UNIT 9

THE MATERIAL SELF

“A very disappointing outcome is always destined to happen to anyone who chases material
things in search of happiness.”
― Edmond Mbiaka
___________________________________________________________________________
SCHEDULE: Week 12

LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
a. a. Understand the complexities of the material self and its interdependence with
consumer culture.
b. The students should be able to compare and contrast various viewpoints through
which the material self is seen.
c. Assess the self toward various concepts and ideas pertaining to its material
component.

STUDENTS MUST BE ABLE TO:

a. Discover a deeper understanding of man's existence, explore and grasp the distinct
facets of self and identity.
b. Illustrate vital, analytical insight as main facets of self and identity are integrated.
c. Explain the different factors and mechanisms which determine the advancement of
various aspects of self and identity.
d. Capable of answering questions “Who am I?” by aligning various thoughts.

REFLECTIVE QUESTIONS
 “What do your possessions mean?”
 When you shop, have and possess something, does it define who you are?

You may have heard the saying, “You are what you eat.” The material self take it one
step further and asserts, “You are what you have.” The material self is the sum total of all
the tangible objects, people or places an individual carry the designation my or mine. There
are two subclasses of the material self:
1. Bodily self - speaks of entities that are clearly an intimate part of who a person is. It
speaks for a person’s pet, (my cat), possessions (my watch), places (my home town), and the
products of one’s labor (my research paper).
2. Extracorporeal self – A person’s sense of self is not only limited to the physical
entities but also includes their psychological ownership of them. For instance, an individual
may have a favorite book she likes to read. The book itself is not a part of the self, rather, it
is a sense of appropriation represented by the phrase “my favorite book.” This is what
referred to when one talks about the extracorporeal/extended self. It includes all of the
people, places and things that they regard as “theirs.”
  It is William James who expanded the study of the self which include nonphysical
aspects of an individual. He asserts that the self was fluid and it comprises more than
the physical body.
o Ways an individual can tell whether an entity is a part of themselves
1. Assessing ones emotional investment in the object or entity. If a person
respond in an emotional way when the entity is being commended or
condemned, the entity is likely to be part of their self.
2. Assess how you act towards it. If we profligate attention on the entity
and work to advance and uphold it, one can infer that the entity is a part
of themselves.

 In addition to highlighting the essential role of motivation plays in ascertaining what

is the self from what is not. James also contend an interesting point about the nature
of the entity that become part of the self. James argues that these possessions are
not simply treasured for what they provide; they are also valued because they
become part of an individual.

THE SELF AND ONE’S POSSESSION.

 People live in a sales and shopping spree culture. They get a wide variety of items for
purchasing from a plain package of spoon and fork to running a restaurant. Anyone
can find product buying promotions almost everywhere including the digital room.
 Product commercials are enticing to make one feel comfortable or look nice. Others
would reach to extent that they desire to acquire this goods.
o What drives people to have the desire to acquire those products are linked to
who they are.
o What a person like, and what they actually have, is connected to their selves.
 Individuals regard their possessions as part of their selves (Belk, 1988).
o There is a direct association between the self-identity with what they have and
what they possess.
o Their desire to have and possess has a connection with another aspect of the
self, specifically, the material self.
 Defining the self by ones possession can contribute to feelings of wellbeing, as well as
feelings of emptiness and vulnerability.
 Overreliance on possessions for self-definition may be manifested in how a person
shop, how they care for the things they acquire, and to what extent they cling to their
possessions rather than discarding them.

“A key to understanding what possessions mean is recognizing that, knowingly or unknowingly,

intentionally or unintentionally, we regard our possessions as parts of ourselves” (Belk, 1988).
Diderot Effect: Why we want things we don’t need
 It is one of the most commonly experienced phenomena of consumption.
 This phenomenon suggest that the purchase
of new belongings frequently causes a cycle of
addiction that drives you to buy new items.
 This is when one has to go back to the mall
and buy another new items just to compliment the
newly-purchased item.
 It does not stop with a new pair of shoes,
for it also extends to a need for a new shirt, new
pants, a watch and a set of jewelries to “tie it all
together.”

