Call of the Mall
The Author of Why We Buy on the Geography of Shopping
Chapter One
America Shops
We're driving toward the mall.
I spend a lot of time in malls. Too much, I
think. I daydream of life on a ranch out west
where I'd go to Wal-Mart every two weeks for
groceries, and that would be it for me and
shopping.
It will never happen.
You are riding with a tall, bald, stuttering
research wonk on the cusp of his fifty-third
year. I am called a retail anthropologist, which
makes me uncomfortable, especially around my
colleagues still in academia who have many more
degrees than I do. For whatever combination of
reasons, I've spent my adult life studying
people shopping. I watch how they move through
stores and other commercial environments - restaurants,
banks, fast-food joints, movie
theaters, car dealerships, the post office,
concert halls. Even in church, I study people.
It is an odd skill, not one I would have sought.
Yet I am good at it, and it pays the bills. I
can't imagine not doing it.
I am definitely not a shopper. I don't own lots
of stuff. W ... read full excerpt from Call of the Mall: The Author of Why We Buy on the Geography of Shopping ebook
