Pinch-Clark1986
| Pinch-Clark1986 | |
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| BibType | ARTICLE |
| Key | Pinch-Clark1986 |
| Author(s) | Trevor Pinch, Colin Clark |
| Title | The Hard Sell: “Patter Merchanting” and the strategic (re)production and local management of economic reasoning in the sales routines of Market Pitchers |
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| Tag(s) | EMCA, Economy |
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| Year | 1986 |
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| Journal | Sociology |
| Volume | 20 |
| Number | 2 |
| Pages | 169–191 |
| URL | Link |
| DOI | 10.1177/0038038586020002002 |
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Abstract
This paper proposes that selling can be viewed as essentially a social, interactional accomplishment, not an economic one. A corpus of audio-visual recordings of `pitchers' — market traders who attempt to sell their goods with a sales `spiel' — is analysed. We locate a number of rhetorical formats and interactional practices (`selling techniques') regularly used by pitchers to manage sales. We show how bargains are constituted and enhanced through a contrast between the `worth' and the selling prices of the goods offered for sale. A number of resources used by pitchers to produce mass sales are also documented. Some analytical consideration is given to the manner in which pitchers strategically exploit intersubjectively held social conventions (`economic' reasoning) in order to intervene in the purchasing decisions of audience members to elicit sales. The consequences of understanding selling and other locally managed, social accomplishments are also explored.
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