Branded: The Buying and Selling of Teenagers

By Alissa Quart. | Current Affairs. $25.

Get your news from a source that’s not owned and controlled by oligarchs. Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily.


A high schooler wears a Pepsi shirt to school on Coca-Cola day and gets suspended for insurrection. A sixth-grader covets a $500 Kate Spade bag, only to toss it a year later. A family drops $1,400 a day to take an sat tutor along on vacation. These dispatches from a label-obsessed adolescence come courtesy of Alissa Quart, whose new book, Branded, plumbs the depths of contemporary marketing to teens.

In Quart’s view, youthful consumerism doesn’t end at the mall but extends to “self-branding,” as teens burnish their exterior selves and extracurricular credentials in pursuit of social success and admission to a name-brand college. Quart haunts video arcades, chat rooms, and malls, and interviews middle schoolers consulting for Teen People — whose executives lap up the students’ insights on angora and advertising copy.

Quart wants to prove that today’s “branded” teens are a new breed, but her argument overreaches. In particular, she censures the label-mindedness of flicks like Clueless while missing their blatantly satirical bent. After all, Clueless is inspired by Emma, Jane Austen’s classic indictment of vanity that still resonates today — with nary a reference to trend-spotters, brand managers, or marketing directors.

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate