The reading passage A Theory of Shopping falls under the Anthropology theme. It analyzes the shopping behavior of London households through a scientific lens to prove a classic hypothesis: shopping is not an act of individual selfishness, but rather a form of spiritual “sacrifice” directed toward others.

This passage will challenge you with multiple-choice questions, Yes/No/Not Given questions that trap readers with the author’s perspective, and sentence completion tasks that require precise scanning for proper nouns. To support your studies, the ECE language center has compiled a detailed translation and an explanation of the answers. We invite you to follow along.

Reading Passage

A Theory of Shopping

[Paragraph 1] For a one-year period I attempted to conduct an ethnography of shopping on and around a street in North London. This was carried out in association with Alison Clarke. I say ‘attempted’ because, given the absence of community and the intensely private nature of London households, this could not be an ethnography in the conventional sense. Nevertheless, through conversation, being present in the home and accompanying householders during their shopping, I tried to reach an understanding of the nature of shopping through greater or lesser exposure to 76 households.

[Paragraph 2] My part of the ethnography concentrated upon shopping itself. Alison Clarke has since been working with the same households, but focusing upon other forms of provisioning such as the use of catalogues (see Clarke 1997). We generally first met these households together, but most of the material that is used within this particular essay derived from my own subsequent fieldwork. Following the completion of this essay, and a study of some related shopping centres, we hope to write a more general ethnography of provisioning. This will also examine other issues, such as the nature of community and the implications for retail and for the wider political economy. None of this, however, forms part of the present essay, which is primarily concerned with establishing the cosmological foundations of shopping.

[Paragraph 3] To state that a household has been included within the study is to gloss over a wide diversity of degrees of involvement. The minimum requirement is simply that a householder has agreed to be interviewed about their shopping, which would include the local shopping parade, shopping centres and supermarkets. At the other extreme are families that we have come to know well during the course of the year. Interaction would include formal interviews, and a less formal presence within their homes, usually with a cup of tea. It also meant accompanying them on one or several ‘events’, which might comprise shopping trips or participation in activities associated with the area of Clarke’s study, such as the meeting of a group supplying products for the home.

[Paragraph 4] In analysing and writing up the experience of an ethnography of shopping in North London, I am led in two opposed directions. The tradition of anthropological relativism leads to an emphasis upon difference, and there are many ways in which shopping can help us elucidate differences. For example, there are differences in the experience of shopping based on gender, age, ethnicity and class. There are also differences based on the various genres of shopping experience, from a mall to a corner shop. By contrast, there is the tradition of anthropological generalisation about ‘peoples’ and comparative theory. This leads to the question as to whether there are any fundamental aspects of shopping which suggest a robust normativity that comes through the research and is not entirely dissipated by relativism. In this essay I want to emphasize the latter approach and argue that if not all, then most acts of shopping on this street exhibit a normative form which needs to be addressed. In the later discussion of the discourse of shopping I will defend the possibility that such a heterogenous group of households could be fairly represented by a series of homogenous cultural practices.

[Paragraph 5] The theory that I will propose is certainly at odds with most of the literature on this topic. My premise, unlike that of most studies of consumption, whether they arise from economists, business studies or cultural studies, is that for most households in this street the act of shopping was hardly ever directed towards the person who was doing the shopping. Shopping is therefore not best understood as an individualistic or individualising act related to the subjectivity of the shopper. Rather, the act of buying goods is mainly directed at two forms of ‘otherness’. The first of these expresses a relationship between the shopper and a particular other individual such as a child or partner, either present in the household, desired or imagined. The second of these is a relationship to a more general goal which transcends any immediate utility and is best understood as cosmological in that it takes the form of neither subject nor object but of the values to which people wish to dedicate themselves.

[Paragraph 6] It never occurred to me at any stage when carrying out the ethnography that I should consider the topic of sacrifice as relevant to this research. In no sense then could the ethnography be regarded as a testing of the ideas presented here. The Literature that seemed most relevant in the initial analysis of the London material was that on thrift discussed in chapter 3. The crucial element in opening up the potential of sacrifice for understanding shopping came through reading Bataille. Bataille, however, was merely the catalyst, since I will argue that it is the classic works on sacrifice and, in particular, the foundation to its modern study by Hubert and Mauss (1964) that has become the primary grounds for my interpretation. It is important, however, when reading the following account to note that when I use the word ‘sacrifice’, I only rarely refer to the colloquial sense of the term as used in the concept of the ‘self-sacrificial’ housewife. Mostly the allusion is to this Literature on ancient sacrifice and the detailed analysis of the complex ritual sequence involved in traditional sacrifice. The metaphorical use of the term may have its place within the subsequent discussion but this is secondary to an argument at the level of structure.

