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Branded: The Buying and Selling of Teenagers

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Branded: The Buying and Selling of Teenagers Cover

ISBN13: 9780738208626
ISBN10: 0738208620
Condition: Standard
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Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

Generation Y has grown up in an age of the brand, bombarded by name products. In Branded, Alissa Quart illuminates the unsettling new reality of marketing to teenagers, as well as the quieter but no less worrisome forms of teen branding: the teen consultants who work for corporations in exchange for product; the girls obsessed with cosmetic surgery who will do anything to look like women on TV; and those teens simply obsessed with admission into a name-brand college. We also meet the pockets of kids attempting to turn the tables on the cocksure corporations that so cynically strive to manipulate them. Chilling, thought-provoking, even darkly amusing, Branded brings one of the most disturbing and least talked about results of contemporary business and culture to the fore — and ensures that we will never look at today's youth the same way again.

Review:

"For the readers still waiting for a substantive follow-up to Naomi Klein's No Logo, this is the book....Quart is brilliant....[B]y the end, readers should be able to spot certain youth demographics and deconstruct their branded worlds instantaneously — and with empathy and anger." Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)

Review:

"Fascinating, highly readable cultural study." New York Post

Review:

"Quart makes it clear that being wary of advertising should be one of those childhood cautions, along with don't talk to strangers, and that it is our job to instruct our children....[A] cogent wake-up call for both generations." Los Angeles Times

Review:

"This is an extremely important topic for anyone interested in understanding the modern American teenager." Seattle Times

Review:

"[A]n empowering work....There are two key problems with Branded. Quart limits her criticism to largely wealthy, largely white kids. She also doesn't come up with a solution that may not itself create more problems." Boston Globe

Review:

"This book deserves to command wide attention among millions of families." New York Times

Review:

"A fascinating and provocative study." BookPage

Review:

"Addressing the possible upsides of teen-marketing ubiquity would have made for a more interesting book, so why did Quart ignore them? Perhaps she felt a more nuanced approach might dilute Branded's brand as muckraking exposé." The Washington Post

Review:

"Quart's style is smart and sassy...a frightening and important book." Women's Review of Books

Review:

"Quart makes a solid case that marketers have honed their approach to teens." Harvard Business Review

Review:

"An excellent book....Branded reveals...the way in which young adolescents are being exploited by advertisers, the media and the companies that create products for this age group. Hopefully it will be a heads up for parents, schools, and government agencies to exercise some moral, if not legal, pressure on these institutions to use some restraint and common sense when marketing to young people." David Elkind, Ph.D., author The Hurried Child and All Grown Up and No Place to Go

Review:

"Quart seamlessly weaves within her cultural criticism and warnings an extremely insightful analysis of the transformation of youth social movements." The Nation

Synopsis:

An incisive exposé of the underhanded advertising initiatives that target teens — and an exploration of the disturbing consequences.
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About the Author

Alissa Quart is a graduate of Brown University and the Columbia School of Journalism. She has written for the New York Times, Lingua Franca, Elle, The Nation, and Salon. She lives in New York City.
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Table of Contents

Acknowledgments xiii
Introduction xv
Branding
Chapter 1 Branded 3
Chapter 2 From the Mall to the Fall: The Teen Consultants 17
Chapter 3 Peer-To-Peer Marketing 37
Chapter 4 The Golden Marbles: Inside a Marketing Conference 47
Chapter 5 The Great Tween Marketing Machine 63
Chapter 6 Cinema of the In-Crowd 77
Chapter 7 More Than a (Video) Game 97
Self-Branding
Chapter 8 Body Branding: Cosmetic Surgery 113
Chapter 9 X-Large and X-Small 129
Chapter 10 Logo U 143
Chapter 11 Almost Famous: The Teen Literary Sensations 165
Unbranding
Chapter 12 Unbranded 189
Chapter 13 DIY Kids 203
Chapter 14 Schools for Sale 215
Afterword 225
Index 233
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What Our Readers Are Saying

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Average customer rating based on 3 comments:
sam2001, August 24, 2008 (view all comments by sam2001)
This book is quite horrible! I could not even finish the stupid thing. Quite frankly this is the worst book i have ever read in my life!
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underworld_lucid_dreamer, June 1, 2008 (view all comments by underworld_lucid_dreamer)
I disagree with the previous review about this book. While Alissa Quart may have a judgemental tone throughout the book, the book still discuses a very good topic.

