Cultural consumption is one of the key activities of everyday life: it says who we are or who we would like to be, it can produce and maintain particular lifestyles, it can promise consolation in time of loss or symbolise success and achievement; it can provide the material for our dreams or maintain social difference and social distinction. For most people, consumption is the practice of culture. This book - the first in a major new cultural studies series - explores the consumption of culture from the postdisciplinary perspective of cultural studies. It provides a critical map of the field, bringing together work on reception theory in literary studies and philosophy, work on consumer culture in anthropology and sociology, and work on media audiences within media studies and sociology. It explores historical work on the consumption of culture, outlines theoretical perspectives, reviews key work in ethnography and surveys recent debates on postmodernism, consumption and identity. The final chapter offers a critical reassessment of the place of consumption in the continuing development of cultural studies.