Objects, Consumption, and Desire: 05Proposal Archives

April 14, 2006

a change at the 11th hour

I tried to post this earlier, but it didn;t seem to work. After discussion with Harvey, I have changed my object. It's unfortunate that Ken is again being abandoned by a women, but that's his problem now. I am now writing on an object that is closer to my dissertation, which is changing trends in personal care for men, and how this relates to consumerism and masculinity. So, my new object is the gillette razor.

The Gillette razor stands out for three reasons. One, Gillette controls more than half of the market for men's razors. Second, Gillette razors are readily associated with men despite their women's line. Third, in my interviews with men I am conducting for my dissertation, I am finding that men are more comfortable discussing shaving than any other grooming routine. As one interviewee put it "we don't talk about our nails, but we'll talk about the Mach3".

In this paper, I hope to give a short social history of shaving (being attentive to periods where beards were popular), compare women's and men's razor design, and finally, try to situate this discussion of shaving in the sociology of beauty lit as well as the literature on grooming/hygiene more generally (and if anyone knows anything about that lit any direction would be appreciated).

Posted by Jane Jones at 5:31 PM

April 11, 2006

"It is a pen. It is not what a lipstick should be."

I have decided the sentences above are going to be my guide in this my paper. Initially I wanted my paper to orbit around the lipstick pen’s value created by means of Marc Jacobs’ marketing strategies. Inspired by Harvey’s comment about the company expecting something in exchange from me in the future, I was thinking of setting it within a gift-exchange framework. It is almost as if they initiate a marriage negotiation when they let me have the pen in a fancy bag for $1.50.

However, I don’t seem myself “pushing the object” if I decide to take this approach. Instead I am thinking of getting into how this lipstick pen demonstrates the arbitrariness of not just the signifier but also the signified. It’s a cross-dressing object. It is a joke. It is inconsistent with logic. I am thinking if there is such a thing as an object with agency, then this one comes close. Well, I have a hunch this could take me somewhere interesting, but I am a little clueless where to start. Any kind of help would be much appreciated:o)

Posted by Sarah Carlson at 11:49 AM | Comments (10)

March 5, 2006

Paper Topics 4

A summary of attempts at finding an object.

1. A Department Store is not an object. However, a display
case within in department store is.

2. Movie theater seats are objects. However, I'm not sure
I'm that interested in them.

3. Hand-made cardboard monkeys (even if the artist is making
100 of them) is not mass-produced enough. Maybe.

4. How about diet books as a genre?

5. How about terra cotta (cooked earth) tiles, produced
for centuries, became wildly popular at end of 19th c,
now experiencing a resurgence in popularity?

Please advise...

Posted by Andrea Siegel at 8:39 AM | Comments (1)

February 21, 2006

"Uncool" life saver: how the condom came to have a negative value in gay sex culture

Presently, if you ask a homosexual man what is trendy in gay culture, he will not tell you that condoms are “in!” This might not be what the Fab Five will advise on their public television show, but definitely, preservatives are getting out of fashion. Despite the efforts of condom marketers to create a variety of this item to suit the user’s personal preferences (the attempt to give them some exchange or display value) it seems that gay men will use them only for their obvious use-value, if they do. This seems ironic for an artefact that had its boom in the market in the early eighties in the midst of the AIDS crisis, but more than just having a low exchange-value in gay sex culture, this item seems to add to the value of other commodities when it is absent from them. As a matter of fact, in the gay sex commerce, more obviously than in the heterosexual part, you pay more for “no condom,” whether we are talking of pornography or prostitution.

Failure to use a condom in men-to-men sexual relations is certainly not a new practice, but the fetichization of its absence is a more recent phenomenon. Since a few years, gay porn made before the AIDS crisis has started a second life with the proud label “pre-condom.” Then a new slang term “bareback sex” and the secondary “raw sex” have appeared to identify contemporary practices. Those words relate to their own niche within gay pornography, and they are widely used in practice among gay men. What is new is not simply the “kink” of unsafe sex, but its evolution in a subculture, with its own style and fashion. In fact, we are in the beginning of a gay “porn war” opposing the more established “mainstream” studios (that have irrevocably included condoms in their videos for a long time) to the rebel bareback pornographers. The large porn “corporations” fear that maverick producers counter their efforts to make the industry well accepted by society, while barebackers blame the “condom Nazis” for creating a hegemonic view of queer sexuality, for wearing a “behaviourial condom” that equates gay sex with disconnectedness. This “ideological” fight can be misleading: in the end, what matters is who will sell the most DVDs. Still, this competition is totally dependant on an object and its rhetorical articulations.

The objective of this paper will be to investigate the history of the condom to enable a better understanding of the actual polemic in gay sex culture and commerce. I will trace the marketing of the condom as a medical device and its publicity through some public health announcement in comparison to its “un-marketing” in the actual porn culture. Both ask gay men to experience their sexuality in different terms.

