Women’s Programs from the Perspective of Conspicuous Consumption: A Study on Gelin Evi (Bridal House) Audiences

Abstract

The roles of the concepts of "bride" and "groom" of marriage, which make up the basic building block and enable society to exist, are changing day by day through popular culture and media in a globalizing and digitalizing world. The media, which is communicated with the mass media, realizes this with images and symbols and directs the meaning, duties and perception of these two concepts. Television, which is the most important of these tools, has become an indispensable part of our daily life since its invention and is still classified as a tool that still maintains its importance in the changing, developing and innovative media field. This tool changes the perception of the "bride" in the society in the direction of "skilled bride, competent bride", and imposes the opinion that social status will be achieved by owning expensive luxury products by emphasizing the external appearance, through "daytime TV women's programs". These programs, in which the practices of conspicuous consumption, which are a part of popular culture, are exhibited, target female audiences of domestic women, who spend most of their time at home, and by creating program contents that have been planned before, they have also affected the way of application of traditional customs and traditions. Bride candidates competing in the "Gelin Evi (Bridal House)" program, which was broadcast between 2015 and 2019 and decided to continue broadcasting again in 2022, created a competitive environment among them, also creating a competitive environment for their homes, their own bridal dowry, clothing, jewelry, food items and arrangements, wedding, and miscellaneous items. It is a program that selects the most assertive bride by scoring the ceremonies and the bridal belongings mentioned in the previous sentence within the scope of the competition. From this point of view, the aim of this study was to reveal the map of this program on the society within the framework of conspicuous consumption policies, and in-depth structured interviews were conducted with 20 women who were the audience of the program. At this point, it has been understood that the program on 20 women included in the research has changed the perception of the bride and created individuals who argue that the bride, who has flashy and exaggerated luxury consumption products, is one step ahead.