Avitts, E (2006) Live the dream: The rhetoric of the furnished model home at the turn of the twenty-first century. PhD thesis, University of Delaware, USA.
Abstract
The professionally furnished model home is a primary marketing tool of the contemporary housing industry in America. These on-site, walk-through displays offer narratives of potential lifestyle and as such, stand as key promoters of idealized middle-class values. This study is a consideration of the rhetoric of furnished model homes and how these spaces assist in establishing culturally perceived norms while denying social, cultural, and economic realities. It explores how model homes are used as symbols that market social identity and the ways in which artifacts shape, and are shaped by, communally driven perceptions of middle-class values. This dissertation explores the methods and meanings of the constructed narratives of the model home at the turn of the twenty-first century to articulate how specific values are communicated and received in presentations of domestic space and the process by which the symbolic nature of material goods is enlisted to market a particular style of family life and social interaction. The paper pursues two goals: first, an increased understanding of the methods utilized by the building industry to market idealized values, and second, an interpretation of the model home within this context. This study begins by locating the origin of the ideals promoted in the furnished model home in order to establish the historical context of the model home in the United States. Drawing on theories of status and symbolism embodied in objects of everyday life, it then looks to specific examples of presentation in order to illuminate the participatory and coercive elements in the design, presentation, and reception of middle-class single family, speculative housing in America. It also examines the hierarchical division of domestic space and considers the gendering of spaces within these constructed domestic environments as presentations of the ideal American family at the turn of the twenty-first century. Most significantly, this study queries the ideological nature of artifacts (buildings, furnishings and decorative details) as agents of social value.
| Item Type: | Thesis (Doctoral) |
|---|---|
| Thesis advisor: | Herman, B |
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | United States; homes; market; marketing; social value |
| Index terms: | United States, artifact, meaning, drawing, narrative, agent, social identity, housing, norms, promoter, everyday life, lifestyle, building industry, social value, marketing, dissertation, social interaction |
| Subjects: | Geography, demography, practitioner, research dissemination and communication, construction type, qualitative and interpretive research, industry analysis, sociology, business, technical documentation |
| Topics: | Design Practice, Urban Studies, Roles and Professions, Stakeholder Management, Construction Technology, Business Strategy, Research Practice, Geographical Context |
| Descriptive scope: | 3 PCT |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here