Condoms are relegated to the pharmaceutical market and not to sex shops, as opposed to other sex devices like lubricants, toys, and aromas. Gay sex shops offers a wide variety of sex accessories with different brands and fashion that will appeal to different kinds of gay men, but condoms are excluded from this market (for example, there is no condom specifically designed for a subgroup like leather men, as it is the case for lubricants and toys.) Therefore the assumption is that the way in which gay men relate to condoms does not have to do with the multiple choices within its consumption, but simply with the choice wether or not to use it; gay men do not differentiate themselves with the use of a certain brand, shape, color, of flavor or condom, but simply with the fact if they use it or not. Then it is my belief that in many cases, the choice to not use condoms might not have to do only with the characteristics of that item, but with the relation of an individual to the sexual culture put forth by barebacking (which is not simply to say that bareback porn leads to unsafe sex practices.) This subculture’s aesthetic is very similar to the “live fast, die pretty” style of the punk world. In opposition, condom marketing focuses of gay men’s need to take responsible choices. The condom thus embodies a struggle within gay community between the “good gay” citizen and the unruly queer that is not concerned with longevity. If condoms are “out of fashion” in the gay community, it is perhaps, on one side, that homosexual men are nostalgic of the more radical sexual past of the “pre-condom” era, and on another side, because it did not enter the gay sex accessories industry (but remained a regulated medical device).

Overall, this research will make use of queer theory works dealing with gay culture and commerce, on sociological texts on consumption and identity, media studies literature on public sex messages and on pornography, as well as a few medical and social work studies on condom use and standards. The issue addressed is in high need of research because of its relation with public health issues. The approach is innovative as it reminds us that to understand the use of an item like the condom, we have to investigate how the object organizes the aesthetic of the performance and experience of the user’s (or non-user’s) sexuality.

Posted by Etienne Meunier at 11:54 PM | Comments (2)

February 20, 2006

The practical everyday bobby-pin

It was time for women to get a hair-cut. Shorter styles were introduced after the turn of the century and in no-time the bob became fashionable (thanks to Irene Castle). This revolution in feminine aesthetics prompted the need for invention: the bobby-pin. Was the bobby-pin the progenitor of the wide variety of hair clips available today? As a metal hair restraining device, does the bobby-pin exist in one form or does this ‘hair-pin with a hump’ have a breath of variety available to the average consumer? Were there bobby-pins invented and patented that never saw the light of manufacture; what can these two-dimensional bobby-pins tell us about need or function or even desire? I will consult patent records to locate information about the imaginary worlds of the not-quite bobby.

The bobby-pin does not escape the pressures of history; war time measures nearly led to its extinction, and the 1940s saw substitutions for this well-placed clip. “Bombshell hair-dos” were invented using thread and other nonmetal fasteners to aid the war effort. Activists in oral hygiene called for new practices in the mid-fifties, citing a rise in “bobby pin notch,” which led inventors like City College graduate Nat Solomon to invent the “Rubber-Tipped Bobby Pin.” This simple seamless metal instrument is both influenced by historical events and produces its own uproar in the cultural milieu.

Unlike the barrette, the bobby-pin is designed to be functional as well as innocuous; its basic design features simplicity and offers the potential for camouflage. The bobby-pin is not meant to be seen, concealment is part of its design, it merely provides for an accentuation of the hair-style, which causes me to wonder about its inherent subterfuge. Do you have to be in-the-know to know about the bobby-pin or is the consumer market inundated with advertisements? The mundane bobby-pin also offers another narrative – that of excitement and deceit. Thieves’ lore tell of its use for lock-picking, newspapers report instances of bobby-pins saving airplanes from crashing, what other uses has the bobby-pin inspired beyond that of hair restraint?

What other spin-off/lash-up inventions has the bobby-pin instigated? In 1948 New Yorker Alice Wallace began asking her friends where they kept their bobbies, this led to the invention of the bobby-pin box. “Alice has found that fear that an idea will be stolen and a desire for all the profits keep many an idea in the closet.” The story of the bobby-pin is replete with the elements of “fear” and “desire”, both fascinating as a subject and as a fastener!

Material culled from ProQuest Historical Newspapers:
“Bobby Pins Harming Teeth.” The New York Times, (May 12. 1954): 34.
“’Bombshell Hair-Do’ to Save War Metal.” The New York Times, (March 17, 1942): 18.
“Nat L. Solomon, Invented Rubber-Tipped Bobby Pin.” The New York Times, (December 13, 1975): 30.
“New Bobby-Pin Boxes Result from Girl’s Pursuit of Idea.” (Byline by Emille Tavel) The Christian Science Monitor, (December 16, 1948): 18.

Posted by Pilou Miller at 4:04 PM | Comments (2)

Fragrance and Fantasy

The focus on physical objects had me thinking immediately about how to classify perfume. I have wanted to write about the fragrance industry for a long time and realized that this class might finally provide the right context. Per BKG and Harvey’s suggestion, I have decided to focus on a particular perfume.

Part of what fascinates me about perfume is that it is an experience of the most obscure of our senses. It is hard to write about the sense of smell for a number of reasons: scientists do not fully understand it, its connection to bodily processes makes people uncomfortable, and it is somewhat ineffable – the language that we have to talk about scent is rather limited. Yet, the fragrance industry is huge and only continues to expand. In writing about perfume I want to keep in mind the sensory experience of objects and how objects are desired and marketed through or because of their sensory appeal. Perfume, its ingredients, packaging and advertisement are all objects but perfume itself is perishable – it has a shelf –life and can go bad or evaporate, as it will eventually. So perfume is an object that has a finite life. Perfumes that remain in production are continuously reproduced, but they may also change as manufacturers finesse recipes, substitute ingredients, and redesign formulas or packaging. The Chanel No. 5 of today looks and smells almost exactly like it did when originally launched, but has been subject to subtle changes. How and when such changes were made would speak to sensibilities about the fashion market and trends in perfume.

