Consumption Markets & Culture

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Beauty salon- a marketplace icon

Nacima Ourahmoune & Hounaida El Jurdi

To cite this article: Nacima Ourahmoune & Hounaida El Jurdi (2021) Beauty salon- a marketplace
icon, Consumption Markets & Culture, 24:6, 611-619, DOI: 10.1080/10253866.2020.1741356

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/10253866.2020.1741356

Published online: 16 Mar 2020.

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CONSUMPTION MARKETS & CULTURE
2021, VOL. 24, NO. 6, 611–619
https://doi.org/10.1080/10253866.2020.1741356

Beauty salon- a marketplace icon

a
Nacima Ourahmoune and Hounaida El Jurdib
a
Marketing Department, Kedge Business School, Marseille, France; bMarketing Department, Olayan School of
Business, American University of Beirut, Beirut, Lebanon

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

Beautification rituals are powerful elements of consumer cultures that Received 16 November 2018
transcend time and place. In an age of “moral terrorism” to “invest” in Accepted 6 March 2020
the body as an imperative, beauty salons -a twentieth century invention-
KEYWORDS
have become a ubiquitous resource for individuals’ self-actualization Beauty salon; marketplace
through consumption. This market-mediated place dedicated to beauty icon; gender; magic;
services is less investigated than the extensive multidisciplinary literature medicalization
available on beauty and the body. We argue in this paper that beauty
salons achieve iconicity through the interplay of four critical dimensions
that reinforce one another: (1) the spatial performances of withdrawal
from the world, (2) the mediation of experiences of gendered intimacies,
(3) the articulations of complex narratives of magical transformations,
and (4) the subtle claims of medico-scientific truths that captivate
consumers.

Introduction
Beautification practices and techniques have a long history and are present in a wide set of con-
sumer cultures as is evident in the extensive multidisciplinary literature on beauty and the body
(see for e.g. Gimlin 2002; Pitts-Taylor 2008; Thompson and Hirschman 1995; Yang 2011).
Indeed, beauty and beautification are topics that transgress geographical and time limits. If we
could time travel and speak to women of long ago, beauty would be easily a common subject
of discussion. Yet, prior to the early 1900s, very few professional beauticians existed, and
where they did, they provided “home services” by appointment to affluent consumers (Black
2004). Today, there exists a burgeoning global market for beauty therapy with a beauty salon
market valued at around $129 billion globally (Zion Market Research 2018). In India, the second
largest market for beauty in the world, the beauty salon market is growing twice as fast as that of
the USA and Europe (KPMG 2018). The MENA and Africa regions are also among the fastest
growing beauty salon markets, due both to local demand and the booming wellness tourism
(Zion Market Research 2018).
Lin and Monga (2017), visiting a poor neighborhood in South Africa, ask “why so many beauty
salons in a township?” The authors add:
This is no Hollywood, Paris, or Milan where one would expect promoters of non-tradable services to focus so
much on beauty. Yet in almost every corner of this low-income neighborhood, there is a hair, make up and skin
care shop with workers and customers focusing on the arts of elegance and the aesthetics of the body. As one
watches them devote their energy and imagination to such matters, in the middle of one of the poorest neigh-
borhoods in this most unequal society, many thoughts come to mind … . (1)

CONTACT Nacima Ourahmoune nacima.ourahmoune@kedgebs.com Marketing Department, Kedge Business School,

Domaine de Luminy, Marseille 13009, France
© 2020 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
612 N. OURAHMOUNE AND H. E. JURDI

