This book sheds light on the consumption of spiritual products, services, experiences, and places through state-of-the-art studies by leading and emerging scholars in interpretive consumer research, marketing, sociology, anthropology, cultural, and religious studies. The collection brings together fresh views and scholarship on a cultural tension that is at the centre of the lives of countless individuals living in postmodern societies: the relationship between the material and the spiritual, the sacred and the profane.

The book examines how a variety of agents – religious institutions, spiritual leaders, marketers and consumers – interact and co-create spiritual meanings in a post-disenchanted society that has been defined as a ‘supermarket of the soul.’ Consumption and Spirituality examines not only religious organizations, but also brands and marketers and the way they infuse their products, services and experiences with spiritual meanings that flow freely in the circuit of culture and can be appropriated by consumers even without purchase acts. From a consumer perspective, the book investigates how spiritual beliefs, practices, and experiences are now embedded into a global consumer culture. Rather than condemning consumption, the chapters in this book highlight consumers’ agency and the creative processes through which authentic spiritual meanings are co-created from a variety of sources, local and global, and sacred and profane alike.

Reviews

"Consumption and Spirituality provides a much-needed overview of a badly-neglected aspect of consumer experiences. Whereas previous studies have focused on various issues related to religion, theology, or expanded states of consciousness, not until now have we had a sustained attempt to consider the interaction between these facets of contemporary life." – Morris Holbrook, Columbia University, USA

Contents

1. Introduction: Unravelling Complexities at the Commercial/Spiritual Interface nallo, Linda Scott and Pauline Maclaran Part I: Marketers’ Sacralisation of the Mundane 2. When Sacred Objects Go B®a(n)d: Fashion Rosaries and the Contemporary Linkage of Religion and Commerciality Diego Rinallo, Stefania Borghini, Gary Bamossy, Robert V. Kozinets 3. Theology Meets the Marketplace: The Discursive Formation of the Halal Market in Turkey Elif Izberk-Bilgin 4. No Gods. No Masters? The "New Atheist" Movement and the Commercialization of Unbelief Mary Johnstone-Louis Part II: Consumers’ Search for Spiritual Meanings in Consumption of the Mundane 5. The Sacred in Consumer Culture Russell Belk 6. Consuming Spirituality and the Spirituality of Consuming Media Narratives: Why Vampirism, Why Twilight, Why Now? Margo Buchanan-Oliver and Hope Jensen Schau 7. The Devil has all the Best Brands: Raising Hell in a House of Horrors Stephen Brown 8. Locating the Sacred in Consumer Culture: Championing Colin Campbell’s Easternization of the West Thesis Alan Bradshaw Par...