 Life seems simply to be loaded with more. We disapprove looking for downgrades,
simplifications, eliminations, reductions. Our natural tendency is always to collect,
incorporate, update, and expand upon.
 In sociology professor Juliet Schor's terms, "the drive to update our stock of things is
unrelentingly unidirectional, constantly rising."

Materialism is defined as the importance a consumer attaches to worldly possessions.

 At the highest level of materialism,
such possession assume a central place in
the person’s life and are believed to provide
the greatest sources of satisfaction.
 To the highly materialistic person,
purchases of consumer goods offer the
potential for magical transformation of the
self.

Probing Question:
What do you think of Diderot Effect? Has this already happened to you?

“The things you own end up owning you”

- Tyler Durden
THE MATERIAL SELF: LIVING IN A MATERIAL WORLD

“In its widest possible sense, a man’s self is the sum total of all that he can call his.”
- William James

Body

Clothing  The physical body is known as the material self’s core

constituent unit.
Family  Material self comprises one’s nearest relatives and material
collection with particular emphasis on clothing.
House
o “what an individual wear is an extension of who they
Other Properties are or try to be

The Material Self Hierarchy

 Every time a person wear different kinds of clothing, it's an opportunity for them to:
o Relate it to the surface of their bodies,
o Merge it with the person’s own genuine realization of life (Hermann Lotze,
1890).
 William James also emphasized the properties one gets to acquire through time (i.e.
a house).
o Acquisition of this entities incorporates the wealth of the empirical self and
thus regarded as the "most intimately yours" because it is made possible by
your labor.
 As you purchase an item, you develop an attachment with most of those things
because you convey the same resources that allow you to carry out the transaction.
 Shrinkage of the Personality- considered by William James as the justification of ones
experience of sorrow in losing any of their personal possessions in a fire or after
seeing their latest collection of shoes be washed away in a storm. This is why you “die
a little” every time you lose some of your possessions.

Probing Question:
How do you cope with an experience of material loss?
Best Buys: Consumer Culture and the Self

“We live in a world of things, and our only connection with them is that we know how to
manipulate or to consume them.”
-Erich Fromm

- Oscar Wilde
 “Necessity is the mother of
consumption.”
 We consume because we need to.
We trade for products and services at each
of our waking moments. In supermarkets
and shopping malls, people negotiate what
is basically the material representation of
their work (money) in return for a multitude
of things that they are continuously made
aware of by advertisements.
 Back then, people’s awareness about what goods and services that are easily accessible
are often drawn from print newspapers and magazines, radio and television.
 However, with the rising popularity of social networking platforms (Facebook, Twitter
and Instagram, etc.) and even selling platforms (Lazada, Shopee, Zalora, etc.), products
and services details can reach consumers even faster.
 With the advancement of technology, advertisers don't have to wait before customers
get home before swamping them with information about their products: they just have
to press their smartphones strategically.
 Consumption has become so pervasive that it now seems second nature to all of us: part
of our identity even.
 In people's lives, the role of goods and services is now beyond their mere function and
purpose, because they have now become the means by which people communicate
their "lifestyle."
 Brands are clearly no longer just coverings on deeper personalities but have become
surrogates of who a person is (Barber, 2007).

Probing Question:
What is your opinion on the social media platforms as well as selling platform’s role in your
life as a consumer?
I saw the Sign: The Semiotics of Consumption

 Our day to day experiences are regulated by the signals and signs. Even outside of
the linguistics and literature from which semiotics is supposed to emerge, we still
find structures of codes from which we derive meaning, including the typology from
which consumer culture works.
 Ferdinand de Saussure (1857-1913) contended that definitions are built off
conventions and are, by default, subjective.
o Therefore, words are unmotivated signals, without defined meanings.
o Signifier may be presented as a word, sound or illustration and the signified,
or the idea or concept attached to it, is still present.
o Synchronously (at a point in time) or diachronically (over a relative time
period), both interactions are never constant and will change over time.
 Relational definitions are said to be allocated to words, such that, one cannot be
identified in total isolation from another (Barry, 2002).
o The proper sense of the word traveler, for example, can only be understood
if it is correlated and compared with related meanings such as “tourist,”
“guest,” “explorer,” and “backpacker” – this is called paradigmatic chain.
 Paradigmatic chain is a series of terms with similar meanings that may be used as
substitutes, but others may not be as rational when used.
o This is explained by the manner in which objects are often seen as associated
with very particular historical or cultural definitions, based on a person's
socio-cultural / socio-political context.
 From an individual's point of view, the interpretation attributed to the symbols is all
but a given, because it already resides in the community to which they belong, with
only slight change over time (Geertz, 1973).
DENOTATIONS AND CONNOTATIONS

