Commodification and Popular Imagery of the Biker in American Culture

increasingly thought of American society as a consumer culture, in which purchasing goods, more than producing them, defines social relations. As such, consumption is intrinsically linked to the social construction of self and society (Adorno; Baudrillard; Featherstone; Horkheimer and Adorno; Slater). Rooted in theories of reification (Lukacs) the commodification of reality (Marcuse), the objectification of the self (Lefebre), society as spectacle (Debord), and the culture industry (Horkheimer and Adorno), contemporary theories of consumption argue that advanced industrial capitalism has become the dominant mode of cultural reproduction wherein all social relations, activities, and objects can be exchanged as commodities (Slater 8, 27). This process has been referred to as the culture industry and it was argued that capitalism, with its all-encompassing emphasis on standardization, rationalization, objectification, and pressures to consume, has led to the commodification of society (Adorno; Horkheimer and Adorno). Accordingly, the culture industry—made up of the media, manufacturers, marketing agencies, and advertisers—appropriates ideas and material cultural products that arise from grassroots society. It then mass produces these polished, retooled, and repackaged products, selling them to the public with powerful marketing strategies designed to convince potential buyers that consumer goods will make their lives better and more complete and meaningful. Consumers are told that they can achieve new identities, become members of desirable