Journal of Marketing Management

Literary Perspectives on Marketing

Marketing and consumer researchers have long been interested in stories (Twitchell, 2004). Yet despite the field’s interpretive turn (Sherry, 1991), literature remains a surprisingly marginalized resource for understanding markets and consumption. While literary criticism has been established within consumer research for decades (Brown, 1998, 1999; Stern, 1989), relatively little work has treated literature itself as a primary source of theorizing, empirical material, or methodological inspiration.

This special issue invites scholars to explore the contributions that literature can make to marketing and consumer research. We encourage submissions that draw on literary texts, literary theory, and literary methods to advance our understanding of consumers, brands, markets, and marketing practices. In particular, we seek work that demonstrates how literature can illuminate dimensions of consumer life that remain difficult to access through conventional empirical approaches. Novels and other cultural texts provide opportunities for researchers to immerse themselves in consumer worlds and develop interpretations through intuition and empathy, reflecting a mode of inquiry that differs markedly from the positivist tradition (Hirschman, 1986).

Recent developments across the humanities and social sciences have brought increased attention to literature as a source of understanding for business school disciplines, including organization studies (Beyes et al., 2019). Within marketing and consumer research, however, their use remains few and far between, with only a handful of notable exceptions (Canavan, 2018; Molesworth & Grigore, 2019; Patsiaouras et al,. 2016; Södergren, 2025; Södergren et al., 2025; Södergren & Vallström, 2024). This is noteworthy given the richness with which literary texts engage questions of consumption. Novels such as Yang Shuang’zi’s (2026) Taiwan Travelogue, for example, explore colonial histories and queer relationships through the consumption of food. Ling Ma’s (2018) Severance, in turn, follows a young woman who clings to her consumer routines through grief and a global pandemic, revealing how the rituals of consumption can serve as solace, mourning, and a means of holding on to a vanishing self.

Recent conceptual developments suggest that this situation is beginning to change. Emerging work in collective close reading (Otnes et al., 2024) and the metaphor of lit crit riffin’ (Takhar et al,. 2025) has demonstrated that literary approaches can contribute to consumer culture and marketing scholarship. These contributions have begun to establish a foundation for literary approaches within consumer research, but much remains to be done to demonstrate their broader applicability and value across the field. This special issue seeks to build on that foundation by establishing literature as a valid source of empirical material, theoretical frameworks, and methodological innovation for marketing and consumer research. Our aim is to demonstrate how literary perspectives can advance understanding of markets, consumption, brands, and marketing practices in ways that complement and extend existing approaches.

The special issue welcomes work that engages literature in at least three interconnected ways.

First, we invite contributions that use literary texts as sources of insight into markets and consumption. Such work may treat novels, short stories, poetry, drama, or other literary forms as empirical material through which consumer culture can be examined and theorized.

Second, we encourage scholarship that adopts concepts from literary theory to advance marketing thought (Ashman et al., 2025; Patterson et al., 2013). Literary traditions offer a rich repertoire of ideas - from narratology and poetics to feminist and postcolonial theory - to help rethink contemporary marketing phenomena.

Third, we welcome methodological and epistemological reflections on literary inquiry in marketing research, building on recent work on collective close reading and lit crit riffin’ that has expanded understanding of what literary approaches can contribute to consumer research scholarship (Otnes et al., 2024; Takhar et al., 2025).

The special issue also welcomes research on the marketing and consumption of literature itself (Brown, 2006, 2015). Contemporary developments such as BookTok and booksmaxxing - not to mention the commercial prominence of book retail spaces like Waterstones and Daunt Books - raise important questions about how literary products are marketed and consumed.

Finally, consumer researchers have long explored alternatives to conventional academic writing, including poetry, short fiction, and novels (Brown & Kerrigan, 2020; Schouten, 2026; Sherry, 2025; Sherry & Schouten, 2002; Södergren & Dagalp, 2025). Such work raises questions about how knowledge is produced in marketing and consumer research. We encourage submissions that experiment with literary forms of scholarship where these forms are integral to a clearly articulated contribution. Such submissions should engage substantively with the special issue’s central concerns and make it clear how the use of literary form advances these aims.

We welcome conceptual, methodological, empirical, and experimental contributions that demonstrate the value of literary perspectives for understanding marketing and consumer culture.

Possible Topics

Possible research topics include, but are not limited to:

• What insights can fiction provide for understanding contemporary consumer culture and marketing phenomena that remain inaccessible through conventional empirical approaches?
• How can specific concepts from literary theory be used as analytical tools for understanding contemporary consumer culture and branding practices?
• What epistemological assumptions are challenged when novels and other fictional texts are treated as legitimate data sources for understanding consumer culture?
• How can narratological concepts deepen our understanding of consumer journeys and marketing experiences?
• How do actors across the book industry (publishers, authors, booksellers) deploy marketing activities to increase the demand for literary works?
• What role does BookTok and other digital trends play in driving literary consumption?
• How can creative writing practices be integrated into consumer research?
• What forms of scholarly contribution become possible when researchers adopt literary or experimental modes of writing?

The full Call for Papers including references can be found at the JMM blog site: https://jmmnews.blog/literary-perspectives-on-marketing/