For more than a century, social theoretical writings on consumer culture and commodity aesthetics have concentrated on the world of capitalist commodities and commercial spaces: on brands, shopping malls and global media culture. Popular commodity aesthetics have had a marginal presence in the literature. However, today, as the popular masses are entering commercial culture to an unprecedented extent, through cheap electronics, ubiquitous internet connectivity and accessible knock-offs, popular commodity aesthetics have increased in importance. In this article, I use fieldwork in Delhi’s electronics bazaars to develop an inside perspective on the popular aesthetic of the bazaar. I argue that bazaars are characterized by excess: the excess of a seemingly chaotic architecture, household objects, and unhindered sociality. The excess is not simply a symptom of an underlying irrationality. It is deeply embedded in the social and economic life of bazaars and contributes towards the ability of small-scale commerce to endure and survive.

一个多世纪以来，关于消费文化和商品美学的社会理论著作一直集中在资本主义商品和商业空间的世界上：品牌，购物中心和全球媒体文化。流行的商品美学在文学中仅占很小的比例。但是，今天，随着大众通过廉价的电子产品，无处不在的互联网连接和可获取的仿冒品以前所未有的程度进入商业文化，大众商品美学的重要性日益提高。在本文中，我将在德里的电子集市中进行实地考察，以对集市的流行美学产生一种内部看法。我认为集市的特征是过剩：看似混乱的建筑，家庭用品和不受阻碍的社交活动的过剩。过度不只是潜在的非理性现象的征兆。它深深植根于集市的社会和经济生活中，有助于小型商业的生存和生存能力。