Representation Of Identities Of Shoppers And Shopping Malls In The Klang Valley, Malaysia: A Study Of Sungei Wang Plaza, Sunway Pyramid And Gardens Mall
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Date
2013-05
Authors
Tan, Huey Pyng
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Universiti Sains Malaysia
Abstract
This research aims at studying identity of shopping malls through elements such as
architecture, shoppers, tenant mix, and festivals decorations. Three popular shopping
malls in Klang Valley – the Sungei Wang Plaza, Sunway Pyramid, and Gardens Mall
are chosen as the research sites. Participant observation, focus group, in-depth
interview, and artifact collection were adopted to obtain primary and secondary data
for coding analysis. The major findings are firstly, shopping malls showed obvious
representations of corporate identity. Secondly, shoppers associate shopping and
shopping malls to economic, social, and psychological activities in terms of the
elements of convenience, comfort, and class identity. Thirdly, shoppers are more
concerned and conscious in representing status identity, though gender and ethnicity
are represented as well. This corresponds with the shopping malls representation of
corporate identities that emphasizes class more than other social identities.
Representations and associations processes are influenced strongly by power and
context, amongst others are the historical, economic, political, technological, social,
cultural, and religious discourses. The findings enable formation of the circuit of
shopping culture and the shopping ideology being the central meaning. The shopping
malls carry the character of an unpurposefully-purposeful hegemonic that represents
mainly the corporate identities with business goals of maximizing profits. However,
the self-centred yet consciously-unconscious shoppers grant their consensual
acceptance to the shopping malls ideology. They “willingly” and “voluntarily”
assimilate with the hegemony and convinced that it is subject to their interests.
Description
Keywords
Shoppers And Shopping Malls , Klang Valley, Malaysia