Sold American: Consumption and Citizenship, 1890-1945

by Charles F. McGovern

At the turn of the twentieth century, an emerging consumer culture in the United States promoted constant spending to meet material needs and develop social identity and self-cultivation. In Sold American , Charles F. McGovern examines the key players active in shaping this cultural advertisers and consumer advocates. McGovern argues that even though these two professional groups invented radically different models for proper spending, both groups propagated mass consumption as a specifically American social practice and an important element of nationality and citizenship.

Advertisers, McGovern shows, used nationalist ideals, icons, and political language to define consumption as the foundation of the pursuit of happiness. Consumer advocates, on the other hand, viewed the market with a republican-inspired skepticism and fought commercial incursions on consumer independence. The result, says McGovern, was a redefinition of the citizen as consumer. The articulation of an "American Way of Life" in the Depression and World War II ratified consumer abundance as the basis of a distinct American culture and history.

Genres: History, American History

552 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2006

Reviews

[Howling Rabbit · Rating 1 out of 5]

The following is taken verbatim from the first paragraph of this mess: "It is spring of 1929, the high tide of an unprecedented prosperity in American life. In a small upstate New York community, the local savings and loan faces closure and liquidation. The board of directors remain skeptical that, despite its solvency, the bank can survive on its current business plan." Each of the above sentences is in contrast with its neighbor. Why is the savings and loan in trouble if the rest of the country is facing "unprecented prosperity"? Why is it still solvent if it is facing "closure and liquidation"? And this is the START of the book!

[Ari Weinberg · Rating 5 out of 5]

Years of in-depth research lead to the culmination of an interesting, long, and thoughtful book.

[Marfita · Rating 4 out of 5]

What did I learn? It's consume or die. Ruh-roh.

Update - from my review on blogger.com:

After the admission that I knew the author personally, I moved on to The Tome.
I'm not through with the footnotes yet, but I did slog through the text. And I mean "slog" in the nicest way. This is the meaty prose of the dissertation, lightened hither and yon by Charlie's inimitable wryness. Example: subheading in chapter 7: "Slaughter on Madison Avenue" - great balls o' fire, he even worked in a musical reference! Further on, he remarks that "in the early 1930s the Buy-ological Urge [as expressed by Better Homes and Gardens:] seemed less frequent than cicadas." This topic is actually one of my pet bugbears. I am a fan of Consumer Reports, which I refer to before all major purchases (using the library copy - tee hee!) I was crushed when the kids' version, Zillions, went on-line where I couldn't read it. There was a time that I wandered around ranting that our economy was based solely on the exchange of cash for crap, yards of crap, endless steaming juggernauts of crap. And what was worse, there seemed to be no way away from it. I truly hoped that this book would tell me where this happened (which might lead to a way away from it). The book does not do this. Anyway, it's never one defining moment. This is a process beginning in the 1890s and on-going to our day and beyond. By "beyond," I mean more than in time, but also geographically. Consumerism seems to be the Ice Nine that will doom our civilization.

If Charlie's book does anything, it confirms my fears (not really immediate fears, but deep ones) about business and advertising.