This scene is not typical of South Africa only, but common to many locations around the globe.
L’Oréal notes for instance that 89% of hair salons in Brazil are informal and located in favelas
(underprivileged areas). In Malaysia and Indonesia, the Islamic beauty salon is a very popular con-
cept (Yaman, Alias, and Ishak 2012), and in China, beauty parlors constitute a significant component
of China’s beauty economy (Yang 2011).
Given the growing reality of the beauty salon and especially in the era of the cult of the body
(Lipovetsky 2002), and ideology of well-being and happiness (Illouz and Cabanas 2018), it is surpris-
ing that beauty salons have not received much attention in the social sciences at large (see Black 2004;
Harvey 2005 for an exception). A central concern in the scholarship relating to market-mediated
beautification practices revolves around the liberation/oppression dyad. Some feminist scholars
argue that market-mediated beauty practices are oppressive in that they push women to conform
to unattainable feminine ideals of beauty and youth (see Bordo 1994; Brush 1998; Naomi 2002),
while other feminists argue that beauty practices can be instrumentally empowering to women
(Davis 1997, 1999). As pointed out by Ourahmoune (2017), celebration or denunciation, liberation
or oppression are insufficient as analytical modes to understand the appeal for “embodied transform-
ations” through beauty practices.
We argue here that to take care of the body is always to work more than the body: around the
notion of beauty therapy exists a world imbued with symbols and social representations, the logic
of which is expressed in the beauty salon, also known as beauty lounge, beauty spa, beauty shop,
beauty parlor or institut de beauté in francophone countries. The very name signals a delicate
issue: how to institute beauty? While these ubiquitous commercial spaces are often perceived as fri-
volous, they constitute sites of fundamental societal tensions that sustain their iconicity in consumer
cultures. Beauty salons, as gendered feminized spaces, are sites of identity experimentation and con-
struction, however not without struggles and dilemmas.
In this article, we focus on Western contexts, primarily France and the United States, for they are
the landmarks for modern beauty and wellness commercial spaces and are home to most of the mul-
tinational brands operating in the spa and beauty salon industry. Moreover, France has been a cen-
tral locus of beauty history (Crane 1990, 2012; Vigarello 2004) and the United States has popularized
the modern beauty salon through its celebrity and popular culture (Turner 2004).
We argue that beauty salons are marked by four characteristics that are crucial to unlock the
dimensions that sustain the iconicity of beauty salons in the marketplace: the logic of withdrawal
from the world, the gendered intimacies performed, the magic techniques of transformation behind
beauty salons’ doors, and finally the current movement of medicalization of the aesthetic.

The beauty salon

So, what is a beauty salon? A beauty salon usually offers a range of services like hair care, styling,
braiding and keratin treatments, facials, waxing, electrolysis, tanning, manicures, pedicures and mas-
sages among many others. Each salon has its own ambience which is reflected in the décor, the lay-
out, the color scheme, the scents and staff uniforms. Salons usually have private rooms for intimate
services that require exposure of the body like waxing and massages, and open communal spaces for
hair and nail care services. The beauty salon lies at the heart of a complex set of discourses and key
sociological debates including; issues of health and well-being; gendered employment practices; the
construction and maintenance of gender identity and sexuality; body rituals and practices; and
leisure activities (Black 2004).
Beauty salons are part of everyday beautification routines and constitute a space that is influenced
by the local culture and rituals within which the salon is situated- for example, henna rituals and
Moroccan hammam in Northern Africa. The ideas of pampering, self-care and transformation
are commonly associated with the beauty salon (Black 2004; Little 2013) and services provided
may be grouped into the following broad categories: grooming, corrective services, stress relief, reju-
venation and well-being.
 CONSUMPTION MARKETS & CULTURE 613

The beauty salon is mostly a feminized space for the construction of femininity- the body is
molded and worked on to achieve what is acceptable or normal for a woman. Nonetheless, more
salons are now targeted at providing grooming services to men. The job of the beautician or “beauty
therapist” is central in maintaining and enhancing body appearance using beauty products, devices
as well as manual techniques. This description categorizes the skills associated with the aesthetic
sphere as superficial, which results in a reduction of the beautician’s identity, leading them to resort
to all possible means to prove legitimacy of their profession (Black and Sharma 2001; Toerien and
Kitzinger 2007). This is a negotiated process. This dialectic between the superficial and the deep cre-
ates tension intrinsic to the beauty care market and unfolds in many key societal oppositions: the
artificial and the real, the deep and the superfluous, the interior and the exterior, the essence and
the appearance, etc. This tension lies in the very nature of work that involves skincare, and more
specifically the epidermis. Images conveyed by beauty salons focus on working the body, its appear-
ance, its identity, in echo, seem only cosmetic.

