Abstract
What do material goods intended for personal consumption mean to community? We use the extreme example of natural disaster recovery in a community to explore this question. Our work describes how members make sense of material objects that transition from private to public possessions (damaged goods) and public to private possessions (donated goods). By blending consumer and community psychology perspectives with our narratives, we employ a three-dimensional framework for analyzing object meanings: (1) material objects as agents of communitas (a shared sense of "we"), (2) material objects as agents of individualism (a focus on "me"), and (3) material objects as agents of opposition (the "we" that speaks for "me" and "us" versus "them"). This theoretical frame allows us to show how different conceptions of identity lead to conflicting meanings of objects within community, and to explain how and why object meanings shift as objects move across time and space from private to public and from scarcity to abundance. We also provide implications for coping with disasters that consider collective and individual identities as well as oppositional stances in between.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 275-287 |
| Number of pages | 13 |
| Journal | Journal of Consumer Psychology |
| Volume | 23 |
| Issue number | 3 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jul 2013 |
| Externally published | Yes |
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All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes
- Applied Psychology
- Marketing
Cite this
A community psychology of object meanings : Identity negotiation during disaster recovery. / Menzel Baker, Stacey; Hill, Ronald Paul.
In: Journal of Consumer Psychology, Vol. 23, No. 3, 07.2013, p. 275-287.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article
}
TY - JOUR
T1 - A community psychology of object meanings
T2 - Identity negotiation during disaster recovery
AU - Menzel Baker, Stacey
AU - Hill, Ronald Paul
PY - 2013/7
Y1 - 2013/7
N2 - What do material goods intended for personal consumption mean to community? We use the extreme example of natural disaster recovery in a community to explore this question. Our work describes how members make sense of material objects that transition from private to public possessions (damaged goods) and public to private possessions (donated goods). By blending consumer and community psychology perspectives with our narratives, we employ a three-dimensional framework for analyzing object meanings: (1) material objects as agents of communitas (a shared sense of "we"), (2) material objects as agents of individualism (a focus on "me"), and (3) material objects as agents of opposition (the "we" that speaks for "me" and "us" versus "them"). This theoretical frame allows us to show how different conceptions of identity lead to conflicting meanings of objects within community, and to explain how and why object meanings shift as objects move across time and space from private to public and from scarcity to abundance. We also provide implications for coping with disasters that consider collective and individual identities as well as oppositional stances in between.
AB - What do material goods intended for personal consumption mean to community? We use the extreme example of natural disaster recovery in a community to explore this question. Our work describes how members make sense of material objects that transition from private to public possessions (damaged goods) and public to private possessions (donated goods). By blending consumer and community psychology perspectives with our narratives, we employ a three-dimensional framework for analyzing object meanings: (1) material objects as agents of communitas (a shared sense of "we"), (2) material objects as agents of individualism (a focus on "me"), and (3) material objects as agents of opposition (the "we" that speaks for "me" and "us" versus "them"). This theoretical frame allows us to show how different conceptions of identity lead to conflicting meanings of objects within community, and to explain how and why object meanings shift as objects move across time and space from private to public and from scarcity to abundance. We also provide implications for coping with disasters that consider collective and individual identities as well as oppositional stances in between.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84878901585&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84878901585&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.jcps.2013.01.007
DO - 10.1016/j.jcps.2013.01.007
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84878901585
VL - 23
SP - 275
EP - 287
JO - Journal of Consumer Psychology
JF - Journal of Consumer Psychology
SN - 1057-7408
IS - 3
ER -