I decided to focus on Chanel No. 5 because it is iconic and historic. However, I also chose it because I do not particularly like it, nor does it work well with my own chemistry – it is not a perfume I like to wear. The perfume was launched in 1921, has been a bestseller ever since then, and is considered classic. It is historically significant because it was the first commercially sold fragrance to use aldehydes in its formula – synthetically created smells. The use of synthetic ingredients is commonplace today and artificial versions of natural scents are usually created. What made Chanel No. 5 so revolutionary was that it was composed to smell unique and not evoke particular natural ingredients – a modern creation. In this way it set course for the modern commercial practices of the industry.

The Chanel No. 5 story is also deeply embedded in the world of fashion; it was created for the legendary designer Coco Chanel. Hence following this object leads me to the world of fashion and design, the “branding” of products with the names of designers (and, increasingly today, celebrities) and the relationship between fragrance designers and those whose names their products will carry: the legend is that the perfume is called “No. 5” because it was the fifth sample that the perfumer offered Chanel; she also considered it her lucky number. The biography of Chanel and her success as a designer is part of the story. I think that Becker’s sense of “worlds” will be helpful in thinking about how to map out the terrain of my study and these different facets of the creation and production of this perfume.

I am thinking of looking into the following topics for my study: The creation of the fragrance, its design and packaging, the development of its marketing and myth over time, the history of its iconic “designer” – the Chanel brand, the perfume industry and the use of natural and artificial ingredients.

There are a number of books on the history and production of fragrance that I will draw upon; many mention Chanel No. 5 as an important and historically revolutionary product. I also plan to contact the Met about their exhibit on Chanel’s fashion and the Fashion Institute of Technology on an exhibit they had about the packaging of perfume. The Fragrance Foundation and its museum should be able to help with historical references and hopefully can point me to ways to access archival advertisements for the perfume.

I have recently discovered perfume blogs and may turn to them for some samples of how current perfume consumers describe the fragrance. Chanel No. 5, because of its longevity, is also a fragrance that has been worn by multiple generations and so many people have memories of the fragrance in relation to mothers, grandmothers and other older women. I may try to include some interviews or descriptions of such memories as a way to get at how the fragrance’s iconic status has shifted over time.

Posted by Leah Strigler at 8:22 AM | Comments (1)

February 19, 2006

Model Worlds: The Case of Twiggy

In the spring of 1967, a peculiar sight appeared on the cover of American Vogue magazine: a child’s face, staring blankly from beneath long and noticeable lashes, pouting in glossy muted lips, strangely doll-like with huge vacant eyes, an uncanny mannequin, made more real because of its eccentricity. Twiggy, a working-class seventeen year-old, the rail-thin Cockney Kid, dominated the covers and pages of high fashion bibles like Vogue and teen journals like Seventeen alike in 1966 and 1967, the years she hit the New York fashion world. Her image was everywhere, as a teen idol, a celebrity, and an ideal of feminine beauty.

The Twiggy look signals a break in the way beauty had long been presented by marketers; copies of Vogue just ten years previous portray a much different aesthetic. In the Fifties, fashion models were elegant women, haughty and perfect, with polished hair, straight posture, ruby red lips and matte, pore-less skin. The rise of Twiggy’s popularity marks a transition in which beauty became younger, messier, and more varied. How does one account for the leap in feminine beauty ideals from the Fifties to the Sixties? What sociological sense can be made of the Twiggy look?

I approach this question by totally objectifying Twiggy as a "look," as a marker of a new aesthetic sensibility. By locating this look in the model world, and treating it as an object to be followed through any other art world, we can link the progression of aesthetic tastes to changing relations between social classes, age groups, and the sexes in the 1960s. This analysis challenges the "fashion fascism" feminist argument that beuaty ideals reflect social relations between the sexest. Rather, I seek to locate the development of a look in a wider range of cultural and economic shifts that happened in the Sixties, such as informalization, evolving market structures, relaxation of class hierarchies, and the movement of fashion into pop culture.

The study will draw from a content analysis of images in Vogue to illustrate the leap in model looks, as well as historical research into the Sixties fashion, art, and model worlds. The baby doll face of Twiggy, I argue, can only make sense in the context of changing relations of dependence between the young and the established, shoppers and advertisers, and men and women that jointly produced the look of the Sixties.

Posted by Ashley Mears at 11:39 PM | Comments (1761)

the ottoman

For this paper I will explore the ways in which the ottoman is a seemingly useless, but deeply meaningful, member of the household furniture family. While it is designed and intended as a footrest, it is also often used as seating, as a table for other objects, or simply as decoration. The range of décor is large, with a variety of adornments and design styles, fabrics and upholstery techniques. A recent advance in the technology of ottomans is the rocking ottoman – an ottoman that moves on hinges to accompany the rocking chair. I am interested in two things in particular about the ottoman – the first being the way that this piece of furniture defines an individual, family, or institution in terms of wealth and class based on it’s design, it’s use, and it’s necessity for excess space. My other agenda is to discuss the ways that the body is socially constructed as “relaxed,” “leisurely,” and “normal” via the design and function of the ottoman. This is certainly linked to its classist implications, but I contend that the way the body is shaped by use of the ottoman is directly related the embodied understanding of the aforementioned words.

Posted by Kimberly Brandt at 7:41 PM | Comments (2)

The body as the site of the subject's identity

My paper will be on the use of artificial nails.

Dynamics of a consumption practice
“Demand is the economic expression of the political logic of consumption”. “Consumption is eminently social, relational, and active.” –Appadurai
“Taste classifies, and it classifies the classifier. Social subjects, classified by their classifications, distinguish themselves by the distinctions they make…”-Bourdieu

I will emphasize the importance of consumption in sending and receiving messages and will suggest that the use of fake nails carries more references than the physical beauty. I suggest that the structure of a given “consumer society” is based on the oscillation between the practices aiming unification and differentiation.

