How did consumer culture become synonymous with westernised societies? Iqani argues that it is the way it is promoted by media texts. She provides a detailed analysis of publicly displayed consumer magazine covers and engages with big questions about the public, power and identity in mediated consumer culture.

MEHITA IQANI is a senior lecturer in Media Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa. She holds a PhD in Media and Communications from the London School of Economics and Political Science, UK.

Acknowledgements List of figures Media in Consumer Culture: An Introduction The Public, Identity and Power in Mediated Consumer Culture A Research Approach for Mediated Consumer Culture Media Retail Spaces as Multimodal Spectacles: The Case of the Newsstand Glossiness in Hyperreal Celebrity Portraiture Commodity Choice and Commercial Heteroglossia in Consumer Media Sexiness and Selling: Consumerism's Pornographic Imagination Paper Mirrors: Images of Ideal Consumers Media Strategies for Selling Consumer Culture: a Conclusion References Index