ABSTRACT
Domestic consumption, in the sense of the purchase by the household of commodities for a home-making process with complex social and cultural objectives, has a history as long as the participation of households in the exchange economy. However, recent important changes have taken place in the home-in the distribution of space, in technology, in the array of goods and in the basis upon which they are offered. The elaboration of the material culture of the home has also involved a redefinition of standards, qualities and hierarchies of value (Duncan 1981; Forrest and Murie 1987; Miller 1987; Putnam and Newton 1990). These changes have been conveyed by advertising as well as artefacts. The advertising and advice surrounding the home has become not only more elaborate and extensive but it has shifted its address towards a problematic of pleasure, choice and self-fulfilment (Goodall 1983; Partington 1989; Morley 1990b). Labour-saving has become leisure, and hygiene has been sublimated into pleasure.
