success. Carrie has met three kinds of men: tactful Drouet, frugal Hanson and the rude co-workers before meeting Hurstwood. Carrie’s judgement of men can be regarded as choosing one lifestyle over another, Carrie is always attracted by the superior, rich and comfortable lifestyles. Her first man is Drouet and her next man is Hurstwood, which can explain this point. At first, Carrie thinks Drouet’s lifestyle is better than coworkers’ lifestyles. Next, spurred by new desires, she gradually becomes tired with Drouet and falls in love with more wealthy and superior Hurstwood. She thinks she will be provided with more chances to get luxurious commodities if she is with Hurstwood. At last, she chooses to leave Hurstwood because Hurstwood can not meet her material desires. Her pursuit of money, property and possessions is her life goal. Her mistress identity for Drouet is the unavoidable outcome of her material desires and the result of her choice of the consumer lifestyle.

2.2 Drouet’s Pleasure-seeking Lifestyle

Drouet is a pleasure-seeking salesman and his life goals are pleasure and sexual desire. Drouet is functioned as an example of consumer desire in the novel. In the consumer society, going after pleasure and seeking for sexual desire play important roles. As is described in the novel, Drouet’s first appearance can show his strong desire for sex and women and he is a very typical sex consumer.

“A strong physical nature, actuated by a keen desire for the feminine, was the next. A mind ...actuated not by greed, but an insatiable love of variable pleasure. His method was always simple, its principal element was daring, backed, of course.by an intense desire and admiration for the sex” (Dreiser 11).

Drouet’s approaching Carrie is due to his women-pursuing life goal. He treats Carrie as an advanced commodity that he can flaunt to his friends. Carrie leaves him at last also partly because no true love exists between them and their relationship is just a sex deal. Drouet works as a salesman, which can make him have satisfactory salary and have more opportunities to all the fashionable things. He can also benefit from his traveling life that provides him with many chances to run into fashionable young ladies. Flirting with various women at the same time is common for him. Drouet often flirts with other ladies although Carrie is his mistress and he avoids the marriage with Carrie because he wants more intense desires. Seeking pleasure and consuming sex are the most important things in his life in his mind. He will turn back to the former pains only if it conflicts with his “pleasure-seeking goal”. Thus, when knowing her success as an actress, it is not surprising that he goes to find Carrie and expects to reconstruct their former relationship. Carrie's fame and popularity, and high social status attract him so much that he would rather forget the former pains Carrie has brought to him. Drouet is set as an example as a new consumer in the whole novel. Although he is older and he is still crazy about wearing vogue clothes, having dinner at fancy restaurants and who desire greatly going after beauty women. He leads a comfortable life without spirit.

2.3 Hurstwood's Consumiug Family

Hurstwood’s family are typical consumers for commodities and pleasures. Their life is stimulated by their hedonistic desires rather than love, care, affection. Mrs. Hurstwood devotes all her time and energy to having upper class. Her material desires far outweigh all other things. George Jr. and Jessica, Mrs. Hurstwood’s children, are indifferent, mean and hedonistic. They only concern about the various conspicuous consumption of their neighbors, about luxury, a wonderful European-tour-plan and their benefits. They desire for wealth and high social status and Hurstwood can not meet their needs. Thus, their attitudes towards Hurstwood becomes colder and colder and Mrs. Hurstwood’s has little power in the family. They even do not care about why their father has been absent from home when Hurstwood’s love affair is discovered by his wife. The family members are all self-centered and their nature has been distant on the effect of consumer culture. Mrs. Hurstwood holds no love and care for Hurstwood and children also have no passions for Hurstwood. Consumer society drives them self-centered, hedonistic.

Chapter Three Alienation of Human Psychology Relationship in Sister Carrie

We consume not only material goods but also human relationships in the consumer society. In the consumer society, all things are measured by money; the traditional human relationships are changed greatly so that people become more and more alienated. This chapter discusses from the three aspects: kinship, friendship, love.

3.1 Kinship

In the novel, family relationship is totally different from what the reader can imagine in the daily life. Consumer culture has changed the affections among people, including kinship, friendship and love because everything is determined by social status and economic strength. As a result, the once warm and friendly family relations are replaced by cold materialized relations.

