The Mass Consumption Society and Gender, Race, and Class in the 20 century America

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In 2004 and 2005, I made a research on the consumer culture in the 20century Los Angeles using newspapers, articles and various official papers of California State Government. At the same time, I participated in the project of writing the history of American consumer culture.In 2004 and 2005, I made a research on the consumer culture in the 20century Los Angeles analyzing newspapers, articles and various official papers of California State Government. At the same time, I participated in the project of writing the history of American consumer culture. As a result of this project, we published a book and I became one of editors. In this book, I wrote a chapter concerning the development of the mass consumer society in the early twentieth century. Owing to this grant, I could analyze various materials and concluded that the mass consumption society developed the differentiation in terms of gender, class and race in American society while the consumption constructed the ideal of homogeneous society.In 2006, I prepared for publishing a book on the relationship between consumer culture and the construction of American identity. This book will be published in August, 2007. In this book, I focused on Los Angeles in the early twentieth century and make it clear that the Americanization movement defined the prerequisites of American citizenship as the ability of acquiring "the American way of life" or "the American standard of living". In other words, newcomers needed to understand how they can be good consumers in order to become good Americans. Furthermore, nativistic movements and racial segregation also used the consumer culture in order to prove that some racial groups could not become American citizens. Thus, three-year research illuminate how consumer culture and every day lives of Americans developed the national identity.