Kinderculture: The Corporate Construction Of Childhood

America is a corporatized society defined by our culture of consumerism. One of the groups most targeted by corporations is children and youth. TV, movies, radio, video games, toys, books, and fast food are all directed specifically at consumers under 18. By marketing directly to kids, advertisers have produced a "kinderculture." The first edition of Kinderculture: The Corporate Construction of Childhood created a discourse that exposed the lack of understanding, education, and contextualization in this new children's culture. This new edition adds discussions on the icons that shape the values and consciousness of children, including hip hop, Disney, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Harry Potter, professional wrestling, Nickelodeon, Weekly Reader, video games, Barbie, McDonald's, and the Home Alone movies. Through entertaining and insightful essays, contributors drawn from the fields of cultural studies, communications, and education analyze the profound effects and the pervasive influence of these corporate productions in a style parents, educators, and general readers will welcome. Arguing that the experience of childhood has been, with or without our consent, reshaped into something that is prefabricated, Shirley Steinberg and Joe Kincheloe reveal to readers the impact our prefab, purchasing-obsessed culture has on our children-and on our beliefs about childhood.