Understanding Difficult Consumer Transitions: The In/Dividual Consumer in Permanent Liminality.
Saved in:
| Title: | Understanding Difficult Consumer Transitions: The In/Dividual Consumer in Permanent Liminality. |
|---|---|
| Authors: | Appau, Samuelson1 (AUTHOR) samuelson.appau@rmit.edu.au, Ozanne, Julie L2 (AUTHOR) julie.ozanne@unimelb.edu.au, Klein, Jill G3 (AUTHOR) jillkleinmbs@gmail.com |
| Source: | Journal of Consumer Research. Aug2020, Vol. 47 Issue 2, p167-191. 25p. 2 Color Photographs, 2 Diagrams, 1 Chart. |
| Subject Terms: | *Liminality, *Consumer psychology, *Change (Psychology), *Consumption (Economics) & psychology, *Self, *Modernity, *Personality (Theory of knowledge) |
| Abstract: | Some life transitions are difficult and prolonged, such as becoming an independent adult, forming a family, or adopting healthy consumption habits. Permanent liminality describes transitions that can span years and even a lifetime with no anticipated end. To understand how consumers are caught in permanent liminality, we examine how Pentecostal converts consume religious services in their difficult transition from the secular "world" to Pentecostalism. We draw on the concept of in / dividual personhood to explain how the Pentecostal dividual is coconstituted in an endless movement between the undesired "worldly" in / dividual and the contiguous incorporation into the desired Pentecostal in / dividual and structure. Pentecostals' permanent liminality thus involves ongoing cycles of separation and incorporation within zones of indeterminacy, in which neither separation nor incorporation is ever completed. This theoretical framework explains the unfinished transition of Pentecostal converts as contested dividuals. We extend this theoretical explanation for future research on liquid modernity and consumers caught in permanent liminality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
| Database: | Energy & Power Source |
|
Full text is not displayed to guests.
Login for full access.
|
|
| Abstract: | Some life transitions are difficult and prolonged, such as becoming an independent adult, forming a family, or adopting healthy consumption habits. Permanent liminality describes transitions that can span years and even a lifetime with no anticipated end. To understand how consumers are caught in permanent liminality, we examine how Pentecostal converts consume religious services in their difficult transition from the secular "world" to Pentecostalism. We draw on the concept of in / dividual personhood to explain how the Pentecostal dividual is coconstituted in an endless movement between the undesired "worldly" in / dividual and the contiguous incorporation into the desired Pentecostal in / dividual and structure. Pentecostals' permanent liminality thus involves ongoing cycles of separation and incorporation within zones of indeterminacy, in which neither separation nor incorporation is ever completed. This theoretical framework explains the unfinished transition of Pentecostal converts as contested dividuals. We extend this theoretical explanation for future research on liquid modernity and consumers caught in permanent liminality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
|---|---|
| ISSN: | 00935301 |
| DOI: | 10.1093/jcr/ucaa010 |