 Saussure coined the term Langue and Parole, as for the larger structures of
language.
o Langue is language like a system dictating the rules and conventions, while
parole is any given linguistic element or object derived from that same
framework (e.g. “Filipino” language is the langue and parole is the statement
or verbal expressions which belong to it).
 Denotation (or the object language) is described as the literal understanding of
something.
 Connotations refer to culture-specific interpretations and philosophies added to it
for myth-making purposes.

Idol of the
masses and
champion of
Filipino actor
the poor;
and director
physical
who once ran
embodiment
for president
of
righteousness
and justice

Denotation vs Connotation Example

(Images retrieved from https://www.pep.ph/peptionary/146832/fernando-poe-jr-a738-20191017-
lfrm)

ANCHORAGE AND RELAY

(Image retrieved from https://www.pinterest.ph/pin/422212533788153906/)

  Roland Barthes (1978) wrote two kinds of relationship between text and image:
anchorage and relay.
 Anchorage draws attention to the significance of text in the picture context.
 Relay put significance to a more cooperative relationship between the two; it is
much used in advertising.
o Advertisements with their versions and logo are made of the anchorage,
while the relay is illustrated by political cartoons of their panels and
verbal booms.

HOW DO I DECIDE WHAT TO BUY?

Activity:
Share at least five things you consider or take into account first before buying something.

 Everyone including the most impulsive buyers experience a systematic cognitive

mechanism before they purchase a piece of furniture or apparel on sale at
random.
 There are five stages in the so-called “Buyer Decision Process according to Philip
Kotler (1980), namely: 1.) Needs Arousal/Recognition 2) Information Search 3)
Evaluation of Behavior 4) Purchase Decision 5) Post-purchase Behavior.

 Problem or Need Recognition: This is the first step in which the customer will
recognize that there is a need and decide what commodity or type of product will be
able to satisfy this need. It is also known as perhaps the most important stage in the
process, since if customers do not see an issue or need, they would not necessarily
go ahead with finding a need
 Information Search: The second of five steps and may be categorized as internal or
external search.
o Internal search applies to the perception or knowledge of a consumer's
commodity, sometimes caused or motivated by personal experience.
 o External searches are carried out where a person who has no previous
experience with a product finds input from personal sources (e.g. word of
mouth from friends/family) or from mainstream media outlets (e.g. internet
sites, user reports) or controlled sources from advertisers (e.g. sales people,
advertisements).
 Evaluating Alternatives: Consumers assess all of their goods or brand choices on a
continuum of qualities that are capable of providing the benefit they seek: the
functional and psychological benefits that they offer.
 Purchase Decision: During this time, the consumer will have the choice of purchasing
the most suitable product, since he has analyzed all the alternatives and recognized
the benefit it would offer.
 Post-Purchase Behavior: How the buyer’s assessment about a purchase would have
a major impact on whether he will buy the product again or choose other items
within the range of brands.

THE CALVINIST PRINCIPLE

“You must submit to supreme suffering in order to discover the completion of joy.”
-John Calvin

 Protestant theologian John Calvin protested

- Oscar Wilde
strongly against the spousal asceticism of the Catholic faith. For
him, it is by consuming material goods that people will really
satisfy the will of God.
 Although Calvin is strongly behind the conviction that
consumption and acquisition of riches are divine actions, he
clarified that these must be achieved only through moderation.
 He appended that the perseverance a person does justify
his consumption.
o The wealthy people are supposed to be the laborious
lot whose wealth is God's will.
o The poor may not work as hard, so it is assumed that
their socioeconomic class and subsequent deprivation
of divine beneficence are rightly exercised.

