After discussing the methodology employed in this work, the following chapters are dedicated to presenting its proper empirical study. It consists in the application of the theoretical framework developed in Part I to the interpretation and discussion of the empirical material: the night dreams, focusing on how subjectivity appears colonized in them, how consumer culture and its imaginary seem to be criticized by them, and the general implications that they seem to show in relation to both subjects and culture. Interpretation and discussion therefore also reveal and present the research findings, which are later recapitulated and summarized in the final chapter with the conclusions.
Thus each chapter that follows discusses the dreams according to their respective dreamscapes, seen as distinct yet interrelated metaphors for the imaginary of consumerism: first the reader is presented with a few dreams related to McDonald’s, interweaved with different archetypal dreams; then two complex and significant dreams related to Disneyland ; and finally a long series of dreams that have shopping malls and department stores as their scenarios, which is concluded with a series of dreams from the same person.
Before we probe into such dream-worlds, however, a few comments are needed. In condensing and reporting the dreams already written in English, and, alternatively, in translating some other dreams into English, I have tried to preserve the original way they were told to me or written. With few exceptions, all the dreams have been abbreviated.1 In interpreting the first dream, the hermeneutic procedures—for example, the use of associations, amplification, and so on, and also how the dream is seen according to a dramatic or narrative structure, and how that is useful for the interpretation—are discussed in more detail. For the other dreams, for reasons of space, I have taken for granted that the reader will bear in mind such procedures, and apply them to the dreams (and so they are not detailed). Concluding the interpretation of each consumption night dream, there is a brief summary of how the dream and its interpretation answer some specific research questions of this work, namely, (1) what psychological factors, domains, or realms are colonized in the dream; (2) how colonization is effectuated; and (3) the possible effects of colonization.
Reiterating, rather than searching for patterns in terms of images (i.e., motifs) or concepts, interpretation, and discussion focus on the patterns in meaning revealed by the dreams. This warning is particularly important as regards the concepts with which one discusses subjectivity. As mentioned, usually the dreams do not refer directly to the dreamer’s “unconscious psyche”, “identity”, “symbolico-religious function”, and so on. These latter are interpretations and translations of symbolic images into psychological concepts, translations that, by definition, should be viewed as somewhat forced and incomplete in relation to the original dream symbol, but which are necessary for discussing the dreams rationally and psychologically. Furthermore, the dream-images often have multiple and varied symbolic connotations; only some of such connotations—the ones that are clearly related to this study’s objects of research—are discussed here. As with any true symbol, one must accept that part of its connotations and meanings always remains concealed, opaque, and untranslatable. Therefore, each summary at the end of each dream interpretation should be seen merely as an approximate, abridged formulation of how the dream seemed to answer the specific questions posed by the specific aims—through its interpreted meanings, translated into psychological concepts. Thus the summaries have a tentative character, and represent a mere attempt at deciphering and comprehending the symbolic worlds of meaning the dreams naturally portray—worlds which should indeed be the reader’s main focus of attention.