Reproduction of Gender Ideology Through Russian Consumer Culture: The Case of Iconography of the ‘Mother’ in Russia, an Extended Abstract

Contemporary studies in consumer research significantly shifted the attention towards gender identities and its importance in consumer culture (Epp and Price 2006; Humphreys and Thompson 2014; Dion et al. 2014; Cova et al. 2013); however, less devotion was given to ideological aspects in gender representations persisting in today’s marketing practice (Thompson and Üstüner 2015; Thompson and Coskuner-Balli 2007). The constant changing patterns of social settings and marketplace ideologies that are socially and culturally produced and reproduced has been one of the most referred themes in consumer research (O’Guinn et al. 2015; Dion et al. 2014; Weinberger and Wallendorf 2012; McQuarrie et al. 2013). Evidently more in-depth consideration was acknowledged by Consumer Culture Theory (CCT) (Arnould and Thompson 2005) scholars who believe in the social reproduction (Bourdieu 1979) and construction of identity as a result of sociohistorical and sociocultural change that are evoked through meanings, symbols and signs (Moisio et al. 2004; Arsel and Zeynep 2013). This paper focuses on the reproduction of gender ideology through exploration of archetypal images of motherhood in contemporary Russian consumer culture.