Beauty salons- a brief history

In the west, and before the 1800s women took care of their own beauty rituals, except for the affluent
who had servants to pamper them. After the industrial revolution, women entered the workforce and
in the early twentieth century, beauty therapy became an opportunity for some women to achieve
economic independence and cater for a larger set of female consumers (Black 2004).
In Europe, Nadia Payot was ahead of her time as one of the first female doctors in France. In
1917, with her expertise in traditional and herbal medicine, she established the concept of the
“beauty salon.” When she met prima ballerina Anna Pavolova, Nadia Payot realized the impor-
tance of skincare techniques in preserving the skin’s beauty and youth. She developed facial exer-
cises which resulted in the “42-Movement Massage,” still performed today at Payot Salons across
70 countries. The first Institut de Beauté was opened on Rue Richepense, in 1925, and a school to
train beauticians appeared in 1947 (history and visuals here: https://www.payot.com/US/en/brand/
history).
In the US, Martha Harper pioneered the beauty salon business, developing the idea of the hair
salon. At the time, most beauticians were African American women who made a living by making
house calls serving wealthy white customers. In the early 1900s, changing hairstyles lead more and
more women to visit beauty salons since beauticians were the only people who had access to special-
ized products. Not only did beauty salons provide African American beauticians with economic
independence, these commercial spaces were also free from surveillance and provided shelter for
civil rights activism (Gill 2010).
After WWII, the growth of Hollywood and celebrity culture along with developments in
visual technologies facilitated the wide circulation of ideal images of beauty, which had a mag-
nified impact on public consciousness. Female body representations and beauty salon portrayals
in pop culture also heightened the attention given to women’s looks which resulted in an expo-
nential demand for beautification services (Honigman and Castle 2006). Beauty salons in pop-
ular culture are depicted as places where friendships are forged, identities transformed, funny
anecdotes shared, and intimate secrets spilled. Some of cinema’s most memorable moments
have been set in beauty salons (see for example Grease, Hairspray, Steel Magnolias to name
a few).
Today, across the globe beauty salons are ubiquitous and constitute a part of consumer’s daily
grooming and beautification rituals. Yet, the market-mediated discourse around the democratization
of access to beauty salons should not mask its subtle power dynamics. High end spas and beauty
salons remain consumption scapes for privileged consumers. Also, the emergence of affordable
beauty salons segment in the USA, for instance, often depicts immigrants serving middle class
women, thereby reenacting the narrative of subordination at the intersection of gender, class and
race.
614 N. OURAHMOUNE AND H. E. JURDI

Beauty salons as spaces of withdrawal and intimacy: backstage

The beauty salon is an intimate space, a protective cocoon that carries the idea of a private social
space that is open to the public. The care provided inside beauty salons often involves the intimate
body rituals and is therefore kept out of the visual field of society: the process of civilization has led to
a domestication of the body in the public space, a deepening of the autonomous, if not the “private”
(Vigarello 1993). It’s a secret world where the fabric of beauty must remain invisible. The beauty
salon draws on mythologies of beauty, which become all the more powerful given the condition
of endless possibilities.
From the start, the beauty salon is positioned outside the social world as an intimate space. The
salon combines a dynamic of protective seclusion and focus on the individual, which is expressed in
the design of the beauty salon. When the beauty salon is not based on a clinical concept, clients are
often received in spaces the reflect the aspirations of the owner (Black 2004). Many beauty salons are
built in hidden spaces, parts are even sometimes established in the basement. One can easily witness
a withdrawal ritual for the client who comes in for treatment. The rooms reserved for therapy are
always, as far as possible, far enough from the entrance. Sometimes this distance increases with
the type of care: body care that is most intimate, like massage or epilation, is done in the most
secluded private rooms.
This construction of a secluded space is strongly expressed at a symbolic level. The space of aes-
thetics is always presented by its “official” spokespersons as a place outside the social world and out
of time. The beauty salon is usually presented as a peace haven, within which tensions and social
logics no longer exist: its borders protect the client from the turmoil outside. Beauty treatments,
lotions and products serve as a defense against external “aggression,” like pollution and the passage
of time.
Personal and timeless, the salon is a “moment offered to oneself,” a moment of indulgence. The
beautician and the client must logically abide by this rule. Everything is done so that all the words
and deeds are dedicated to the person. Touch plays a primordial role, developed as a soft and sensual
language beyond words. Discretion and secrecy are central: tacitly, the beautician is obliged not to
reveal to the public what is happening behind these closed doors. In this sense, the aesthetic universe
of the beauty salon is wholly devoted to the well-being of the customer.
Beauty salons can be likened to the “backstage” as described by Erving Goffman:
This is where illusions and impressions are made openly; it is here that stage props and elements of the personal
facade can be stored by piling up in their entirety entire repertoires of actions and characters … . This is where
we can examine the costumes and other elements of the personal facade to rectify the flaws. (Goffman 1973,
110–111)

To appear as natural in the theater of the world, and to give the impression of innate beauty, stripped
of all effort, clients mask a whole aspect of behind-the-scenes work that takes place in the beauty
salon.

