Possessing Leisure

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Abstract
Thorstein Veblen presented leisure as an economic symbol of social status. Herbert Marcuse argued that leisure is part of the one-dimensionality of alienated life defined in terms of possessions and market participation. Together, their analyses underly the neo-Marxist theme of “commodification” in which leisure is seen as having been truncated to acts of individual consumption in time earned through economic compliance. Free and self-determinative action is reduced to choices of products and packaged experiences. Leisure as earned time and purchasing power is one aspect of buying into the capitalist system designed to protect and reward investment capital first. Such alienated leisure is compared to concepts of leisure as action and creative freedom. However, research into what most people actually do and the meanings they ascribe to their activity suggests that neither the commodification critique nor the creative ideal adequately explain the diversity of contemporary leisure. Neither, on the other hand, is without analytical merit. The differences are partly based on perspectives. Each approach asks different questions. Veblen and Marcuse are probably both right… and incomplete. Another metaphor is offered to augment the themes of status symbolism and repressive commodification. Evidence for any perspective, however, is incomplete.

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