Questions

Questions 1 – 3: Choose THREE letters, A – F. Write your answers in boxes 1-3 on your answer sheet.

Which THREE of the following are problems the writer encountered when conducting his study?

A. uncertainty as to what the focus of the study should be

B. the difficulty of finding enough households to make the study worthwhile

C. the diverse nature of the population of the area

D. the reluctance of people to share information about their personal habits

E. the fact that he was unable to study some people’s habits as much as others

F. people dropping out of the study after initially agreeing to take part

Questions 4 – 11

Do the following statements agree with the views of the writer in Reading Passage 3? In boxes 4-11 on your answer sheet write:

YES — if the statement agrees with the views of the writer

NO — if the statement contradicts the views of the writer

NOT GIVEN — if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this

4. Anthropological relativism is more widely applied than anthropological generalisation.

5. Shopping lends itself to analysis based on anthropological relativism.

6. Generalisations about shopping are possible.

7. The conclusions drawn from this study will confirm some of the findings of other research.

8. Shopping should be regarded as a basically unselfish activity.

9. People sometimes analyse their own motives when they are shopping.

10. The actual goods bought are the primary concern in the activity of shopping.

11. It was possible to predict the outcome of the study before embarking on it.

Questions 12 – 14: Complete the sentences below with words taken from Reading Passage 3. Use NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS for each answer. Write your answers in boxes 12-14 on your answer sheet.

12. The subject of written research the writer first thought was directly connected with his study was _______________.

13. The research the writer has been most inspired by was carried out by _______________.

14. The writer mostly does not use the meaning of ‘sacrifice’ that he regards as _______________.

Complete Translation of the Reading Passage

[Paragraph 1] For a one-year period, I attempted to conduct an ethnography of shopping on and around a street in North London. This was carried out in association with Alison Clarke. I say “attempted” because, given the absence of community and the intensely private nature of London households, this could not be an ethnography in the conventional sense. Nevertheless, through conversation, being present in the home, and accompanying householders during their shopping, I tried to reach an understanding of the nature of shopping through greater or lesser exposure to 76 households.

[Paragraph 3] To state that a household has been included within the study is to gloss over a wide diversity of degrees of involvement. The minimum requirement is simply that a householder has agreed to be interviewed about their shopping, which would include the local shopping parade, shopping centres, and supermarkets. At the other extreme are families that we have come to know well during the course of the year. Interaction would include formal interviews and a less formal presence within their homes, usually with a cup of tea. It also meant accompanying them on one or several “events,” which might comprise shopping trips or participation in activities associated with the area of Clarke’s study, such as the meeting of a group supplying products for the home.

[Paragraph 4] When analysing and writing up the experience of an ethnography of shopping in North London, I am led in two opposed directions. The tradition of anthropological relativism leads to an emphasis upon difference, and there are many ways in which shopping can help us elucidate these differences. For example, there are differences in the experience of shopping based on gender, age, ethnicity, and class. There are also differences based on the various genres of shopping experience, from a mall to a corner shop. By contrast, there is the tradition of anthropological generalisation about “peoples” and comparative theory. This leads to the question as to whether there are any fundamental aspects of shopping which suggest a robust normativity that comes through the research and is not entirely dissipated by relativism. In this essay, I want to emphasize the latter approach and argue that if not all, then most acts of shopping on this street exhibit a normative form which needs to be addressed. In the later discussion of the discourse of shopping, I will defend the possibility that such a heterogenous group of households could be fairly represented by a series of homogenous cultural practices.

[Paragraph 5] The theory that I will propose is certainly at odds with most of the literature on this topic. My premise, unlike that of most studies of consumption, whether they arise from economists, business studies, or cultural studies, is that for most households in this street, the act of shopping was hardly ever directed towards the person who was doing the shopping. Therefore, shopping should not be understood as an individualistic or individualising act related to the subjectivity of the shopper. Rather, the act of buying goods is mainly directed at two forms of “otherness.” The first of these expresses a relationship between the shopper and a particular other individual such as a child or partner, whether present in the household, desired, or imagined. The second of these is a relationship to a more general goal which transcends any immediate utility and is best understood as cosmological in that it takes the form of neither subject nor object, but of the values to which people wish to dedicate themselves.

