Identifying Suburbia: Competing Place-Making Processes And Shifting Materialism Within Global Capitalism

Materiality has always been central to identity creation, but the focus of this materiality has shifted with the growth of the global capitalist system. Through examining the relationships between identity formation, place, and capitalism, I outline that historically identity has been centered around the materiality of place and an individual’s physical relationship with the land and those who share it. In the last few hundred years, the material base of identity has shifted towards commodities and other material forms rather than a focus on the physical landscape. Suburbia functions as an arena through which to examine this relationship, as it involves peoples’ interactions with land, materiality and the influences of capitalism on settlement development. This study will explore the ways that suburbia functions as a material object for identity formation rather than an attachment to the landscape itself, and the ways that conflicting place-making processes under capitalism lead to the necessity of forming identity through material channels other than place-making, such as the commodity.