Zygmunt Bauman's Concepts of the Repressed and the Seduced (Essay Sample)

Introducing Social Sciences
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Introducing Social Sciences
People have different constraints and choices in how they live their lives. People's lives are not prearranged or fixed but shaped by society and individuals in dynamic ways. Contrarily, individuals are constrained by social practices and ideas that impact their choices. Firstly, the essay will discuss Zygmunt Bauman's concepts of the repressed and the seduced and Sharon Zukin's claim that consumption allows people to be innovative and controlled. By utilizing the word 'controlled,' she recognizes the numerous techniques and strategies that advertisers, marketers, and retailers use to convince people to purchase their products (Woodward, 2014, p. 191). However, she contends that shoppers are self-aware persons who scrutinize information and acclimatize the situations for their purposes and prerequisites. Secondly, the essay will discuss choice and constraint based on the idea of connections and disconnections, where people choose and perform particular identities to shape their lives in specific ways. Thirdly, it will explore how segregation issues can generate connections and disconnections. Generally, although people respond to disparity and dissimilarity in their distinct personal ways, they are also affected by the broader social restraints, expectations, and prospects.
Bauman's Concepts of the Repressed and the Seduced
Bauman places people in modern Western societies into two consumer categories: the seduced and the repressed. He argues that people live in a consumer society instead of an industrialized society and that the forms of liberty and inequity vary from what preexisted (Woodward, 2014, p. 125). A consumer society guarantees autonomy and choice to persons capable of consuming efficiently due to their social and fiscal circumstances. For Bauman, the seduced group consists of people with extra wages to spend on the things they desire and in a position to purchase the principles of a consumer society (Woodward, 2014, p. 125). The seductive appeal of consumption is that it provides services and goods that people yearn for and a sense of social membership and self-expression to persons capable of consuming effectually. However, the pressure to conform to the consumer society is intense since failure can easily result in degraded identity and social segregation. For instance, a person with mobility issues due to a lack of a car or public transport can be socially excepted in certain areas. In Bauman's terms, the seduced are admitted to membership in society because they can expend more than others.
Contrarily, the repressed group is excluded from the consumer society. It includes persons with restricted life chances, such as the lowly, jobless individuals, people in casual employment, migrants, or those unable to partake completely in a consumer society like the elderly, disabled, and chronically ailing people (Woodward, 2014, p. 127). Their prospects for social affiliation and self-expression in a consumer society are more constrained unless they can compensate for their deprived status with a valuable skill. Therefore, the repressed are more likely to be exempted from some society facets since they are regarded as failures. According to Bauman, the society remains segmented and disproportionate in terms of exemption and enclosure from the consumption activities.
Zukin's Concept of Control and Creativity
People exercise choices in their day-to-day activities, particularly in expenditure. Consumption has been regarded as