• Differentiation
This term suggests the use of fake nails in an attempt to mark one’s difference. First of all, not every woman who goes to nail salons asks for fake nails. As a matter of fact, although the market for artificial nail has grown really big, it seems that the demand comes from certain class (?) structure. Taste-acquired “cultural competence” is used to legitimize social differences. Ethnic identity carries an importance too. There are certain debates among the African American groups around the use of fake nails by the African American women. Some African-American men claim that the use of these products is a result of the fact that “white folk still have influence over what we, as Black people, consider to be beautiful”. On the other hand, though, there is another suggestion: that the manipulation of the products of the market can be used against the ideals of dominant ideology. In this respect, the body might be seen as a space where individuals “design” their own discourse. I wonder to what extent this practice is similar to the practice of dying one’s hair, for instance. (In both cases, what seems interesting to me is that the practices are as ephemeral and changeable as what the dominant ideology suggests.) The question in this part will be this: who are consuming fake nails most? It seems that the degree of the regular use of artificial nails is an important aspect as well.

• Re-unification
This part will suggest that the consumption results with two types of “unification”. First, the production of one’s own discourse usually comes hand in hand with a sense of groupness: a group of people who share that same discourse. There emerges a group of people who come together under the roof of the use of these products. It is interesting to find that there are certain web sites where you can find this “groupness”: groups of women who support the fake nails and groups who attack this use.
The other type of unification is maintained by the market itself. Brands advertising their products that allow women to use these nails at home, without going to a salon, claim that their products will please everyone, “from Easterners to westerners”, women can decorate their nails according to their own taste. Market offers to reach to every woman regardless her background and identity, and this means unification. In order to do this, different styles, tastes etc. are used for the sake of consumption.

Posted by Ilgin Yorukoglu at 7:40 PM | Comments (2)

Monkey Business

The Empirical Data:

On Friday I was talking with my friend Jimmy Grashow, an artist.

"How are you doing?"
"I'm on monkey #52. It's great. You should come up and see"
Jimmy, who lives in Connecticut, has a commission from the Decordova Museum and Sculpture Park to fill their front hall with monkeys swinging from the ceiling. He's aiming to make around 100. He makes them out of cardboard--he makes most of his work out of commonly found materials--cardboard, twist ties, things like that.
"Jimmy," I said. "I have a project for school. I have to write about an object."

"Come up and write about monkeys!" he said, you can even make one of your own!"

The Theoretical Underpinings:

Using the framework established by Howard Becker in Art Worlds, I propose to spend a day with artist Jimmy Grashow and interview him about the making of monkeys and his art worlds. Also I will learn how to fabricate my own monkey.

Posted by Andrea Siegel at 7:16 PM | Comments (2)

The Man Behind the Barbie

The Becker and Latour readings from last week directed us to be critical of “great man” theories of art and science. For every genius, there is a social network (or multiple social networks) in place that provides the foundation and support for great ideas. These networks are hierarchal, and although neither Becker nor Latour mentions this point, I would guess that these hierarchies are classed, raced, and, importantly for my project, gendered. Revisionist theories of history, as well as feminist historians, often point out that “great men” have equally great women standing behind them. Although these women are not in the limelight, their labor is instrumental in the success of their male counterpart.

In 1956, Ruth Handler, co-founder of Mattel, invented Barbie and she had her debut at the American Toy Fair in New York City (http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blbarbiedoll.htm). Two years later, Ken was introduced (http://www.dolls4play.com/barbiehistory.html), and he and Barbie immediately began dating. After forty-three years of dating, Ken and Barbie parted ways in February 2004 (http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/02/12/offbeat.barbie.breakup.ap/). During this time, Ken stayed in relative seclusion – until just last week, when he re-emerged with a new image and a mission: to win back Barbie. Although Ken claiming to be a metrosexual with a makeover now puts him in the game a bit late, his makeover is noteworthy for several reasons, which will comprise the focus of my project. As one half of an “All-American Couple”, Ken can tell us something interesting about courtship, masculinity, and the anxieties that exist between the two. Further, the fact that Ken is, after all, a doll, indicates how these anxieties are translated to the market.

This project will be guided by several questions. Why and how is Ken’s existence dependent on Barbie’s? How is Ken’s masculinity dependent on Barbie’s femininity? What can the social history of Ken tell us about larger social trends that are relevant to masculinity and courtship? How is Ken marketed to appeal to what is primarily a young female market? Using Ken as my methodological entry point, I hope to be able to understand what Ken the Doll tells us about gender, masculinity, and how the two are constructed to sell a commodity as well as an ideal.

Posted by Jane Jones at 6:27 PM | Comments (7)

cobblestones

Cobblestones are living multiple lives. As a utilitarian paving material they remain in certain out-of-the way neighborhoods throughout U.S. cities, especially in industrial or residential alleyways, where nobody bothered to pave them over or remove them from the street. Although as a general paving material they have been supplanted by asphalt and concrete, this very obsolescence has allowed them to serve as a signifier of ‘authentic’ historic streetscapes and to be used and reused in an aesthetic and historical context.

There are multiple companies that specialize in shipping cobblestones from Europe or in digging them up where unwanted in the U.S. and moving them to another context where they will presumably be more appreciated for their historic value.

