Book

Engineered to sell : European emigrâes and the making of consumer capitalism

Logemann, Jan L., author

2019

Overview

Forever immortalized in the television series Mad Men, the mid-twentieth century marketing world influenced nearly every aspect of American culture-- music, literature, politics, economics, consumerism, race relations, gender, and more. Jan Logemann traces the transnational careers of consumer engineers in advertising, market research and commercial design who transformed capitalism, from the 1930s through the 1960s. He argues that the history of marketing consumer goods is not a story of American exceptionalism. Instead, the careers of immigrants point to the limits of the \"Americanization\" paradigm. First, Logemann explains the rise of a dynamic world of goods by emphasizing changes in marketing approaches increasingly tailored to consumers. Second, he looks at how and why consumer engineering was shaped by transatlantic exchanges. From Austrian psychologists and little-known social scientists to the illustrious Bauhaus artists, the migr s at the center of this story illustrate the vibrant cultural and commercial connections between metropolitan centers: Vienna and New York; Paris and Chicago; Berlin and San Francisco. These mid-century consumer engineers crossed national and disciplinary boundaries not only within arts and academia but also between governments, corporate actors, and social reform movements. By focusing on the transnational lives of migr consumer researchers, marketers, and designers, Engineered to Sell details the processes of cultural translation and adaptation that mark both the mid-century transformation of American marketing and the subsequent European shift to \"American\" consumer capitalism.

• Publisher: The University of Chicago Press
• Subject: Immigrants United States. / Marketing United States History. / Consumers United States. / Industrial design United States.
• ISBN: 9780226660011, 022666001X, 9780226660158, 022666015X

Item info:

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Holdings :

Call Number	Copies	Material	Location
HF5415.1.L64 2019	1	BOOK	BUSINESS