Aim of the course

Consumption is taking center stage as a subject of study in multiple disciplines, including sociology and anthropology among others. Marketing and consumer research disciplines, along with economics, which had claimed consumption studies as their terrain, are both energized and challenged by this new interest in consumption. The purpose of this course is to critically investigate some of the key classics that constitute the foundation for many of the current perspectives in consumer research. Authors covered during the seminar include but is not restricted to Jean Baudrillard, Pierre Bourdieu, Michel Foucault, Anthony Giddens, Jürgen Habermas, Claude Lévi-Strauss, and Marshall Sahlins. The learning goals of the seminar are on the one hand to provide a basic academic education for doctoral candidates within some of the major founding texts behind the current work of consumer culture theorists. On the other hand, the goal is also to demonstrate the relevance of general and classical theory for the specific empirical projects and contexts of the doctoral students.

Therefore, the program includes three major types of tutoring: 1) lecturing from the faculty on the canon of classics, 2) dialogues where faculty and students elaborate on the relationship between the bodies of theory covered and specific applications in contemporary consumer research and 3) a number of one-to-one sessions where students sign up for a meeting with a particular faculty member for discussion of and advice for the student’s own project. The seminar covers classical works and authors within a multitude of disciplines such as sociology, anthropology, critical theory and philosophy.

Faculty

The invited faculty members for this seminar are Eric J. Arnould, University of Wyoming, A. Fuat Fırat, UTPA, Benoît Heilbrunn, ESCP-EAP Paris, Jeff B. Murray, University of Arkansas and Melanie Wallendorf, University of Arizona. In addition, faculty will consist of Søren Askegaard, Matthias Bode, Dannie Kjeldgaard and Per Østergaard, all from University of Southern Denmark - Odense.

Location and dates

The seminar will take place at St. Catherine’s College of the University of Oxford, where we also enjoy on-site accommodation and meals. The seminar will begin Sunday, August 19th in the evening and end the night of Thursday August 23rd , 2012. Thus we expect the students to arrive Sunday afternoon August 19th at the latest and leave August 24th at the earliest.

Other course information

The seminar will be held in English, and is 6 ECTS credits. The number of students will be held at 25. The tuition for the seminar, which includes accommodation and all meals, is 850 Euros.

Seminar coordinator

Søren Askegaard, Professor of Marketing, Department of Marketing & Management, University of Southern Denmark - Odense, Campusvej 55, DK-5230 Odense M, Denmark. E-mail: aske@sam.sdu.dk. Tel: +45 65 50 32 55. Fax: +45 66 15 51 29.

Seminar prerequisites

There are no particular prerequisites for Ph.D. students. Selection will be made from among applicants on the basis of a letter of interest, which should address the student’s dissertation research interests and the fit of this seminar within their doctoral program or other research interests. The letter of interest including research project presentation should be no longer than 1.000 words, and should be submitted to the seminar coordinator no later than May 15th 2012.

The students who are selected will be required to read the literature included in this program. They will come to the seminar ready to make a brief presentation of their research project. Each of the faculty-presented sessions will be based on a combination of lecturing and dialogue based on the readings and the lecture. At the end of the seminar, students will make another presentation that will indicate how the seminar has expanded and enriched their research project. An important and by experience very valued part of the program, however, is a set of one-to-one interactive sessions with the faculty, where the student and one of the faculty members can meet and address particular questions and issues concerning the doctoral student’s own work.

To acquire the credits for the seminar, the student must deliver satisfactory presentations and participate actively and constructively in the seminar discussions as well as in the one-to-one sessions with faculty members. The group of faculty will meet at the end of the seminar to assess each of the students’ performance.