Beauty salons as space of gendered intimacies

The gender culture that permeates the beauty salon milieu plays a fundamental role in withdrawal.
Today, the aesthetic world is still largely a feminized space: the profession, even more than the cli-
entele, is almost exclusively feminine, and all the imagery and symbolism surrounding the beauty
treatment are in the feminine world. If men, mainly those of the upper classes, constitute a potential
market targeted by the cosmetic industry, they are often a priori excluded from this universe even
though they still underpin its logic. In most parts of the world, men are not allowed in the beauty
salon. This exclusion allows the clients to stay out of the male gaze, and also to avoid any risk of
licentious behavior. The beauty salon is a world populated by women, idealized by advertisements,
fueled by intimacy and sensuality of care, the subject of many male fantasies. Men, however, are
allowed into salons that are specifically designed to offer services for men. On a global level, however,
 CONSUMPTION MARKETS & CULTURE 615

beauticians are part of a feminized economy of care. Women have long been confined to maternal
roles whose care is an expression of self-esteem, or evoke the confused sensation to have been, from
an early age, “attracted” by this type of profession (Black and Sharma 2001). This of course signals
the traditional gender socialization which remains solid in this marketplace environment. At a gen-
eral level, beauty is socially considered a female habitus, naturalized in the ideological discourses of
“the eternal feminine.” The importance of being between women, out of the sight of men, is con-
stantly reminded being able to “let the mask down” for a moment, to relax, is always presented as
something essential and positive. This “in-between women” is also played at the level of professional
relations in salons, and involves a form of maternalism. This is sometimes expressed by caring atten-
tions, sometimes by a play of emotional power, which results in the marking of differentiated hier-
archical positions (Black and Sharma 2001). Moreover, the type of intimacy played in the beauty
salon recalls affiliation with eighteenth century attitudes of high-status women before their servants.
Undressing in front of servants was not an issue as they were considered beings quasi without affects.
This type of cold intimacy connects also with the way we undress in front of doctors, the body is not
invested with affect. Yet, in the secluded beauty salon, another intimacy emerges based on confi-
dence: quasi-psychologists, the beauty therapist listens and advises women on their very personal
issues. An inter-dependency develops between service provider and clients beyond body care (Üstü-
ner and Thompson 2010).
This feminine counter-universe (De Beauvoir 1949) is in itself paradoxical: although outside the
male gaze, it does not erase it presence. These feminine “in between” constructions/scenes are mean-
ingful because they also prepare, precisely, the social representation or seduction scripts in which
men have the main role, thus solidifying gender binaries. Men also find room in the professional
world of aesthetics: they occupy most of the time dominant positions (leaders of cosmetic compa-
nies, owners of institutes or perfumeries, commercial executives, etc.), often without direct relations
to consumers. When they do serve consumers, they are mostly concerned with visible beautification
-like hairdressing and make-up. In contrast to skincare and massage; which in many locations in the
world are sought after by women, visible beautification is leveraged by the media as famous experts,
giving rise to powerful haute coiffure global chains (e.g. Jacques Dessange, Jean-Louis David, Jean-
Marc Maniatis, Franck Provost dominate the French national scene where the vast majority of hair-
dressers are women). Beauty salons as marketplace icons give women temporary feelings of withdra-
wal from social pressures while reinforcing these same gender asymmetries and traditional gendered
scripts.

Beauty salons as sites of magic techniques of transformation

Beauty salons, as real and symbolic marketplace spaces cut off from the world, secret, and properly
feminine, possess elements that are conducive to the expression of magic, as conceptualized by Mar-
cel Mauss (1902–1903). According to Mauss, magic often seeks to accomplish tangible results, much
like the work of science and technology, where belief is diffuse. Yet this is where the similarity ends,
since science is based on experimentation whereas magic is an a priori belief. The rationalism of
Western societies does not prevent magic from interfering with many practices, which provide mar-
kets with physical conditions conducive to exercising it. According Mauss, magic is less concerned by
the form of its rituals but by the conditions in which they are performed and the place they occupy in
a specific society (among other things in opposition to religion, science, and techniques). In this view,
it is necessary to consider the unique role of the magician (the beautician in this case) who renders
acceptable the contested legitimacy of magic in modern societies. The magic is thus dependent on the
need for an immanent external force (the mana). Also, magic rituals are performed out of public
view, just like a beautician’s work.
These features of magic permeate the field of the aesthetic in various ways. For instance, the some-
times divine, sometimes devilish nature of beauty is accentuated by the vocabulary and the imagery
of aesthetics. The terms “recipes,” “elixir” or “miracle” are prevalent in the world of beauty salons,
616 N. OURAHMOUNE AND H. E. JURDI

