I går var vi slösare — i dag är vi sparare

Etnologiska reflexioner kring en privatekonomisk mässa

Abstract

This article is part of an ongoing research programme on The Culture of Late Capitalism in Sweden. A major aim is to study the shift from modernity to postmodernity by cultural analysis of the discourse practices of the market economy. My study shows that a new kind of narrative and how and where economic values are created seems to be shaped under the influence of financial capitalistic dominance. Modern industrial capitalism involved in the production and exchange of commodities with the aim of accumulating a surplus value. Today it seems that economic growth has become a question of individual investment, speculation and calculation. There is a link between the increase of the monetary signifiers independent from the material world and the blurring of the boundary between the real and its representations characteristic of postmodern culture. The referential relation between signs and reality seems to be broken.