I finished high school not that long ago, but even though I am not an American I understood what she was talking about as this phenomenon is pretty much universal. What she's mainly attacking isn't the brands or the dubious marketing strategies that are adopted by the big corporates: she's attacking the consumerism and the dependence on material wealth and conspicuous consumption for the display of one's worth, or the faking of one's worth to be more precise.

The stories that she's talking about are quite similar to things that I have witnessed in real life and the pressure on teenagers to be "cool" is real. It explains why you will not be that popular if you don't spend all your allowance on peer-approved merchandise if you're a high school student, or why your son keeps nagging about your buying him a PSP.

I am an ESL student and didn't have significant trouble making my way through the book, the vocabulary isn't that complex. I had no idea what Delia*s or Prada were, but that's about all the trouble that I had.

It's not a bad book at all, but it doesn't get 5 stars from me because I felt that some topics were oversimplified, the relationships that she has established between the brands and teenage behavior may be very interesting and her theory is indeed very good, but I felt that she was so confident about her own theory that she treated it as a law in her book.

It definitely is one of the books that can get you through high school if you're not on the top of the totem pole, otherwise it's an interesting read that may make you analyze some of the behavior of teenagers or yourself when you're in a store.
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jellycup, May 11, 2006 (view all comments by jellycup)
I did not like this book i read 3 pages and felt i couldn't go on. Absoutly dislike the way its written and i have to read it for enlgish and am having trouble raeading more than 1 page at a time
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Product Details

ISBN:
9780738208626
Author:
Quart, Alissa
Publisher:
Basic Books (AZ)
Subject:
Children's Studies
Subject:
Advertising & Promotion
Subject:
Consumer Behavior - General
Subject:
Child Development
Subject:
Business-Advertising
Copyright:
2004
Edition Description:
Trade Paper
Publication Date:
February 2004
Binding:
TRADE PAPER
Language:
English
Pages:
272
Dimensions:
8.25 x 5.5 in 10.5 oz
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Related Subjects


Business » Advertising
Business » General
Business » Management
Business » Marketing
Computers and Internet » Networking » General
Health and Self-Help » Child Psychology » General
Health and Self-Help » Psychology » Child Psychology
History and Social Science » American Studies » Popular Culture
History and Social Science » Sociology » Children and Family
History and Social Science » Sociology » General
Languages » ESL » General
Religion » Comparative Religion » General

Branded: The Buying and Selling of Teenagers Used Trade Paper
0 stars - 0 reviews
$7.95 In Stock
Product details 272 pages Basic Books - English 9780738208626 Reviews:
"Review" by , "For the readers still waiting for a substantive follow-up to Naomi Klein's No Logo, this is the book....Quart is brilliant....[B]y the end, readers should be able to spot certain youth demographics and deconstruct their branded worlds instantaneously — and with empathy and anger."
"Review" by , "Fascinating, highly readable cultural study."
"Review" by , "Quart makes it clear that being wary of advertising should be one of those childhood cautions, along with don't talk to strangers, and that it is our job to instruct our children....[A] cogent wake-up call for both generations."
"Review" by , "This is an extremely important topic for anyone interested in understanding the modern American teenager."
"Review" by , "[A]n empowering work....There are two key problems with Branded. Quart limits her criticism to largely wealthy, largely white kids. She also doesn't come up with a solution that may not itself create more problems."
"Review" by , "This book deserves to command wide attention among millions of families."
"Review" by , "A fascinating and provocative study."
"Review" by , "Addressing the possible upsides of teen-marketing ubiquity would have made for a more interesting book, so why did Quart ignore them? Perhaps she felt a more nuanced approach might dilute Branded's brand as muckraking exposé."
"Review" by , "Quart's style is smart and sassy...a frightening and important book."
"Review" by , "Quart makes a solid case that marketers have honed their approach to teens."
"Review" by , "An excellent book....Branded reveals...the way in which young adolescents are being exploited by advertisers, the media and the companies that create products for this age group. Hopefully it will be a heads up for parents, schools, and government agencies to exercise some moral, if not legal, pressure on these institutions to use some restraint and common sense when marketing to young people."
"Review" by , "Quart seamlessly weaves within her cultural criticism and warnings an extremely insightful analysis of the transformation of youth social movements."
"Synopsis" by , An incisive exposé of the underhanded advertising initiatives that target teens — and an exploration of the disturbing consequences.
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