Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 2001. [Vol. 7.] Eger Journal of American Studies.(Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 27)

Studies - Sándor Végh: Adoption or Adaptation?: Interpretations of the Automobile

system was working for their benefit. In fact, it was working because of them, and the aim was achieved by simply de-emphasizing capitalist interest and overemphasizing consumer choice. The automobile, which apparently brought about immediate changes in society, established new institutions, and created roadtowns, suburbs, shopping malls had, in fact, no automatic consequences

—its whole existence was under the control of corporate leaders in key decision-making positions,, i.e., controlled by the providers of the consumer society. Every decision was dictated by business and the effort for higher profits. The consumer did not really got what he wanted, but what was offered. There was, of course, a considerable feedback from the customers regarding their desires and needs, but it was the providing capitalist who monitored, filtered, and decided mainly on the basis of the profit demands and

—to a less extent

—on the consumers' desires. This fact was supported by the highly manipulative commercial advertisement, of which the main goal was to have the consumers buy the merchandise with the cheapest production cost at the highest price possible, while they still thought that they had made a bargain. Although this is not surprising at all if one is aware of the fundamentals of economics, free market capitalism, free competition, and is able to look at the automobile as a piece of consumer product, not only as an ingenious invention that can take one to distant places. The car for the masses arrived at a time when Americans had extra money and "free time." The prosperity of the 1920's had its role, but the nation's overwhelming acceptance of the automobile was also due to several other factors. Let us examine some of them. Self-awareness of the average American in the early years of the automobile The automobile was a distinguished manifestation of the enormous change in the thinking of the American public during the first decades of the century. A growing self-awareness in the nation had actually begun after the economic recession in the 1890's when the average American became increasingly aware of his impersonalization as a worker, his insignificance as a citizen, his helplessness as a human being, and, finally, a diminished understanding of his rights as an American. The peak of the individualization movement coincided 79