| dc.description.abstract | The purpose of this thesis is to study how today’s consumer society can be understood from an
analysis of the phenomenon Every Day Carry (EDC). The aim is thus to problematize the daily use
of the artifacts that surrounds us and investigate how these can be understood as networks of human
and non-human actors, aswell as identity- and meaning-making practices in today’s consumer
society.
The theoretical and methodical framework is built upon an eclectic variety of consumptiontheories,
Michel Callon’s, John Law’s and Bruno Latour’s work on Actor-Network-Theory,
Discourse analysis inspired by Michel Foucault, Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe and an
ethnographic methodology specifically adapted for online research. The empirical material consists
of photographs and commentaries from two EDC blogs aswell as commentaries regarding EDC
from a commentary field on Youtube.com. These are analyzed together with materials in the form of
a calendar from the magazine Faktum, internet articles and relevant previous studies relating to
EDC.
From the material networks of human and non-human actors appears, which is shown to have an
important role in how EDC is performed and how identity- and meaning-making thereby are
discoursively negotiated, defined and reproduced. EDC is also shown to be a powerful subversive
marketing strategy, that allows people to both consume products, meaning, identities and each other.
It also shows how people, in power relations, adopt or become assigned different subject positions,
which are linked to how a specific conception of gender and class identity, and how specific
worldviews regarding them, are discoursively negotiated, defined and reproduced. | sv |
