The Idea of Luxury A Conceptual and Historical Investigation [Paperback]

This book analyses the idea of luxury, shows how its evaluative meaning has changed, and explores its role in the determination of social order.Suggesting that the value attached to luxury is a crucial component in any society's self-understanding, this innovative study reveals how luxury has changed from being essentially a negative term, threatening social virtue, to a guileless ploy supporting consumption.Suggesting that the value attached to luxury is a crucial component in any society's self-understanding, this innovative study reveals how luxury has changed from being essentially a negative term, threatening social virtue, to a guileless ploy supporting consumption.In this far-ranging and innovative study Christopher Berry explores the meanings and ramifications of the idea of luxury. Insights from political theory, philosophy and intellectual history are utilized in a sophisticated conceptual analysis that is complemented by a series of specific historical investigations. Dr. Berry suggests that the value attached to luxury is a crucial component in any society's self-understanding, and shows how luxury has changed from being essentially a negative term, threatening social virtue, to a guileless ploy supporting consumption.Part I. Preliminary Essay: 1. Luxury goods; Part II. The Classical Paradigm: 2. The platonic prelude; 3. The Roman response; 4. The Christian contribution; Part III. The Transition to Modernity: 5. The de-moralisation of luxury; 6. The eighteenth-century debate; 7. The historicity of needs; Part IV. Politics, Needs and Desires: 8. Luxury and the politics of needs and desires; 9. Luxury, necessity and social identity. ...he makes a strong, trenchantly argued case for the indispensability of the category of luxury to any society's self-understanding. Robert Anchor, American Historical Review