ABSTRACT
To the extent to which there can be said to be a sociology of consumption it has been mainly concerned with the differential purchase, use and symbolic significance of material objects. Such objects include not only housing but also clothes, cars, electrical goods, furniture and so on. In this chapter I shall suggest that this is an overly restricted focus and that there are a range of alternative items of consumption, of various services, which raise particular complex problems of interpretation and explanation. In particular I shall be concerned with those services related to tourism and holiday-making. It will be argued that interesting and complex issues arise with regard to the social relations surrounding such tourist-related services, in particular the nature of so-called ‘positional goods’. A paradox will be detailed, namely, that, although within economics rather than sociology, some advance has been made in explaining the consumption patterns of tourist-related services, the conclusion of such work is that such consumption is indelibly social. Explaining the consumption of tourist services cannot be separated off from the social relations within which they are embedded.
