Mark J. Crowley - Böcker

In twentieth-century Britain, consumerism increasingly defined and redefined individual and social identities. New types of consumers emerged: the idealized working-class consumer, the African consumer and the teenager challenged the prominent position of the middle and upper-class female shopper. Linking politics and pleasure, Consuming Behaviours explores how individual consumers and groups reacted to changes in marketing, government control, popular leisure and the availability of consumer goods.From football to male fashion, tea to savings banks, leading scholars consider a wide range of products, ideas and services and how these were marketed to the British public through periods of imperial decline, economic instability, war, austerity and prosperity. The development of mass consumer society in Britain is examined in relation to the growing cultural hegemony and economic power of the United States, offering comparisons between British consumption patterns and those of other nations.Bridging the divide between historical and cultural studies approaches, Consuming Behaviours discusses what makes British consumer culture distinctive, while acknowledging how these consumer identities are inextricably a product of both Britain’s domestic history and its relationship with its Empire, with Europe and with the United States.

In twentieth-century Britain, consumerism increasingly defined and redefined individual and social identities. New types of consumers emerged: the idealized working-class consumer, the African consumer and the teenager challenged the prominent position of the middle and upper-class female shopper. Linking politics and pleasure, Consuming Behaviours explores how individual consumers and groups reacted to changes in marketing, government control, popular leisure and the availability of consumer goods.From football to male fashion, tea to savings banks, leading scholars consider a wide range of products, ideas and services and how these were marketed to the British public through periods of imperial decline, economic instability, war, austerity and prosperity. The development of mass consumer society in Britain is examined in relation to the growing cultural hegemony and economic power of the United States, offering comparisons between British consumption patterns and those of other nations.Bridging the divide between historical and cultural studies approaches, Consuming Behaviours discusses what makes British consumer culture distinctive, while acknowledging how these consumer identities are inextricably a product of both Britain’s domestic history and its relationship with its Empire, with Europe and with the United States.

The Post Office was central to Britain’s effort to win the Second World War. From sending mail to connecting telephone calls and processing war savings certificates, its functions united a nation in a sense of common purpose and camaraderie, but also connected Britain with the outside world. Yet, owing to the pressures of military conscription, these essential functions, required to maintain morale on both on the home and military front, were discharged by women workers, many of whom had not previously undertaken such important and complex work. Drawing on a range of archival material, Mark J. Crowley highlights the role of the Post Office and public service in Britain’s Second World War home front experience, and examines the vital contribution of women in this area, which has, until now, received little attention from historians. While primarily focusing on the personnel practices affecting the position of women workers in the Post Office and public service, he also draws on the experiences of women workers through surviving oral history accounts, and the limited existing archival material recorded by women workers at the time. While this is not a social history of women's employment in Britain, it will seek to place their experiences of work and duty to the public service in the wider context of the government's expectations of women during the war effort.

Examines the "home front" war effort from an overall imperial perspective, assessing the contribution of individual imperial territories.There is increasing interest in the "home front" during the Second World War, including issues such as how people coped with rationing, how women worked to contribute to the war effort, and how civilian morale fluctuated over time. Most studies on this subject are confined to Britain, or to a single other colonial territory, neglecting the fact that Britain controlled a large Empire and that there were numerous "home fronts", each of which contributed greatly to the war effort but each in slightly different ways. This book considers "home fronts" from an overall imperial perspective and in a broad array of territories - Australia, India, South Africa, Ceylon, Palestine and Kenya aswell as Britain. It examines many aspects of wartime life - food, communications, bombing, volunteering, internment and more, and discusses important themes including identity, gender, inequality, and the relationship between civilians and the state. Besides case studies outlining the detail of the situation in different territories and in different areas of life, the book assesses "home fronts" across the Empire in a comprehensive way, setting the case studies in their wider context, and placing the subject in, and advancing, the historiography.MARK J. CROWLEY is Associate Professor of History at Wuhan University, China. SANDRA TRUDGEN DAWSON is an Instructor in the Department of History at the University of Maryland.Contributors: NUPUR CHAUDHURI, MARK J. CROWLEY, SANDRA TRUDGEN DAWSON, NADJA DURBACH, ASHLEY JACKSON, RITIKA PRASAD, LINSEY ROBB, SHERENE SEIKALY, JEAN SMITH,ANDREW STEWART, PETER THORSHEIM, CHRISTINE WINTER