Guest Lecture: Mike Featherstone
“Luxury, Consumer Culture and the Problem of Sustainability”

The following lecture will be given by Professor Mike Featherstone, Institute for Creative and Cultural Entrepreneurship (ICCE), Goldsmiths College, University of London.

This lecture is part of GA’s class “Arts in Globalization,” which is basically for GA students, but anyone on campus is welcome to attend. (However, the number of seats is limited.)
If you are interested, please contact the following address.
info-ga@ml.geidai.ac.jp

Date: Friday, December 13, 2024 16:20-17:50

Place: GA Lecture Room, TAKI PLAZA 4F, Ueno Campus, Tokyo University of the Arts
(MAP No.19 below)
https://www.geidai.ac.jp/access/ueno

Speaker: Mike Featherstone (Professor, Goldsmiths College, University of London)

Moderator: Yoshitaka Mori (Professor, Graduate School of Global Arts, Tokyo University of the Arts)

Language: English (no interpreter will be provided)

Organized by: Graduate School of Global Arts

Luxury, Consumer Culture and the Problem of Sustainability
Mike Featherstone (Professor, Goldsmiths College University of London)

For the greater part of history luxuries were regarded as dangerous and corrupting and therefore frequently regulated. With the rise of mass consumer culture, it is often argued there has been a ‘democratization of luxuries’ through the shopping, entertainment and leisure industries, with images of luxuries everywhere. Yet luxuries goods and experiences also carry a high price tag and sense of exclusiveness, with super-rich luxury lifestyles and conspicuous consumption highly visible models in the media.   Consumer culture is now central to the global economy providing 60-70% of the GDP of leading nation-states.  But there are accumulating problems:  overtourism, overconsumption and unsustainability.  The planetary consequences of consumption are clear now that the extraction of natural resources has reached a key tipping point.  In this context can luxuries become sustainable?  How viable are the strategies offered by the luxury industry and are there alternatives to government regulation?  Are there ways in which consumers can change their lifestyles to go beyond over-consumption and over-luxury?  Historically there are examples of ways of harnessing the immaterial luxury experience and a number of these will be discussed.