Consumption: The Segmentation Sign Embeded A System Of Meaning

Consumption society is a symbolic society, in which people are controlled and symbolized by a system of meaning. In consumption society, people's spirit and belief are structured by consumption ideology, behind which is the concealed capital power. Therefor consumption society is a symbolic society leaded by consumption ideology. the system of meaning of the sign segments and rebuilds the social stratification. Jean Bardrillard, one of the most well-known contemporary French philosophers in the world, made a unique contribution to the development of consumption study which has revealled the new trends of the west consumption society, and his Symbolic Consumption Theory provides a new way of understanding the postmodern consumption world.The thesis attempts to give an elaborate research on the frame of Baudillard' Smbolic Consumer Society Theory by means of retrieving the history of consception of 'consume', 'symbolic value' and 'the system of meaning', and eventually strives to abstract all Baudrillard's Smbolic Consumption Society Theory from his implicit and complex thoughts. This thesis tries to figure out how Baudrillard linked up the commercialization of the daily life, the consumerization of human society, and the Symbolization of consuming under the effects of related theories such as the Marxist Political Economy, Daily Life Criticism and Semiotics.At the macroscopic level, this thesis focus on how Baudrillard heritaged and developped Semiotics and Daily Life Criticism, on the production process of the system of meaning by capital and power, on how this society culture the consumers by media. At the microscopic level, this thesis will analyze how people internalize the sysem of meaning to establish the sence of self-identity and class-blonging, to lean anthentative rules concerning about Role Theory and Symbolic Interaction Theory theory.Lastly, this article will discuss Smbolic Consumption Society Theory's contribution to the study of sociology. For one thing, explore the possibility and the value of sociosemiotics's application in sociolgy study; for another, discuss the change resulted by Daily Life Criticism on methodolgy and study object.