We derive the sociological viewpoint of malls from Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of department stores Bourdieu pointed out five juxtapositions to highlight the main differences between museums and department stores, of which features characterize the present malls. Noise, bustle, the sense of freedom, and the sense experience of touching instead of illustration are the most typical characteristics of malls. In shopping centers we measure and superficially weigh up the enjoyment of the items we would like to buy, while at a museum we only observe the items on display that are not for sale (Bourdieu 2002).
Utopia
Buildings are separated from the outside world. They keep up the appearance of a fantastic and idealized world in their layout and structure (from the placement of the items to the temperature). Malls are places that create a dreamlike order of the world, fantasies, give settings to the open contradictions of time, space, and subjectivity. The arrangement of the interior space (fountains, exotic artificial plants) tries to establish the utopic world of consumption. Renovating an old
factory building or a warehouse often creates a nostalgic atmosphere. The unusual complex of the never-ending things to see, the pictures that cannot be connected represent the norm, the above-mentioned dichotomy (Shields 1992:7- 9). Hankiss Elemér confirmed the realization of Morris and Shields. According to Hankiss these are closed, safe and complete worlds girdling the visitors with the charm of beauty and richness. When you are inside, it is difficult to resist the feeling of standing in the middle of a happy universe, where you can forget the threatening external life. The visitor sees only the blue sky and the sunshine filtering through the crystal panels of the glass dome. In this milieu there is no snow, no sleet, no rainstorm, no drought no winter or summer, no day or night. Nothing reminds us of caducity. The time has stopped and the illusion of eternity has taken its place (Hankiss 1998: 18-19). In Hankiss’s point of view a mall is the gentle, beatific way of utopia, „a pseudo-democratic twilight zone” between reality and fiction commercially produced, where everyone is anonymous and everyone can imagine himself/herself as equals, where are no conflicts and strifes, where are no social classes, rich and poor, there are no worries and responsibilities. The buildings are the reincarnations of the old "garden of delights" modern versions of the remote island, where – according to the medieval and renaissance imagination - the happy spirits dwelt. (Hankiss 1998: 42). This world is (seemingly) full of important and meaningful things, the exhibited commodities were planned and advertised in such a way that they are the meaning, the senses, the experience of the aim radiate, and let the fulfillment of the life be promised. Banners, posters, advertising texts30 always continually emphasize the importance of this dimension of fullness. Many times more are promised than the commodities can once fulfill, but this does not alter the final result: people are stunned spur of the moment. (Hankiss 1998: 41).
30 Thanks to the magic of the effect of advertising a new sweater can become the perfection of life
and the symbol of an accomplishing life. A new lipstick or eye-shadow cav give us a superb personality. A jewel cab bring into our lives the glow of transcendence. A nice or expensive souvenir, as a magic wand, can fulfill a human relationship with joy and meaning, where it was lot long time ago. The mall beautifies, tame, trivialize the strange world as well. It is full of surprising secrets, like the jungle, just that that is not hostile, but a friendly jungle which is full of pleasant surprises (Hankiss 1998: 41).
Sacred
Malls also evocative mysteries and ceremonies. Featherstone (1991)31 and others say, that the consumer society, and it’s symbolic centers the shopping malls, open the door the to old-time carnivals archaic and anarchic forces and bring their memories alive and evoke nostalgic myth. Recall the last lost communities and neighboring authorities, a past where human coexistence and social cohesion existed.
The reference to an imagined past is particularly evident then and there, when old churches, stores or factories transformed into malls32 (Hankiss 1998: 20). In this environment, people are looking strongly to maximize spiritual life situations that lift them out of space, out of time. We easily lose our sense of time, onlookers have been supposed to be somewhere else a long time ago, and yet we walk the passages, unconsciously let ourselves introducing to a promise to meet our needs, seductive, and stimulating scenery world, artificially created an artificial environment. This "trap-world" impact on us in a way that we believe that this is what we want, what we do, but this is absolutely not the truth. The deep desire of man is to be master of his own life, as well as experience a timeless, invisible companions affiliation with fate. Consumer spaces manipulating these two basic requirements by combining the magical atmosphere of the holy sites with the illusion of the free-doer, active man’s faith. This process is described to pinpoint by Thomas Meggyesi – architect - who has said in the West End’s relations that: „diabolic, parabolic, sacred place". (Trencsényi 2000: 37) According to others point of view they also say that malls are the assets of the worlds’ inhumanity: they captivate people rather than to liberate them. They believe that malls within the consumer society are the instrument of power and authority in a Foucault way. It manipulates people; infantilize them to unconscious players with the vicious circle of immediate awareness and satisfaction of desire. (Hankiss 1998: 22).
31
Featherstone (1991) warns that as a result of the expansion of consumer culture has changed, the social space in which human interactions take place a new environment creted where the presentation of the body is in front. The malls at least as much are the places of self-presentation as consumption. The social background of this is that the appearance of a person gives more information about the individual.
32
Building taverns often planned to remind us to a sailing ship cabin of the colonial era taverns, the 30s railroad dining car families, 19 century Italian villas or ancient pagodas.