George Ritzer is Distinguished University Professor at the University of Maryland, where he has also been a Distinguished Scholar-Teacher and won a Teaching Excellence Award. He was awarded the Distinguished Contributions to Teaching Award by the American Sociological Association, an honorary doctorate from LaTrobe University in Australia, and the Robin Williams Lectureship from the Eastern Sociological Society. His best-known work, The McDonaldization of Society (8th ed.), has been read by hundreds of thousands of students over two decades and translated into over a dozen languages. Ritzer is also the editor of McDonaldization: The Reader; and author of other works of critical sociology related to the McDonaldization thesis, including Enchanting a Disenchanted World, The Globalization of Nothing, Expressing America: A Critique of the Global Credit Card Society, as well as a series best-selling social theory textbooks and Globalization: A Basic Text. He is the Editor of the Encyclopedia of Social Theory (2 vols.), the Encyclopedia of Sociology (11 vols.; 2nd edition forthcoming), the Encyclopedia of Globalization (5 vols.), and is Founding Editor of the Journal of Consumer Culture. In 2016 he will publish the second edition of Essentials of Sociology with SAGE.

About the Author
Preface
1. Globalization: A New Conceptualization
Key Topics in the Study of Globalization
Globalization Theories
Glocalization and Grobalization
Grobalization: The Major Processes
Glocal, Grobal, and Local
2. Nothing (and Something): Another New Conceptualization
Defining Nothing
Defining Something
The Something-Nothing Continuum
Globalization and the Dimensions of Nothing
3. Meet the Nullities: Nonplaces, Nonthings, Nonpeople, and Nonservices
Nonplaces (and Places)
Nonthings (and Things)
Nonpeople (and People)
Nonservice (and Service)
Relationships Among the Nullities
An Illustrative Excursion to the Movies
4. Nothing: Caveats and Clarifications
Conceptual Aids to Understanding Nothing
Some Paradoxes
The Social Construction of Nothing
The Economics of Nothing (and Something)
In Defense of Nothing
5. The Globalization of Nothing
Elective Affinities
Grobalization: Loose Cultural and Tight Structural Forms
The Grobalization of Nothing: Enabling Factors
6. Theorizing Glocalization and Grobalization
Theorizing the Globalization of Culture
Analyzing Sport: Use and Abuse of the Concept of Glocalization
Analyzing McDonaldization Anthropologically: More Use and Abuse of Glocalization
Thinking About the Fate of the Local
Contributions to Cultural Theories of Globalization
7. The Globalization of Consumer Culture---and Global Opposition to It
Elements of Consumer Culture
Driving Forces Behind the Globalization of Consumer Culture
The Role of Branding
Beyond the Usual "Consumer" Suspects
Global Attacks on the Symbols of American Consumer Culture
The Globalization of Nothing and September 11, 2001
8. Loss Amidst Monumental Abundance---and Global Strategies for Coping With It
Theory and the Paradoxes of Consumer Culture
Loss Amidst Monumental Abundance
Strategies for Overcoming the Sense of Loss
Notes
Index