Probing Question:
Do you agree with John Calvin that people can fulfill God’s will through both hard work and
material consumption? Elaborate your point.
THE MARXIST PERSPECTIVE

“From each according to his abilities,

To each according to his needs.”
-Karl Marx

 Marxist thinking placed consumer culture within the

sophisticated muddle of the capitalist economic model.
 If other academic fields view consciousness as the
deciding force in society, Karl Marx proves the opposite:
it is society that decides consciousness
o Economic forces determine how we act
or decide.
o Material life describes the structures of
the self (physical, political or spiritual), with its modes of
production.
 The paradox is that while the identity of the
proletariat is strongly agreed upon by the capitalist class, the
latter prohibits the former from creating what is called class consciousness, which is
perceived as a form of revolutionary motive.

COMMODITY FETISHISM

 A foundation that capitalist society has

over the material selves of individuals, at least
from the viewpoint of Marx, is what
anthropology terms fetishism: a very
simplistic conviction that inanimate objects
should be imbued with God-like forces.
o This may refer to the manner
in which many goods are given a higher
commercial value without regard to the labor which has gone into their
production, thereby essentially being merely stigmatized commodities
deprived from their human essence (Felluga, 2005).
o The risk here is that many consumers may then consider these goods as
having inherent meaning, even without human intervention.
 For instance, people wait in line for hours outside Apple stores only to
have one of sort, not to acknowledge the worth of its production, but
to purchase into the legend and exceptional status of the brand.
ALIENATION

 Work in capitalist economies is always forced and non-voluntary, which is why some
of the workers escape it like an epidemic (Marx, 1964).
 Individuals work in such conditions to afford rewarding goods (from holidays to
premium products), however not for their own sakes. Thus, work appears entirely
separate from the individual, as it provides little or no valuation that satisfies the
need.
o This contributes to workplace apathy, and inevitably to alienation from work.

Labor
Earn

Consumption Alienation
as escape
Spend

 Since labor is stripped of its inherent significance to the self, the laborer resorts to
consumption, for it are from it that they achieve gratification.
 Capitalists are undoubtedly mindful of this, so they double down on ads to sustain
this cyclical approach (picture above): that purchasing items gives brief relief from
the misery to which they are subjected (Berger, 2010)

Unit Summary
The material self is centered on the physical body, stressing one's material
ownership (clothing) and the society of whom they belong, according to William James. This
figure is very influential in the wider sense of consumer culture, which shows how the
process of consumption, through the hounding of the mass media, is promoted in the
society. This is generally done by utilizing signs and symbols, and by manipulating their
connotations. This, in turn, impacts the development of one's identity, since one's worldly
possessions and favored ways of life gradually become extensions of who a person is. Our
behavior in relation to consumer products is also influenced, as outlined in the Buyers
Decision Process by Philip Kotler. As John Calvin states, one's propensity to purchase items is
therefore willed by God, and it is a direct example of how one's good work and
perseverance will be divinely rewarded in tangible form. Consumption, for Karl Marx, is a
material escape from labor forced in a capitalist society, frequently leading to alienation.
 References
Barber, B. (2007). Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults and Swallow

Citizens Whole. New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company.

Barry, P. (2002). Beginning Theory: An Introduction to Literary and Cultural Theory.

Manchester, England: Manchester University Press.

Barthes, R. (1978). Image-Music-Text. New York, NY: Hill & Wang.

Berger, A. A. (2010). The Objects of Affection: Semiotics and Consumer Culture. Basingstoke,

UK: Palgrave Macmillan

Clear, J. (2012). The Diderot Effect: Why We Want Things We Don’t Need — and What to Do

About It. Retrieved from https://jamesclear.com/diderot-effect

Felluga, D. (2005). Modules on Marx IV: On Commodity Fetishism. Retrieved from

www.cla.purdue.edu/english/theory/marxism/modules/marxfetishism.html

Geertz, C. (1973). The Interpretation of Cultures. New York, NY: Basic Books.

Kotler, P. (1980). Principles of Marketing. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Lotze, H. (1890). Microcosmus: An Essay Concerning Man and His Relation to the World.

New York, NY: Scribner &Welford.

Palean, E. D. V., Nazario, M. B. D., Valero, J. B. G. & Descartin, I. K. L. (2018). Introspection:

Understanding the Self. Mandaluyong City, PH: Books Atbp. Publishing Corp.
 ACTIVITY

Instruction: Using at least five images (cut from newspapers or magazines), create a mood
board and label it “My Material Self.” Include a brief description.