Minimalism or Materialism?
In a blog post by Karen Sternheimer called "Thinking Like a Sociologist: Is Minimalism a Social Movement?" she discusses the possibility of minimalism being a new social movement. In the post, she introduces the idea from the recent influx of tv shows and social media presenting us with the idea of decluttering and living a minimalistic lifestyle. She argues this by showing us exactly what qualifies as a social movement as well as all of the outside influences and benefits to living a minimalistic lifestyle as spread by those that encourage it. She then goes on to offer an explanation for the sparking of this movement through social change, the coming of a new generation into adulthood. However, she does say that without proper statistical information, minimalism as a social movement cannot be proven, though does pose a compelling argument.
This sociological observation is something I found interesting because common sense would argue that we live in a very materialistic culture where more is more. In media as well as in common social practices, we glorify those that have more than us, whether that be expensive items, large collections of items, bigger houses, more cars, etc. We see this all the time portrayed in movies, television, and online. The idea of minimalism as a social movement would contradict our common sense ideal of what success looks like in many cases. For example, online beauty influencers are promoting different makeup products, clothes, beauty products, and a number of other items to us on a daily basis as must-have items. They reach millions of people with their message, so one would believe that intuitively most people would want to be like them and get more things, better things, things that are seen as name brand or of high value. In the Netflix docuseries Broken, the very first episode of season one called "Makeup Mayhem" speaks on the explosion of the makeup industry in the last few years, that it has skyrocketed in value through online promotion and consumers buying more than ever. This would speak against seeing minimalism as a social movement simply because the majority still wants more, the newest products because they are a fad, and people want to fit in. This is just one example but you can see this on many different platforms of media. Seeing minimalism portrayed as a social movement would directly contradict what we see on the media every day, but would be a valuable transition for our current generation.
This would make a large impact if it turns out to be true. As Karen mentions in her article, minimalism as many positive implications. It encourages things like waste reduction, recycling, and living cleanly in terms of your carbon footprint. If this becomes idealized as a social movement this could majorly impact our society in a positive way. As a social movement or trend, this may cause the majority of people to take part or at least try this lifestyle which could cause a major decrease in consumption or excess consumption of products. This may very well leave a largely positive impact on how we interact with our day to day goods. I think this very well may be a social movement because people are starting to understand the implications our actions have on the environment and more people every day are wanting to do something about it. This could potentially spark real change in our environment.
Blog post: Thinking Like a Sociologist: Is Minimalism a Social Movement? by Karen Sternheimer
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