This signification of historical authenticity has given the term ‘cobblestone’ special import, being used in everything from subdivisions in Phoenix (where, incidentally, the only actual cobblestones seem to be on the subdivision sign), to loft apartments in New York, to Thomas Kinkade paintings celebrating what seems to be an entire way of life based around cobblestones: “The pace of life in Cobblestone Village seems a century removed from what we typically find in our fast-paced culture. English country life is slow, rich, satisfying.”

And as an added bonus, apparently cobblestones are good for you, too – so good, in fact, that somebody can buy their own cobblestone mat and walk around on it in the comfort of their own home. Recent research has suggested that daily walking on cobblestone mats (granted, these cobblestones defined somewhat differently than the types generally used to pave U.S. cities, as they are small, rounded stones) may have multiple health benefits for seniors. The researchers at the Oregon Research Institute (where, incidentally, one can purchase one of these cobblestone mats for $39.95) note that the practice is based on principles of reflexology found in “traditional Chinese medicine.” The dynamic used in selling these mats concentrates less on their physical historical-ness and more on showcasing scientific studies and their linkages to ‘tradition’.

From Gavin Historical Bricks, an online seller of salvaged cobblestones:

"200+ Year Old European Granite Cobblestones from the streets of some of the nation's most historic cities! Historical Bricks has salvaged large quantities of historical granite cobbles from the streets throughout the Midwest. These beautiful cobbles were used as ship ballast on ships traveling from Europe over 200 years ago!"

This paper will attempt to trace the social life of cobblestones, as their status has partially shifted from a utilitarian way of paving roads to one in which they stand in for some authentic representation of the past either as physical artifacts or as links to traditional practices. The quote above also points to a couple of interesting threads: first how cobblestones can be seen as junk in one context but as historical commodities in another, and second how provenance is traced not just back to the historic cities of the U.S. but to Europe itself. They may be multiple spaces removed from their original context, but this seems to make them even more authentic.

Obviously, Appadurai has a lot to say here. Historical analysis will follow how cobblestones have been seen as commodities, objects, and signifiers, and how the meaning of a cobblestone path can vary significantly depending on whether it was created or uncovered as part of a conscious aesthetic decision or is simply in evidence because it was never paved over in the first place. It will also be important to see who is buying these cobblestones (for personal gardens or for public developments?), to trace the redevelopment of historic districts and their incorporation of these stones, and to look at how narratives overlap.

Posted by Mark Treskon at 6:24 PM | Comments (1)

The Coaster

Depending on who you talk to and where you are talking to them there are several names for the thing you put under a drink: coasters, beermats, dripmats, pulp-board mats, fiber-board drink coasters. For this paper I would like to explore this object using an anthropological perspective as described by Mary Douglas. With this as a foundation I will explore the world of coasters using ideas raised in the class readings. As we work through the semester I am hopeing to continually be exposed to different ways of thinking about objects, now specifically coasters, which will increase my understanding of our material world.

Coasters, of what I have learned so for, have an origin story. This story is perpetuated by makers and suppliers of cardboard coasters, the kind you usually find at bars. Their product is directly related to the story as they make the 'original' type of coaster or in Germany beer-mats. I would like to investigate this origin story as a starting point, seems logical enough. But then my next question revolved around what happened after its origin, as this is what really makes an object, not how is started but how it is subsequently used. How has the coaster changed from a beer absorbing mat to objects the have become a necessary part of table culture.

I would like to see how its materiality and function has changed. How are they related? Are they related? I would like to investigate the users of coasters and understand how they see coasters in their lives. I will also include collectors in the group of users hoping this adds dimension to my investigation of the two sided object that is the coaster

Posted by Jean-Luc Howell at 12:36 PM | Comments (1)

It's all about Desire

I will try to investigate the third term in the title of this course: desire. For this purpose I would like to find out what happened to video game console the Xbox 360. There was little advertising, a few reports in the news from launch parties (video game shows), and suddenly within a week or so after the public release all of Xbox 360 units were sold out. What happened?

Desire is constitutive of value as we have found out from Appadurai (who drew on Simmel). Objects have value because we desire them and not because they would be scarce, scarcity is only a consequence of desire. As a sociologist I have to argue that desire is not a possession of an individual but is social. It is socially constructed and the task is to answer how. So to go back to Harvey’s instruction to start with the question ‘How?’ instead of ‘Why?’ I will try to show how the desire for Xbox 360 was constructed/produced and by doing this answer the question why did people desire this game console so much that it virtually disappeared and is not available in the stores. On the other hand one should be careful not to impute too much intentionality to certain actors and this is where the term construction might be somewhat misleading. Perhaps it would be better to talk about emergence, a sequence of events, and a constellation of actants. In short: how did all the relevant elements lash-up?
Some of the issues that would need to be considered is the relevance of technological specifications, was it its description or visualization? Is there any about the new sleek design? Is it about advertisements or rather lack of them? Did this advertising create sort of a mysteriousness? How did the desire for the console diffuse through population (weak advertising indicates importance of mouth to mouth marketing-social contagion)? Is identity something that is relevant to explaining desire? Who are these people that gobbled up all those consoles? How are history and future of Xbox and its competitors relevant to desire? Where was it possible to buy and how come it was not possible to buy it anywhere for such a long time after being sold out? What was the role of critics (Becker’s art critics)? How did all these things lash up?
On the method: I will perform a content analysis of gamers’ online forums and blogs a few weeks before the public release of Xbox 360. I expect that I will be able to trace the sequences of building of a momentum just before the sales started. If this task turns out to be too daunting in terms of the sheer amount of data to analyze then I will turn to analysis of reviews by critics.

