Consumer society hermeneutics

Rational - Choice Hermeneutics

Rational choice and hermeneutics seem at odds, but the tension can be fruitfully resolved. The conflict between them closely mirrors the earlier conflict between historicism and positivism. In interwar Vienna, an influential group of social scientists tried to combine the best elements of both approaches. Rational choice was united with Verstehen and the method of ideal types, as evidenced by t...

Discretionary unplanned buying in consumer society

This paper addresses a disjunction between consumer behaviour discourse about ‘impulse buying’ and the reality of shopper behaviour in contemporary marketing and retail environments, by revising the concept of unplanned buying. ‘Discretionary unplanned buying’ is distinguished from impulse buying and is argued to be part of the core meaning of a ‘consumer society’. Consumers buy goods and servi...

Factory farms in a consumer society.

Horizons of Hermeneutics: Intercultural Hermeneutics in a Globalizing World

Starting from the often-used metaphor of the “horizon of experience” this article discusses three different types of intercultural hermeneutics, which respectively conceive hermeneutic interpretation as a widening of horizons, a fusion of horizons, and a dissemination of horizons. It is argued that these subsequent stages in the history of hermeneutics have their origin in—but are not fully res...

Hermeneutics, information and representation

By drawing from semiology, epistemology and philosophical hermeneutics, we discuss the way that computer systems, particularly systems used in collaborative work, represent information, situation and activity. In other words, we focus on approaches to representation in design for computer–supported collaborative work (CSCW). We point out similarities between discourse in hermeneutics and in the...