The Sum of Small Things, Elizabeth CurridHalkett
The Sum of Small Things, Elizabeth CurridHalkett
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The Sum of Small Things
A Theory of the Aspirational Class

Author: Elizabeth Currid-Halkett

Narrator: Rachel Dulude

Unabridged: 8 hr 35 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 10/24/2017

Synopsis

In today's world, the leisure class has been replaced by a new elite. Highly educated and defined by cultural capital rather than income bracket, these individuals earnestly buy organic, carry NPR tote bags, and breast-feed their babies. They care about discreet, inconspicuous consumption—like eating free-range chicken and heirloom tomatoes, wearing organic cotton shirts and TOMS shoes, and listening to the Serial podcast. They use their purchasing power to hire nannies and housekeepers, to cultivate their children's growth, and to practice yoga and Pilates. In The Sum of Small Things, Elizabeth Currid-Halkett dubs this segment of society "the aspirational class" and discusses how, through deft decisions about education, health, parenting, and retirement, the aspirational class reproduces wealth and upward mobility, deepening the ever-wider class divide.

About Elizabeth Currid-Halkett

Author, speaker, and researcher Elizabeth Currid-Halkett is the James Irvine Chair in Urban and Regional Planning and professor of public policy at the Price School of Public Policy at the University of Southern California. Her research focuses on the arts and culture and most recently, the American consumer economy.

She is the author of The Warhol Economy: How Fashion, Art and Music Drive New York City, Starstruck: The Business of Celebrity, and The Sum of Small Things: A Theory of the Aspirational Class.

Currid-Halkett has spoken about her work to audiences at 92Y Tribeca, Google, Harvard University, Vanderbilt University, among others. Currid-Halkett's work has been featured in numerous national and international media outlets including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Salon, the Economist, the New Yorker, and the Times Literary Supplement.

Currid-Halkett received her PhD from Columbia University. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two sons.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Rachel

For being just a hair under 200 pages, this book read really slowly. In sum, it felt like the same information over and over again packaged in a slightly different way that got kind of boring quickly.There was a difference in the writing of different chapters. The second chapter felt like an academi......more

Goodreads review by Mehtap

Fair gehandelt berichtet über die Konsumgesellschaft und wie überwiegend in den USA sich der Status geändert hat. Was sind Statusprodukte? Warum wird im überteuerten „Whole Foods“ eingekauft statt im „Trader Joes“. Warum ist Lulemon so begehrt geworden? Und überhaupt was ist konsumieren und warum tu......more

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