Tensions of Consumer Individualism

Globalizing poses particular challenges to likhet – Norwegian conceptualizations of alikeness – and with it the Norwegian conceptualization of individualism, because globalizing advances a different conceptualization of equality than the one on which likhet is based. The present essay explores cultural identity negotiations within Norwegian globalized consumer culture and addresses culturally expressed aspects of globalization as they emerge in negotiations of local identities in cultural texts. TV commercials are analyzed via a critical cultural theoretical framework. Specifically, three patterns that speak to likhet as a site of tension in a globalized context are discussed: exoticization, utilization, and juxtaposition.