The McDonaldization of Society 6 Sixth Edition

This book makes interesting, logical reading as long as you accept that 'macdonaldization' is a bad thing. If you find no problem with the concept then it is a bit like proving black is white.

I took an Introduction to Sociology course that used both this and Jon Witt's  The Big Picture: A Sociology Primer . While I found Witt's book to be engaging and informative to someone new to the field, I did not enoy Ritzer's book very much. Not to say he doesn't have good ideas, but I found the writing bland and, at times, overly technical.Ritzer argues that the fast-food priciples epitomized by McDonald's - efficiency, calculability, predictability and control - are permeating society as a whole. He takes examples from the mundane (food shopping) to the extravagent (climbing Mount Everest) to the horrifyingly extreme (the Holocaust) to illustrate his point. He also devotes time to detailing how one can "deMcDonaldize" society. He also has extensive endnotes for further reading.However, this book contains some very serious flaws. It is very obvious that Ritzer views this McDonaldization as a completely negative entity, glossing over the fact that, in non-extreme doses, some of those four priciples can be good things. His bias is so evident he goes as far to quote Weber and say that McDonaldization is leading us into a "polar night of icy darkness." I find it a little hard to take his text seriously when he uses such metaphors.He also devotes a chapter to "Globalization and McDonaldization," which starts out well enough but ends up being little more than a plug for another of Ritzer's books that made my head hurt with its liberal use of jargon and confusing syntax ("Although the grobalization of nothing is at odds with the glocalization of something,... the grobalization of nothing is also at odds with the grobalization of something... there is no conflict between the grobalization and the glocalization of nothing." - The whole chapter reads like that).And one more thing that bothered me - a pet peeve, I know, but still - was that the kerning (text spacing, or the space between the letters) is sometimes noticably different from page to page. As someone who has a passing knowledge of basic layout, this irked me.This text conveys some very interesting concepts, but it is executed in a less-than-stellar manner. I'd take this book a chapter at a time to minimize frustration.

I bought this book immediately following finals, getting an AMAZING deal on this BRAND NEW book!!! It doesn't have a scratch, mark, or any highlighting in it!! I CAN'T WAIT to read it!!!

it has served its purpose for the one of my class requirements! It has some interesting info not expected. Thanks!

Another textbook that I had to buy for my PMBA program. This book can be summed up in one word, repetition. The same problems were discussed over and over throughout the book.

was for school

Great book, lot of interesting facts, easy to read, well arranged, good for using in some research papers or essays.

Not true sizes. When I received the product is was extremely small and of poor quality. Would not recommend this product.

I recommend this book to anyone interested in business. It is a great read and look at business from a different perspective. It was recommended to me whilst I was doing my MSc in Management and it helped speed up my learning.

Correct

Well received thank you. XXX XXX XXX XXX XXX XXX XXX XXX XX XX XX XX XX XX XX X

good

Clean copy.