Posted by Miodrag Stojnic at 12:35 PM | Comments (1841)

The Plunger

Plunger = A device consisting of a rubber suction cup attached to the end of a stick, used to unclog drains and pipes. Also called plumber's helper. (The American Heritage Dictionary of English Language).
In New York I discovered the old-fashioned plunger in bathrooms of bars and apartments and astonishingly, they looked like the ones in Germany. Two thoughts immediately crossed my mind.

Firstly, the toilets might change if you are switching borders of countries, but the plunger stays the same. Secondly, if a household object does not change during decades, it might be already perfectly designed? The latter assumption seems not to be correct, because there is a variety of designed plungers which can be purchased online. I want to explore the designed and functional background of the plunger and connect thereby the object to the social world. How to use a plunger if you would not have any cultural knowledge about its function? Relying on Douglas & Isherwood, I want to investigate the meaning and the value of the plunger in the circulation of goods. What is the use/ exchange value of a plunger?

Pointing to the idea of Veblen and Bourdieu that an object is a sign of lifestyle, the plunger will certainly not fit in the category of “status-enhancing” objects. I like to figure out why the plunger is more a common household device (which everybody has, but nobody speaks about it) than an aesthetic object. (It could be art but more in the Duchamp sense, and that would not be original at all anymore). I adapt therefore Beckers idea of artworlds to reveal the network of the plungers' world.

I am also interested in the plunger, because its obvious connections to specific places. Given the nature of clogged toilets, the plunger should always be in reach of the toilet. However, newer versions of the plunger do not transform so much the object itself but are more concerned about hiding it. Apparently, the toilet plunger is regarded as something “spoiling” the clean environment of the bathroom. My analysis of object and social environment will therefore start in the bathroom.

Furthermore, the plunger as an invention is closely connected to the development of the sewage system. Thus, a historical exploration might be necessary to get insights in how we deal with plungers today. What does a plunger tell us about the self-image of Western civilized countries? Where is the connection between technological progress and the fact that toilets still clog and that there is something as simple as the plunger to help out? The cultural dimension might also be explored through the notion that feces are seen as a sort of “cultural” pollution of the ideal society. Excrements like waste have to disappear as fast as possible and it is the plunger who just stop and inverse the flow of disappearance by bringing back to surface what should not be seen. In this association, I see the plunger as an object to analyze progress and civilization.

Note: To get better insights in the "American Way" of dealing with plungers, i would appreciate as many personal comments as possible about your experiences with plungers. thanks!

Posted by Teresa Reiber at 11:54 AM | Comments (1)

Credit Cards, Anonymity, Trust, and Branded Money

Like Mintz’s excellent piece on sugar, I would like to look at something that is so ubiquitous it is hard to imagine what life would be like without it: the credit card. While the concept of credit has evolved over time from perhaps a marker of poverty (needing credit at the general store was not always a sign of trust in the customer’s ability to repay but an act of pity) to a specific account at a particular store, to the current possibilty of small, short term loans that can be made at just about any outlet by just about anyone. Diner’s Club created what was the first card similar to what we have in our wallets today. In 1960, a card was created that would allow restaurant goers to eat without paying cash; they were billed for their meals at the end of the month and had to pay the bill in full. Because they had to pay in full, this card was a charge card, but not exactly a credit card. The term of the loan was only the number of days between the purchase and the end of the monthly term. (Footnote: Diner’s Club still exists as a brand but it has been taken over by Visa which was necessary because usership was falling due to the card’s limited acceptability at a wide variety of retailers.) Credit cards, rather than charge cards, do not require repayment in full at the end of any particular term. They have consistently lowered the amount of the total due at the end of the month so that it is now about 2%. At this rate of repayment, users could spend decades paying off the average debt load (Footnote: the average debt load appears more or less bi-modal. Many people pay their cards off in full every month or carry less than $500 from month to month. There are also many who carry loads of $15,000 and more).

For my project, I would like to look at the way the credit card has enterred the consumption arena and changed it. Face-to-face interactions with cashiers are no longer necessary; you can pay for gas at the pump, buy things over the phone and now the internet, and even when shoppers arrive at a point of sale, they are more likely to have a close interaction with a credit card swiping machine than a cashier. Furthermore, credit cards make it possible to spend on another’s behalf with surprising ease. I am a personal assistant and carry my boss’s credit card in my wallet all the time. The only store of the thirty or so where I have attempted to use the card that has refused me because I am clearly not a man, was Filene’s Basement. Even locations that go through the motions of comparing the signature on the back of the card to the one that I sign do not always stop me…but really, my name is not Robert. I have also used my parents credit cards to buy things online and I find this transferrable aspect of credit cards to be rather interesting. If my boss or my parents were to give me cash, they would be in control of just how much cash I should receive. But giving me a credit card requires them to trust me not to spend wantonly. In my boss’s case, he does not review the bill at the end of the month to check the validity of the charges; I do. The anonymity of sale transactions that accompanies credit card uses also combines with retailer trust to make it possible for just about anyone to use just about any card at any location. Credit cards may seem more legitimate than cash, at least as far as the retailers are concerned, or they may not be willing to forfeit 2% of their income which is the amount credit cards usually make per sale.

