The Nature of Leisure and Consumption

Abstract

Consumption studies, which describes and explains consumers, their consumptive behavior, and the creation, distribution, and purchase of the goods and services they consume, is a decidedly interdisciplinary field. Clarke, Doel, and Housiaux (2003, pp. 3–20) observe that, scientifically, consumption has been approached in three different ways, resulting in three identifiable bodies of literature. Economics and marketing look at it from the financial angle of the production and distribution of wealth. Anthropology, sociology, and cultural studies examine the social and cultural implications of consumption. History and geography explore consumptive practices across time and space. Such concerns as politics, ethics, and aesthetics, these authors observe, cut across these three bodies.