Course Description
This course will explore the multiple and intersecting features of consumption studies and environmental communication, with a special focus on the place of media, luxury and waste in relation to consumer subjectivity. In late capitalism, identity and a sense of personal value is more wrapped up than ever in practices and discourses of consumption, as indeed are the massive environmental challenges we face as species and polity. This course will invite participants to critically explore how the materialities of luxury and waste relate to discourses of individual agency, ethical positionality and “the good life”. These are further complicated when regimes of development and social realities of inequality are taken to account, which are key in Global South contexts. Participants will be encouraged to identify and explore overarching questions about the ways in which consumer discourses are evolving in relation to mediation, ethics and inequality as well as in relation to pressing issues of environmental sustainability and climate change.

Syllabus
Weeks 1 and 4 are organized to encompass more theoretical and philosophical content, while Weeks 2 and 3 are organized to explore specific case studies and empirical material in relation to the theoretical debates that precede and follow. The “big questions” animating each day’s content are noted.

Week 1: Consumer Capitalism and Media
This module will focus on introducing and exploring key theoretical frameworks for the critical study of consumption and the media, with a special focus on how these two areas of cultural theory relate.

Day 1: Critiquing consumption
- How does consumption relate to, and co-construct, capitalism?
- What are the complex relations of power that animate consumption as practice?

Day 2: Mediated aspiration in the global south
- What patterns are evidence in the global geopolitics of consumer culture?
- What does a good life look like in unequal societies?

Week 2: The Contested Terrains of Luxury
This module will explore empirical expressions of luxury alongside theoretical frameworks for making sense of luxury culture in a highly unequal global system.

Day 1: Branding, power and media economics
- How do narratives of luxury operate?
- How does luxury intersect with discursive regimes of sustainability and development?

Day 2: Hedonism and leisure
- What are the cultural politics of elite and pleasure-oriented consumption?
- What can we learn from the case studies of food, tourism and festivals?

Week 3: Waste and Subjectivity
This module will consider the cultural and environmental consequences of the end point of all consumption: waste. This will be contextualized through a critical consideration of individual agency and identity in capitalism.

Day 1: Why waste matters
- How are production, consumption, and disposal linked in material and ethical terms?
- What practices of disposal and waste matter in the face of the economic activities in late capitalism (fast fashion, single use-plastic, etc.)?

Day 2: Individuality in the age of collective crisis
- What forms of self-expression and self-actualization matter in the age of the Anthropocene/Capitalocene?
- How can creative and collective practices in relation to waste offer opportunities for ethical and aesthetic recovery?

Week 4: Environment and Affect
This module will explore the links between growing awareness of environmental collapse, and its root in consumer capitalism, and consider the ethics and aesthetics of action and agency in response.

Day 1: Climate activism
- What are the ethical modalities available for responding to growing public understanding of climate change?
- How might consumer subjectivity interrupt, or drive, action in response?

Day 2: Witnessing collapse
- What forms of emotive and embodied feeling are possible in the age of the Anthropocene/Capitalocene?
- How does consumption produce feeling, and what can we do with it in relation to collective (human and more-than-human) survival?

Virtual component
Virtual activities will be offered in July, to help students prepare for the course.
1. Course Orientation Session Online (60 minutes)
This session will introduce students to the course and its learning outcomes and provide an overview of its structure and content. Students will be asked to introduce themselves and their backgrounds.
2. Presentation and Assignment Topic Guidance Seminar (60 minutes)
This session will offer an interactive process for students to choose a topic to centre their course assessments on. This session will give students a chance to reflect in advance of the course commencing on the topic they would like to explore in their assessment criteria. Examples and options will be offered, and students will have a chance to discuss and debate preliminary ideas.
3. Asynchronous Preparation
Students will be expected to commence with reading in advance of the course delivery. They will be allocated into small study groups and encouraged to commence with discussions of readings and informal discussions (e.g., over WhatsApp) in advance.

