Commodity Fetishism in Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence :: Edith Wharton Age Innocence Essays

Commodity Fetishism in Edith Whartons The geezerhood of InnocenceCommodity fetishism is a term first coined by Karl Marx in his 1867 economic treatise, Das Kapital. It takes two words, one with a historically economic bent and another with a historically religious bent, and combines them to be a captious term describing post-industrial revolution, capitalist economies. Specifically, this term was apply to delimit the application of fussy powers or ideas to products that carried no such inherent value. In Edith Whartons The Age of Innocence, old New York society is dissected as if the book were a study in cultural anthropology. One of the critical elements of this society is its emphasis on material items. From Parisian dresses to brand fig cigars, this society is particularly interested in what a member owns. A brief examination of how commodities affect the creation an identity and social effect in Whartons New York will be endeavored. But first, trade good fetishism will be defined more specifically in the beginning we do-nothing apply Marxs ideas to the novel. The comprising elements of this term will be examined to throw a general understanding of the economic and social ideas that went into its creation. The term trade good is often considered to be synonymous with a good, any produced item, such as refined sugar or textiles (Spickard). Although this seems a decent, basic definition, a commodity actually refers to something useful that can be turned to commercial or other advantage. The key point here is that a good fails to be a commodity when it no longer has a commercial advantage. A pile of gold is only a commodity if someone agrees to steal it.The term fetish, despite the prevalent sexual connotations of today, actually has a religious origin. A fetish is any physical object that is believed to have special or magical powers, often associated with animistic or shamanistic religions. Thus, to found something a fetish is to infuse an ina nimate or material object with special powers above and beyond that of its physical self. The concept of commodity fetishism, then, was used by Marx to describe the over-appraisal of commodities in a capitalist economy.What is Marx saying? How can something be worth more than its worth? This occurs when the use value, the essential capacity to satisfy a human want, of something is of different worth than its convert value, the social capacity to be exchangeable for other commodities (Wenning).