ABSTRACT

Since the global economic crisis of 2007–2008, ‘capitalism’ has been the topic of widespread general discussion in both mainstream and social media. In this book, Christian W. Chun examines the discourses of capitalism taken up by people in their responses to a street art installation created by Steve Lambert, entitled Capitalism Works for Me! In doing so, he considers several key questions, including:

  • How do everyday people view and make sense of capitalism and its role in their work and personal lives?
  • What are the discourses they use in their common-sense understandings of the economy to defend or reject capitalism as a system?

Chun looks at how dominant discourses in social circulation operate to co-construct and support capitalism, and the accompanying counter-discourses that critique it. This is key reading for advanced students of discourse analysis, language and globalization/politics, media/communication studies, and related areas. A video lecture by the author can be accessed via the Routledge website (www.routledge.com/9781138807105) and the Routledge Language and Communication Portal (www.routledgetextbooks.com/textbooks/languageandcommunication).

 

 

chapter 1|22 pages

The discourses of capitalism

chapter 2|18 pages

Ideology, common sense, and hegemony

chapter 4|30 pages

Common-sense beliefs

“The only system that ever does work”

chapter 5|28 pages

Hegemonic discourses of capitalism

“Nothing is perfect”

chapter 6|24 pages

Counter-hegemonic discourses

“Who gets all the money?”