Cultural Knowledge and Resources: Three Studies on the Role of Cultural Knowledge in Consumption

Abstract

Resources (natural, economic, social, and cultural) that people rely on for support are sources of power for social and economic actors, including consumers, households, and firms. Resources are created in the interaction of two component parts: cultural knowledge and latent materials. Human actors need to apply appropriate cultural knowledge to latent material (objects, experiences, and potential relationships) in order for them to be converted into resources; cultural knowledge needs to be applied to latent materials to render them meaningful and useful. In this sense, agency and power, one's ability to act in the world, rest not only in resources but also in these underlying components. As such, there is ample motivation for marketers to study and understand not only resources, but also the role of cultural knowledge as an activator in contemporary society.The introductory chapter conceptually develops the thesis that cultural knowledge governs the successful activation and use of latent materials to generate resources. Since understanding cultural knowledge is so important, the introduction then motivates three separate empirical studies on the dynamic role of cultural knowledge in consumers' lives. Each focuses on either how cultural knowledge is (1) accumulated by individual consumers post socialization, (2) deployed by individual consumers, or (3) deployed through collective consumption. Each empirical study is a self-contained project with its own theoretical development and contribution to the marketing and sociology literature, yet each contributes to an overall theoretical understanding of cultural knowledge.