accompanied by images representing transformed bodies, detached from reality and in contact or
osmosis with the elements (water, air, fire, earth) in supernatural narratives are very prevalent.
The common use of such a lexicon of signs expresses a genealogical relationship with magic (Rema-
ury 2000). The history of beautification, which has continued to evolve towards more scientific
descriptions, reveals the importance of magic rituals and symbols in aesthetic practices since ancient
times. The history of cosmetology shows that in the pursuit of beauty and youth, cultures have
always resorted to “magical” concoctions and ingredients like spices, herbs, oils and honey. The rep-
resentations of any profession related to the maintenance of beauty draw on magic symbolism: the
body and its organic elements – hair, blood, perspiration, dead skin, etc. –are loaded with magic. The
body, attached to the self and to the identity, relates to the sacred, and is part of the economy of sym-
bolic goods. Moreover, the profession of beautician develops an art of transformation – which sum-
marizes for Mauss what magic is, which has “immediate effect and is essential to modify a given
state” (54).
The techniques used in beautification also evoke the aesthetics of magic. For example, the scrub, a
technique which consists of smoothing the skin, becomes an eraser of age, to stop the harmful action
of time. These techniques must work like magic. If a massage or facial do not give immediate results
they are abandoned. To reinforce the magical effects of a beauty treatment, advertisements often
emphasize that the results are “visible from the first session” or play the visual “before/after” opposi-
tion. Just like magic, you have to believe in the virtues of such techniques or products for the result to
be effective: the belief is often a priori, especially when it comes to oriental or “ancestral” manual
techniques, labeled “authentic.” The different skincare and makeup techniques are often transmitted
by particular brands or persons holding the method, bringing them closer to magic. Indeed, every
beautician has “tricks” that distinguish them from others. There is no universal method, and beau-
ticians often claim that they modify a particular technique because it is outdated. Beauticians some-
times even create their own instruments just like a magician designs his amulets. Sometimes they tell
captivating stories on the histories of the instruments and products they use.
Another element of cosmetology that is similar to magic is the notion of sympathy (reasoning in
terms of similarity). Many beauty products are formulated with ingredients according to the law of
similarity (carrots for tanned skin, the placenta for rejuvenation and renewal, etc.). These properties
are staged in advertising, which accentuates this notion of sympathy, plunging consumers in an
ocean of purity to extol the merits of a supposed algae product to rehydrate the skin, or comparing
the face to a faded rose that can bloom again thanks to a cream with flower essences. Beauty products
are always presented like magic products, themselves responsible for Mana. Beauty products are pre-
sented like fruits of a complex alchemy, their properties are presented as miraculous. When the beau-
tician prepares a night cream for the client, the idea is that this extraordinary substance will operate
at the night in an invisible work of transformation.

Beauty salons and medicalization of the aesthetic

Some salons give the impression of a clinic where the staff are dressed in white and formality in cli-
ent-staff interactions is emphasized. Whiteness gives the impression of cleanliness, sterilization and
clinicisation to emphasize the medicalized nature of treatments and the professional status of the
staff. One key characteristic of the evolution of the beauty salon as an iconic element of postmodern
consumer societies is this medicalization of the aesthetic. This movement reveals the assimilation of
the concept of care and the progression of medical knowledge, of the biological functioning of the
skin, and more widely of (feminine) physiology. One only has to see advertisements for cosmetic
products, created by biologists, patented by experienced dermatologists and advised by experienced
pharmacists. This “clinicized” beauty universe presents a technologically constructed body, inherited
from the medical model of knowledge. This is a rationalized and fragmented body, cut off from the
world and from the individual: objectified. Linguistic representations portray a rational vision of the
body, the ideal type of scientific vision. This aspiration to scientific recognition also takes form in the
 CONSUMPTION MARKETS & CULTURE 617