Learning Outcomes
Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to:
- Critically analyze and assess the concepts of consumption, luxury, and waste from African and Global South perspectives, recognizing their implications for identity, agency, and ethical responsibility in the context of late capitalism.
- Demonstrate an understanding of the interdisciplinary connections between consumption studies, environmental communication, and social justice, particularly as they relate to development and inequalities prevalent in Global South contexts.
- Apply relevant theoretical frameworks to examine the relationships between consumer behavior, environmental degradation, and social structures, particularly in relation to how these frameworks inform discussions on "the good life."
- Contextualize consumer practices and discourses within broader socioeconomic and cultural environments, emphasizing how local realities of luxury and waste influence individual and collective consumption patterns.
- Reflect critically on personal and collective ethical positionalities concerning consumption choices and their environmental impact, and articulate a reasoned argument about the balance between consumption, waste, and sustainability.
- Analyze the role of media and communication in shaping consumer discourses around luxury and waste, including how these discourses perpetuate or challenge existing inequalities.
- Engage in practical activities and discussions that highlight the complexities of luxury and waste in everyday life, exploring pathways toward more sustainable consumption practices.
- Collaborate with peers to identify overarching themes and questions about consumption in relation to mediation, ethics, and inequality, fostering a collective inquiry approach to learning.
- Conduct independent research that contributes to the existing body of knowledge on consumption and environmental challenges, particularly focusing on African and Global South contexts.
- Communicate ideas effectively in both written and oral formats, demonstrating the ability to convey complex concepts related to consumption, environment, and inequality to diverse audiences.

Teaching Method
The course will be structured over four weeks, with 2 days of in-person instruction per week (on Tuesdays and Thursdays). The rest of the week will be assigned to self-study of the assigned texts, and preparation of course assignments.

Each day of instruction will be structured as follows:
- Session 1 (90 minutes): Theoretical framework
Here, the course convenor will present a synthesized discussion of key literature and invite students to debate the big questions and concepts relevant to the day’s topic.
- Session 2 (90 minutes): Empirical analysis
Here, the course convenor will present a range of empirical case studies, from current research, media, popular culture, film, economics and beyond, for exploration, analysis and discussion.
- Session 3 (90 minutes): Student presentations and discussion
Here, students will each have a turn to present key case studies or literature reviews or lead interactive sessions on a topic of choice related to the day’s topic, which will have been collaboratively agreed upon and assigned in advance.

Assessment
Students will be required to complete the following assessed pieces of coursework:
1. An individual in-person presentation during the four-week course (20%)
2. A constructive and conceptually grounded written peer review report on another allocated student’s presentation (10%)
3. A short proposal of 300 words for an analytical essay on a chosen topic (5%)
4. A constructive and conceptually grounded written peer review report on another allocated student’s essay topic proposal (5%)
5. A written essay of 3,000 words in which key theoretical and empirical aspects of a chosen topic are elaborated upon and explored (30%)
6. The creation of a practical communications artefact (e.g., short video, podcast, etc.) exploring empirical and analytical aspects considered in the written essay (30%)

Indicative Reading List
Boetzkes A (2019) Plastic Capitalism: Contemporary Art and the Drive to Waste. Cambridge, Mass: The MIT press.
Boykoff M (2019) Creative (Climate) Communications. Cambridge University Press.
Clark T (2015) Ecocriticism on the Edge: The Anthropocene as a Threshold Concept. Bloomsbury Publishing.
Death C (2014) Environmental Movements, Climate Change, and Consumption in South Africa. Journal of Southern African Studies 40(6): 1215–1234.
Dosekun S (2020) Fashioning Postfeminism: Spectacular Femininity and Transnational Culture. Champaign: University of Illinois Press.
Freinkel S (2011) Plastic: A Toxic Love Story. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Gabrys J (2013) Digital Rubbish: A Natural History of Electronics. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Holt DB (2002) Why Do Brands Cause Trouble? A Dialectical Theory of Consumer Culture and Branding. Journal of Consumer Research 29(1): 70–90.
Iheka C (2021) African Ecomedia: Network Forms, Planetary Politics. Durham: Duke University Press.
Iqani M (2016) Consumption, Media and the Global South: Aspiration Contested. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Iqani M (2020) Garbage in Popular Culture: Consumption and the Aesthetics of Waste. Albany: SUNY Press.
Iqani M (2022) African Luxury Branding: From Soft Power to Queer Futures. Critical Advertising Studies. London: Routledge.
Iqani M and Dosekun S (eds) (2019) African Luxury: Aesthetics and Politics. Bristol: Intellect Books.
Johnson AE and Wilkinson KK (eds) (2020) All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, & Solutions for the Climate Crisis. First edition. New York: One World.
Lopez A, Ivakhiv A, Rust S, et al. (eds) (2023) The Routledge Handbook of Ecomedia Studies. Routledge environment and sustainability handbooks. London; New York: Routledge.
Parenti C and Moore JW (eds) (2016) Anthropocene or Capitalocene? Nature, History, and the Crisis of Capitalism. Kairos. Oakland, CA: PM Press.
Yusoff K (2018) A Billion Black Anthropocenes or None. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota Press.

Last updated: March 19, 2025