At the beginning of the novel, Carrie goes to Chicago to visit her sister Minnie. Minnie and her husband Hanson agree that she can live here for the purpose of benefiting from her labor salary. However, they didn’t care about their family relationship between them. Hanson didn’t care about whether Carrie is at home; her sister Minnie shows a little care about Carrie just because she can have rents from her every month. When Carrie is ill and loses her job, which means she can not pay the rents. Minnie and Hanson hope that she can go back home. At this time, Carrie realizes the affections between them are just a commodity based on the mutual benefit. Minnie and Hanson’s attitude toward Carrie also makes Carrie come to Drouet’s side. Carrie knows that “They would not care [her leaving]. Hanson particularly would be glad when she went. He would not care about what became of her.” (Dreiser 92)

Consumer culture has a great influence at the end of 19^th century and the beginning of 20^th century. Under the strong impact of consumer culture, people show off wealth and enjoy life without limits, especially in the Hurstwood’s family. Hurstwood’s family are the typical representation in the society. Hurstwood’s wife spend all her energies teaching her daughter to engage more with the gentlemen from the upper class in order to change the fates of the whole family. Mrs. Hurstwood cares little about her husband. In her world, nothing is more important than money and money is everything. Her two children are also indifferent, selfish and never satisfied with the life that Hurstwood affords them. The two children never care about their father’s heath and they just treat their father as the source of life expense. Essica, Hurstwood’s daughter, has “notions of life which were decidedly those of patrician. She liked nice clothes and urged for them constantly” (Dreiser 106). And Hurstwood’s son George Jr., has “considerable vanity, and a love of pleasure that had not, as yet infringed upon his duties, whatever they were”(Dreiser 106).When their father Hurstwood’s economic situation have a rapid fall, their attitudes towards their father become indifferent. They may not realize that they have lost the most expensive thing- the affections of kinship in the world-.

3.2 Friendship

People can get what they want even at the cost of friendship in the consumer culture. The numbers and types of friends can also show people’s social status. Thus, people try their best to associate more with the friends that are beneficial for them. Once the values of the friends are lost, they will forget and abandon the useless friends at once. Carrie’s experiences in New York make her understand that people can live in the same apartment for a long period of time without knowing each other. Carrie desires for making friends but nobody is willing to communicate with her. Thus, Hurstwood takes up the whole life of her. The economic problem of Hurstwood also changes his friendship. When Hurstwood is the manager in Chicago, his life is surrounded with different kinds of people, such as actresses, businessmen and such successful people in the society. “a very acceptable individual of our great American upper class-the first grade below the luxuriously rich.”(Dreiser 59).When Hurstwood steals money and escapes, his circle of friends change greatly and his old friends all avoid meeting him. Hurstwood becomes isolated and loses contact with all his old friends. In the later period, Hurstwood is in despair and none of his friends come to help him. The friendship is apparently vulnerable in consumer culture.

3.3 Love

In Sister Carrie, Carrie is the mistress of Drouet and Hurstwood. Drouet is the first man that Carrie knows about in her train to Chicago. Originally, Carrie is a pure girl who is full of imagination about the future. In the train, Drouet describes a good picture of Chicago which also arouses Carrie’s curiousness about the city. Drouet can be treated as the turning point in Carrie’s life. Carrie becomes Drouet’s mistress after accepting a large amount of help and care from him. Drouet is often with Carrie before Hurstwood and treats Carrie as his private property that stimulates Hurstwood’s envy of him. In fact, there is no true love between Carrie and Drouet. Carrie only cares about her appearance and how to become beautiful. Drouet treats Carrie as the commodity that can meet all his aspects of desires and Carrie just treats Drouet as the ladder that helps her get out of the poor situation. Thus we can conclude that there is no love or loved relationship between Drouet and Carrie and their relationship is just as consumers and commodities.

It is the same with Hurstwood. Carrie becomes more mature because of the constant contact with society and Drouet can not meet Carrie’s need gradually. At this time, Hurstwood appears and gives Carrie more hope. Carrie can’t avoid comparing Drouet with Hurstwood and she finds more advantages of Hurstwood. Carrie’s innocence, curiousness, desire for materials make her have a good impression of Hurstwood. Thus, the feelings that Carrie of Hurstwood can’t be called the true love.

On the other hand, Hurstwood is a successful middle-aged manager and is a typical image of a successful man. However, contradiction lies in his so-called calm and joyful family. There is no feeling and communication between his wife and him. Their marriage is only in form. Hurstwood’s enterprise, income, social status plays the leading role in their family because members of the family hope to be in the upper class. Nevertheless, the whole control lies in the hand of Mrs. Hurstwood and Hurstwood has low status in the family. Tired of the selfish family members and low family status, Hurstwood chooses to elope with Carrie. Only with Carrie can Hurstwood’s sense of entitlement, status and vanity be satisfied. Thus, the feelings that Hurstwood for Carrie can’t be called true love in a real sense.

Conclusion

America was exchanging from a production society to a consumption society during the period of late 19th century and the early 20th century. As a result, consumer culture emerged in America. Consumer culture includes consuming habits, consuming values and consuming ethics presented from people’s consumption behaviors in general. People treat consumption of commodities, like clothes, residence, restaurants, as signs to show their identity, wealth and social status. Besides, consumer culture advocates consumption, material possession and a life of enjoyment and satisfaction. Consumption can not only satisfy people’s needs but also indicate people’s identity, wealth and social status. Therefore, consumption has its symbolic functions.

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