I am also interested in the form that credit cards have taken. They could easily have been made out of thin metal or even stiff paper, but they are not. They could easily have been larger or smaller, but all of those cards, business cards, ID cards, and credit cards have become standardized to more or less the same size (there are some international variations). Did the wallet precede the card or the card precede the wallet or did they arise together? Beyond those basic questions of form, what about the current state of customizable cards? On the one hand, particular brands of cards carry certain meanings. An American Express implies a different class status than just a Visa or Mastercard. A Diner’s Club card is rather esoteric but it often suggests that it might be a card paid by the company, which is always a sign of higher class status. Within the realm of any particular brand there are also status points to be gained in terms of the appearance and service level associated with the “gold card”, the Platinum card, and so on. The mythical American Express black, a card with no credit limit that is only available by invitation epitomizes exclusivity and class status as communicated by a piece of plastic. Has this kind of credit card posturing replaced the status that used to come with a large wad of cash? And what does it mean to have a card that is associated not with gold or platinume status, but with amazon.com or your alma mater? Does the credit card sit a little too close to your ID card? Are we using credit cards to suggest identity affiliations?

Economists and credit card marketers have gone to great lengths to figure out how credit card policies effect consumer behavior. Lowering the amount due per month to 2% of the total, increasing late fees (and all fees), tying repayment of one card to repayment behavior on other cards and accounts, and raising credit lines have all had positive benefits for the credit card companies. But those things aren’t the main thrust of my inquiry. I am not so much interested in looking at the changes to the fine print. I am interested in exploring the major implications of the way credit cards structure interactions with others, the way readily available credit influences how people allocate funds and make consumption decisions, and the way electronic transactions have influenced the 24-hour nature of our consumption assumptions. It is interesting that people think of credit cards as safety nets, as something that can be there “just in case”. What implications does this have for saving behavior? If you can use your credit card as a safety net, why build up a cash fund “in case of emergency”? On the other hand, if you could afford to pay off your credit card, but choose not to, what does that mean? Is credit different than money? Once we have credit cards that allow sales to take place between users and machines, rather than users and cashiers, do we expect to be able to buy at any time? Have credit cards contributed to the perceived speed-up of social life? How has the rise of credit card use influenced the shipping industry? Has the ratio of shipments to businesses and shipments to consumers changed? Are there more overnight and rapid shipments because the shipments are going to consumers rather than stores? (Before there was the internet there was catalog shopping which also relied on shipments from warehouses directly to consumers, but the instantaneousness and anonymity of internet shopping would seem to have increased the demand for overnight and rapid shipping. It’s easy to understand that a person might take some time to put an order together, but a machine should be able to do it immediately, without tiring.)

This project hopes to untangle the credit card from its many relationships to everything from the shipping industry, to interactions with cashiers and employers, to saving/spending ratios, to expectations of continuous and instantaneous consumption, and even to the making of identity through the branding of money.

Posted by Laura Noren at 9:31 AM | Comments (1)

The Money Clip

Engravable Watch Money Clip, Things Remembered Personalized Gray Stripe Money Clip, Tool Money Clip, Sterling Silver Lucky Aces Dollar Sign Money Clip, Computer Chip Money Clip, Bahamas 50 Cent "Blue Marlin" Two Toned Coin Hinged Money Clip, First Flight Centennial® Money Clip Knife, High Polish Chrome Multitasker Money Clip – these are only few of the types of money clips which the (cyber)stores offer to the customers. The money clip is one of the simplest objects of all; still, it reveals a lot of its user. He is a man, for sure, middle class or upwards; in addition, the money clip also tells us about the owner’s taste, his financial situation and personal habits.

The outline of my research:
1. the money clip
a.) description
b.) design / form
c.) function
d.) value
2. the history of the money clip in relation to the history of money
3. the money clip users’
a.) the practicality of money clips: gender
b.) the performativity of money clips: class
4. the money clip market – the commodity category of ‘gift’
a.) where can you buy it?
b.) lack of advertisements
c.) the market competition

1.
In the first section of my research paper I will attempt to provide a comprehensive description of the money clip. Here I will borrow Becker’s perspective and focus on the details in the ordinary, hoping to succeed in discovering the extraordinary about it. While we have seen money clips several times; it is still challenging to characterize this seemingly trivial object. What does it look like? What material is it made of? What is the best way to describe its shape? What other forms does it take? What is the average size? What is the usual color?
Then I will describe the money clip’s function. The primary function is obvious: “to store cash and/or credit cards in a very compact fashion for those who do not wish to carry a wallet” (wikipedia). What other applications can we imagine? Do people use it for other purposes? Some money clips have other built-in devices, such as watches or knives; but do the owners take advantage of these other functions in reality? Or should we consider the built-in watch or knife merely as a decoration?

Methodology, resources:
I will primarily rely on my own observations and assumptions. At the same time, I will also try to interview some money-clip users as well as money-clip sellers.

2.
Next, I will attempt to reconstruct the history of the money clip. In order to do so, first I need to contextualize the ‘money-clip’ within a broader network of objects. What other objects does the money clip interrelate with? It is made of silver/ steel or stainless steel (according to latest fashion), its primary and only function is to store paper money, and it is a variant of the wallet. Since the invention of the money clip must have been preceded by the introduction of paper money, I will start my research with looking into the history of money to see when the first bills were issued and when they became part of the everyday life. Then, I hope to find some sources on the history of accessories to see when wallets were first used. By the end of this part of the research, I hope to be able to tell the approximate time when paper clips were first used and also present the evolution of the object. The analysis will end with the future: will the disappearance of paper money lead to the disappearance of money clip? In my research I will demonstrate how the design and the functionalism of money clips adjust to the conditions of the 21st century and Credit Card societies.

