MATERIAL

SELF
 1.Explain the association of
self and possessions
2.Identify the role of
consumer culture to self
Objectives and identity
3.Appraise one’s self based
on the description of
material self
 A wealthy person gave you a
debit card and told you to
use it as much as you want to
DEBIT CARD make yourself happy.
CHALLENGE What are you going to do
with your debit card?
Write as many as you want.
 ▪ What do you feel as you do the
Debit Card Challenge?
▪ Which among the items in your list
you like most? Why?
▪ If ever you were given the chance in
Analysis real life, to have one among the list,
which will you choose? Why?
▪ Does your choice different from
what you answer in question
number two? Why or why not?
 ▪ A Harvard psychologist in the late
19th century who wrote the book,
THE PRINCIPLES OF PSYCHOLOGY
William in that understanding the self can
James be examined through its different
components.
 1.Constituents
2.Self-feelings or the feelings
and emotions they arouse
Components 3.The actions to which they
prompt, self-seeking and self-
preservation
 ▪Composed of…
1.Material self
Constituents 2.Social self
of Self
3.Spiritual self
4.Pure ego
 ▪Hierarchy of material
self…

Material 1.Bodies
Self 2.Clothes
3.Immediate family
4.Home
 ▪ Body…
✓ the inner most part
✓Attached to its commodity we
cannot live without
✓Making sure it functions well and
Material Self good
✓Preferential attachment or intimate
closeness to certain body parts
because of its value to us
 ▪ Clothes…
✓“The Philosophy of Dress” by Herman
Lotze
✓Microcosmus by Lotze stipulates that
“anytime we bring an object into the
surface of our body, we invest that
object into the consciousness of our
Material Self personal existence taking in its
contours to be our own and making it
part of the self.”
✓Clothing is a form of self-expression.
We choose and wear clothes that are
reflection of our self
 ▪ Immediate family…
✓ what they do or become affects us
✓When a family member dies, part
of our self dies too
✓When lives are in success, we feel
Material Self victories too
✓When they fail, we are put to shame
or guilt
✓When in disadvantage situation,
there is an urgent help
✓The nearest replica of our self.
 ▪ Home…
✓ Where are heart is
✓The earliest nest of selfhood
✓ An old cliché about our rooms,
“if only walls can speak”
Material Self ✓It is an extension of self because
in it, we can directly connect our
self
 ▪ Russell Belk (1988), “we regard our
possessions as part of ourselves. We are what
we have and what we possess.”
▪ As one grows older, putting importance to
material possession decreases.
We Are ▪ However, material possessions gains higher
What We value in our lifetime, if we use material
possession to find happiness, associate these
Have things to significant events, accomplishments
and people in our lives.
▪ The possessions that we dearly have tell
something about who we are, our self-
concept, our past, and even our future.
 ▪ Go back to your Debit Card Challenge
list. Put a mark on the left side of each
item with the following categories:
B - if the item is related to your
body
DEBIT CARD C - if the item is related with clothes
CHALLENGE F - if the item is related or intended
to your family
H - if the item is related with home
 1. Which among the categories you
have the most in your list?
Answer the 2. What do you think these things tell
about your self?
following
3. Make a reflection paper about
questions: material self. You may use your
answers from the above questions
in making your reflection paper.
RESEARCH ▪ Make a research on the role of Filipino consumer
culture to Filipino self and identity.
PAPER