Smart Living

The Author: Tania Lewis is Senior Research Fellow in Sociology at La Trobe University, Melbourne. Her work in the fields of media and cultural studies has been published in Media, Culture and Society, Television and New Media, Cultural Studies<>Critical Methodologies, Continuum, and the European Journal of Cultural Studies.

«‘Smart Living’ explores the increasing prevalence of ‘lifestyle’ expertise in the mass media and in the process tells us something important about the forms of selfhood we have and aspire to today. Tania Lewis’s lucid readings of the popular genres of advice on the management of the self offer serious insights both into the media and into the social underpinnings of malleable selfhood. ‘Smart Living’ is an exemplary analysis of a shift in some of the fundamental categories of social life.» (John Frow, University of Melbourne)«Lifestyle formats work within the familiar, contrastive dynamics of modern popular culture. Enhanced ‘personal development’ and the chance to get closer to happiness go along with the further reach of commerce into who we are and what we do. Tania Lewis offers a thoughtful exploration of origins, communicative forms and impact, setting this within a broader appraisal of the future of public identity.» (John Corner, University of Liverpool)