appropriation of medical terms to legitimate therapy at the salon in the aesthetic field: for example,
the neologism of “epidermologist” or “dermograph” instead of beautician. Using terms like “skin
assessment” and “beauty diagnosis” are expressions likely to bring together aesthetic and medical
protocols.
Contemporary beauty institutes increasingly adopt a similar look, beauticians wear white robes in
a sterile looking physical space, abandoning the intimate image of old salons in favor of a clean and
functional version similar to a clinic. These new beauty spaces simply borrow from medical science
its hygienic and rational aspect. Cleanliness is irreproachable, everything seems sanitized. The colors
are often dominated by white tones; some brand names or products, often associated with a sober
presentation, also evoke the medical world. These beauty institutes also share with the medical
world the basic equipment used: padded tables, ergonomic adjustable chairs, halogen lamps, etc.
The aesthetic apparatus, often beyond its practical aspect, is a means of ostentatiously affirming
its membership in the world of scientific rationality: the complexity of their technology is often
accentuated by their design. One can analyze in the same way the wearing of the white coat by
the beautician. It is rare today to find beauticians in the institute who do not don this attire.
Obviously, this attire has a very functional appearance, but it also allows beauticians to mark
their professional status and to take a look similar to that of the nurse. This desire to associate
the beauty salon with a medicalized, “more scientific” environment, to modernize its image and
give it credit, is clearly expressed by the professionals who dominate the field who are likely to
give it a new orientation.

Conclusions
The body is sacralized with a moral imperative, or what Baudrillard (1998) calls “moral terrorism,” to
“invest” in the body as capital to extract from it signs of youth, beauty, happiness and sexual desir-
ability. The body is thus a crucial symbolic currency in consumer cultures. Yet, there is a gender
aspect to this moral imperative in contemporary societies; there are strong social demands on
women’s physique and the way in which they are supposed to present themselves, while men are
still not held to the same standards. The ideology to engage in sexualized feminine beauty, which
is deemed liberatory “choice feminists” but subjugating and oppressive by second wave feminists
(Bordo 1994), rests on a trinity accursed to fight: the hair, the fat and the wrinkle- the very focus
of the beauty salon.
Consumer gender scholarship emphasizes the role of advertising and marketing in solidifying
gender asymmetries by inviting women to constantly police their bodies to attain often unrea-
listic aesthetic ideals (Otnes and Zayer 2012). We contend in this paper that even though beauty
salons represent a locus for key and complex gendered tensions, they remain insufficiently inves-
tigated as a research context. Our reading of the beauty salons also reflects key anthropological
tensions between the feminine and the masculine, the manifest and the hidden, the clean and the
dirty, the temporal and the magical. The beauty salon encapsulates these universal tensions in
confined spaces where consumers obtain relief when they outsource some of the body work
and effort expected by society. The salon offers consumers a way to engage in the neoliberal
tale of constant self-transformation/make-over (Ourahmoune 2017), relying on expert beauti-
cians to compete in economies of desire. The salon allows to work and sediment gender rep-
resentations on an intimate level through touch and senses, connecting consumers with their
bodies in hyper-modern consumption cultures where the body is central yet “erased” (Le Breton
1990).
The four salient dimensions narrated are critical in illustrating the iconicity of beauty salons, yet
none of these dimensions can succeed separately in achieving iconicity. Rather, the four narratives
operate dialogically (Askegaard and Linett 2011; Morin 1982) to enable consumers to feel good, elev-
ated and socially included. The four dimensions work in an interactive and recursive manner to
exacerbate and resolve key contradictions, like the tension between the magical aspects and the
618 N. OURAHMOUNE AND H. E. JURDI

medical techno scientific narratives which invariably cohabit these spaces using a myriad of signifiers
to attract consumers in a circuit of desires.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes on contributors
Nacima Ourahmoune is a professor of Marketing and Consumer Culture at Kedge BS, France. Her research tackles
topics related body politics, sexuality, gender equality and intersecting identity markers in Western and Post-colonial
contexts. Her work appeared in Consumption, Markets & Culture, Journal of Business Research, Journal of Public Policy
and Marketing, Marketing Theory, Journal of MacroMarketing, Journal of Consumer Behaviour.
Hounaida El Jurdi is an Assistant Professor of Marketing at the Olayan School of Business, AUB. Her research inter-
ests are focused on consumer culture in non-western contexts, with a specific focus on consumer identity, the body and
the politics of representation. In terms of methodology, her approach is mainly interpretive and encompasses ethno-
graphic research, historical research, hermeneutic analysis and action research. Her research is interdisciplinary in
terms of theoretical grounding with a strong emphasis on transformative approaches and outcomes through the
exploration of ethical implication of marketplace practices or topics with social impact. Her work has appeared in
the Journal of Macromarketing, Journal of Consumer Marketing and in Contemporary Consumer Culture Theory
Handbook.

ORCID
Nacima Ourahmoune http://orcid.org/0000-0003-2244-5492

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