Consumption Framework and Example

Americans do represent themselves by what they drive, what they eat, how they furnish their homes, and, most of all, what they wear. Possessions mark people's class, regional, racial and gender characteristics. People's possessions indicate subtle attributes as well: occupation, where they went to school, marital status, causes they support, and music they prefer. Choices are required among products to enable people to fullfil their desire to constitute their own identity (51). Norton disagrees that Americans mistake desire for need, and she writes that "Americans know that these are not necessities. Consumers recognize desire as desire. In doing so, they transform consumption from an act of necessity, imposed and inevitable, into a source of pleasure and an act of will" (55).

Food may be one of the basic necessities for life, however, the variety of food choices in both grocery stores and restaurants is amazing. Food choices in the countless restaurants in Los Angeles include ethnic and American dishes, prepared authentically, modified for American tastes, or by a chef's special recipe. For this urban study, a relatively

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Some common words found in the essay are:
Los Angeles, Norton Americans, Clifford Geertz', , los angeles, Michael Schudson, food choices, reservation booth, Chicago Chicago, Berkeley California, Popular Culture, restaurants los angeles, popular culture, seated promptly, restaurants los, diners restaurant, urban ethnography,
Approximate Word count = 1080
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page)

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