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The article considers marketing as a socially located practice, and argues that any form of trade or exchange may be seen to both reflect and reinforce the social structures, customs and outlook of an entire culture and not simply a part of it. These developments are grounded in aspects of anthropology which, in turn, suggest that not only is trade a socially significant activity but that the objects which are traded in are themselves remarkable as reflections of the nature and influence of those who caused them to be manufactured. The article may be seen accordingly as an attempt to develop insights into the societal and cultural processes associated with contemporary variations in the “cultural design of persons and goods” (Sahlins, 1976). This understanding may then be used as a basis for the further investigation of marketing and its part in the “creation and movement of goods”.

Discusses the analogy of two bow ties, part of a deceased relative′s effects, showing that although one was worn out and the other unopened they were both second‐hand. Compares this with the element of choice in people and their life symbols of occupational and domestic choices through time.

Despite tempting parallels between contemporary theories of biological evolution and the commonplace adaptation of products in varying cultures and circumstances, any apparent support for notions of market‐based Social Darwinism is seen as misplaced. Closely observed examples from Japanese commerce show that exchanges of goods, ideas and people involve processes of “bricolage” whereby consumers’ individual and collective skills in trading words and things enable the retention and repair of their various social standings as well as their broader ethical and cultural assumptions. These multiplying interpretations are the bases of our everyday lives and the route by which inequalities in popular access to power, language and goods reflect and reinforce other imbalances evident in the workings of both market economies and consumer cultures.

The purpose of this paper is to explore introspection in marketing research, its controversial origins, its positioning as an art form, the possibilities and the pitfalls of research based on this method, and how to successfully enter into its creative spirit.

Although its overall approach is broadly conceptual, in a similar fashion to the dramatic device of a‐play‐within‐a‐play, the paper makes a habit of using introspection to reflect on introspection.

While it is clear that well‐written introspections can deliver rich stream‐of‐consciousness accounts of marketing‐relevant goodness from beginning to end, they provide more than just frivolous entertainment. The innermost imperative of introspection equates well with consumption, creativity and aestheticisation, the corner‐stones of arts marketing.

The inherent mucky‐mindedness of introspection as a formal method lays its success or failure on the shoulders of the paper's author.

Whatever their interpretive methodology of choice, arts marketers, indeed all marketers, should give serious thought to integrating introspection into their research approach.

While many of the ideas in the paper are pilfered from other sources (see long list of references), the author is proud to assert that precisely these words have never been written in precisely this order.

Despite the breadth of knowledge on self and identity formation across the study of organizations, the field of organizational development and change has limited research on the construction of professional identity. Much has been written to describe the “self-concepts” of those practicing and researching in the field, but there have been no investigations that have explored how these “self-concepts” form. In addition, although women have contributed to defining the “self” in the field, men have held the dominant perspective on the subject. Thus, in this chapter, we address a disparity in the research by exploring the construction of professional identity in the field of organizational development and change, and we give voice to the renowned women who helped to build the field. Using the profiles of 17 American women included in The Palgrave Handbook of Organizational Change Thinkers, we perform a narrative analysis based upon the concepts and models prevalent in the literature on identity formation. By disentangling professional identity formation of the notable women in the field, we can begin to see the nuance and particularities involved in its construction and gain deeper understandings about effective ways to prepare individuals to work in and advance the field.

The purpose of this paper is to examine theories of marketing and entrepreneurship and compare these with entrepreneurial marketing practices.

The paper uses a case study to explore the social constructions of narratives.

The paper reveals how interactions based around meanings, purpose and identities work to create products, customers, entrepreneurs and even the market. Here the emphasis on signs, symbols and images redirects attention to create space for expectations to grow.

The paper develops its argument that merely modifying existing theory is conceptually inadequate; a new framework is introduced which enables the understanding of how entrepreneurship and marketing combine. The paper shows how this fertile dynamic produces not only new products, but also may actually create new markets.

This case study demonstrates how entrepreneurship and marketing become inseparable in the co‐production of identity and future.

A crisis, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, is “a decisive moment”, “a turning point”, “a time of great difficulty”. If this is the case, then marketing cannot possibly be in crisis. Crises are temporary states of heightened anxiety, whereas marketing is in a semi‐permanent philosophical pickle. Or so scholarly commentators would have us believe. This paper argues that there is no crisis of representation in marketing. There are more, and more varied, representations of marketing than there have ever been. Representationally speaking, marketing is living in a golden age, a time of Croesus and King Midas. The real problem is that many of these representations are not very good, albeit for understandable reasons. We need to raise the quality rather than increase the quantity of our “experimental” endeavours and this paper makes five recommendations to that end.

Outlines uses and gratifications theory and its limited advertising applications to date. Presents findings from a qualitative study which identifies many marketing and non‐marketing uses of advertising by young Scottish adults. Argues that this supports a view of audiences as active, selective and sophisticated consumers of advertising. Suggests that the active, reward‐seeking consumer of advertising challenges traditional models of advertising effectiveness and requires a reorientation of the advertising‐planning process.

The literary world is an elitist enclave, where anti‐marketing rhetoric is regularly encountered. This paper aims to show that the book trade has always been hard‐nosed and commercially driven.

This paper is less a review of the literature, or a theoretical treatise, than a selective revelation of the commercial realities of the book business.

The paper shows that the cultural industries in general and the book business in particular were crucibles of marketing practice long before learned scholars started taking notice. It highlights the importance of luck, perseverance and, not least, marketing nous in the “manufacture” of international bestsellers.

By highlighting humankind's deep‐seated love of narrative – its clear preference for fiction over fact – this paper suggests that marketing scholars should reconsider their preferred mode of research representation. Hard facts are all very well, but they are less palatable than good stories, well told.

The paper makes no claim to originality. It recovers what we already know but appear to have forgotten in our non‐stop pursuit of scientific respectability.