[Paragraph 6] It never occurred to me at any stage when carrying out the ethnography that I should consider the topic of sacrifice as relevant to this research. In no sense then could the ethnography be regarded as a testing of the ideas presented here. The literature that seemed most relevant in the initial analysis of the London material was that on thrift discussed in chapter 3. The crucial element in opening up the potential of sacrifice for understanding shopping came through reading Bataille. However, Bataille was merely the catalyst, since I will argue that it is the classic works on sacrifice and, in particular, the foundation to its modern study by Hubert and Mauss (1964) that has become the primary grounds for my interpretation. It is important, however, when reading the following account to note that when I use the word “sacrifice,” I only rarely refer to the colloquial sense of the term as used in the concept of the “self-sacrificial” housewife. Mostly, the allusion is to this literature on ancient sacrifice and the detailed analysis of the complex ritual sequence involved in traditional sacrifice. The metaphorical use of the term may have its place within the subsequent discussion, but this is secondary to an argument at the level of structure.

Academic Vocabulary Summary

Ethnography (n): A study describing a culture or group.
Conventional sense (phrase): Traditional meaning or common understanding.
Cosmological foundations (phrase): Core value systems or fundamental beliefs.
Gloss over (v): To avoid dealing with something difficult or to downplay complexity.
Anthropological relativism (phrase): The view that cultural practices should be understood within their own context.
Elucidate differences (phrase): To make clear or explain differences.
Robust normativity (phrase): Strong or sustainable standards/norms.
Heterogenous / Homogenous (adj): Diverse/varied vs. uniform/identical.
At odds with (idiom): In conflict or disagreement with.
Colloquial sense (phrase): Everyday or informal meaning.

Detailed Answer Key for A Theory of Shopping

Questions 1 – 3: Multiple Choice (Choose THREE letters from A-F)

Correct answers: C, D, E

C – the diverse nature of the population of the area

Explanation: The end of paragraph 4 highlights the characteristics of the surveyed area: “…I will defend the possibility that such a heterogenous group of households could be fairly represented…”. “Heterogenous” means mixed, including many differences in gender, age, ethnicity, and social class. This was a major challenge for the author when analysing data. Therefore, C is correct.

D – the reluctance of people to share information about their personal habits

Explanation: In paragraph 1, the author states the reason for the study’s obstacles: “…given the absence of community and the intensely private nature of London households…”. The “intensely private” nature of London families meant they were hesitant and unwilling to share personal life habits with outsiders. Therefore, D is correct.

E – the fact that he was unable to study some people’s habits as much as others

Explanation: At the beginning of paragraph 3, the author admits the inconsistency in data collection: “To state that a household has been included within the study is to gloss over a wide diversity of degrees of involvement.” Some participants only agreed to short interviews, while at the other extreme, there were families the author could visit and accompany to many events. This disparity in involvement proves the author could not study every subject with the same depth. Therefore, E is correct.

Other options are incorrect because:

A is incorrect because the author clearly defined his work as focusing on shopping itself; he was not confused about the focus.

B is incorrect because the author explicitly stated he had exposure to 76 households; the text does not complain about a lack of quantity.

F is incorrect because the text contains no mention of people dropping out after initially agreeing to participate.

Questions 4 – 11: Yes / No / Not Given

4. Anthropological relativism is more widely applied than anthropological generalisation.

Answer: NOT GIVEN

Explanation: In paragraph 4, the author mentions two opposing schools of thought: anthropological relativism and anthropological generalisation. However, the text only explains the nature of each school and does not provide any comparison regarding their scale or popularity in the field.

5. Shopping lends itself to analysis based on anthropological relativism.

Answer: YES

Explanation: Paragraph 4 states: “The tradition of anthropological relativism leads to an emphasis upon difference, and there are many ways in which shopping can help us elucidate differences.” This confirms that shopping is well-suited for analysis under the relativist perspective. “Lends itself to analysis” means it is very useful for that type of analysis.

6. Generalisations about shopping are possible.

Answer: YES

Explanation: At the end of paragraph 4, the author asserts his view: “…I will defend the possibility that such a heterogenous group of households could be fairly represented by a series of homogenous cultural practices.” Using uniform cultural practices to represent a diverse group is essentially performing a generalisation. The author believes this is feasible.

7. The conclusions drawn from this study will confirm some of the findings of other research.

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