Bibliography
Carlile, William Warrand. The Evolution of Modern Money. New York: A. M. Kelley, 1969.
Chown, John F. A History of Money : From AD 800. London ; New York: Routledge, 1994.
Moore, Carl H., and Alvin E. Russell. Money : Its Origin, Development, and Modern use. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 1987.

3.
In this section of my research I will try to describe the social group of money clipper users.
1. The practicality of money clips: gender
My hypothesis is that mostly (only?) men use the money clip. I hope to confirm this hypothesis by my research as well as explain what makes money clip a masculine object. Why do only men prefer money clips to wallets? What other functions do wallets have which money clips cannot perform? There is no room in them for coins, photographs or any other personal items. At the same time they easily fit into any jeans’ or pants’ pockets. What other factors can we think about which might influence one’s choice between money clip and wallet?
After the analysis of the object and my attempt to answer what makes the money clip masculine, I will turn to its users and ask what makes men decide for the money clip. To find the answers, I will look into studies on genders and objects / consumption, history of fashion and other case studies which may offer a methodology for my research.

Bibliography
Adams, Rachel, Savran, David. The masculinity studies reader, Malden, Mass. : Blackwell, 2002.
De Marly, Diana. Fashion for Men : An Illustrated History. New York: Holmes & Meier, 1985.
Howard, Vicki. "A "Real Man's Ring": Gender and the Invention of Tradition." Journal of Social History 36.4 (2003): 837-56.
Leland, Jacob Michael. "Yes, that is a Roll of Bills in My Pocket: The Economy of Masculinity in the Sun also Rises." The Hemingway Review 23.2 (2004): 37-46.
Nelson, Sarah M. Gender in Archaeology : Analyzing Power and Prestige. Walnut Creek, Calif.: AltaMira Press, 1997.
Shannon, Brent. "ReFashioning Men: Fashion, Masculinity, and the Cultivation of the Male Consumer in Britain, 1860-1914." Victorian Studies 46.4 (2005): 597-630.
Sørensen, Marie Louise Stig. Gender Archaeology. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell, 2000.

2. The performativity of money clips: class
Although the money clip is an ordinary object which is equally available for the poor and the rich (its price varies between 8 dollars and 5000 dollars), nevertheless, I argue that the use of money clip is still class related. I suppose that mostly members of the middle class or upper middle class choose to purchase / use it. I hope to reinforce my hypothesis by researching the consumptive habits of classes as well as the social phenomenon of luxury. I will also look at the performativity of money clips and describe the ways in which it constructs / contributes to the holder’s class identity and representation.

Bibliography
Nickles, Shelley. "More is Better: Mass Consumption, Gender, and Class Identity in Postwar America." American Quarterly 54.4 (2002): 581-622.

4.
In the last section of the paper I will try to map the money clip market, define the manufacturers and the distributors as well as the channels of distribution. Although there is an extensive and competitive market of paper clips, companies usually do not advertise this product in itself. I argue that for the distributors money clip is always an element of a larger commodity category - the “gifts.” I will end my paper with the idea of the “gift-industry” and I will try to explain what makes certain thing a perfect gift, what characterizes a ‘gift’ (as a commodity category) and why certain things are better gifts than others.
Here again, I will primarily rely on my observations, but I will also analyze the representation / presence of the money clip’s market on the Internet.

Bibliography
http://www.answers.com/topic/money-clip
http://men.style.com/gq/fashion/styleguy/accessories/49e
http://www.indobase.com/fashion/men-fashion/accessories/miscellaneous/
http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-simers18dec18,1,3809129.column?coll=la-headlines-sports&ctrack=1&cset=true

Posted by Aniko Szucs at 4:19 AM | Comments (1)

February 18, 2006

The Lipstick Pen

Ever since I moved to New York eight months ago, I have made it a custom of mine to drop by the Marc Jacobs store on Bleecker Street when I venture out to by veggies and fruit at the Chelsea Market. I never buy anything at the store, I simply go in there to get a sense of the atmosphere, see what they have on the shelves and racks, how the shop assistants dress and behave, etc. At least this was what I did until one day in December 2005, when a new sort of merchandise had entered the store.

That day in December they actually had things for sale that I could fit within my student budget: $10 retro elastic belts with a discrete yet visible Marc Jacobs Label, $5 metallic leather key chains with “Marc Jacobs” imprinted on it, $1 “stinky rat” key chains with “Marc Jacobs” printed on the back, $2 “cocktail rings” with big faux diamonds (no logo), $1.50 condoms individually packed in little white boxes with “Marc Jacobs” printed on them, $1 logo’ed plastic pencil sharpeners in a variety of colors, and finally, my favorite of them all: a $1.50 lipstick (ballpoint) pen with the name of the designer written on the “lower cylinder” part of the “lipstick”.

Unless it will be denied by powers greater than myself, I have decided that my research paper is going to be integrated around the Marc Jacobs lipstick pen. What exactly about it that fascinates me I have still to figure out. But below I have tried to work myself into issues/aspects I would like to address:

Familiarity: I was born in 1981, and in general I feel that a lot of the inexpensive merchandise they sell at the store is something I know from my childhood. When touching for example the “stinky rat” key chain, the lipstick pen and the plastic pencil sharpeners, there is something about their tactility that is just so familiar. To be honest, I do not know if I have ever owned a lipstick pen, but still I feel like I have. It is a little like “Casablanca”. I have never seen that film from beginning to end, yet I know the characters and the outline of the film, certain quotes, the music, etc. In short, the lipstick pen is so very familiar. It is as if it is something that is very much mine and that I am one of the few that have a “connection” to it. (When mentioning I was born in 1981, I do it in part because I wonder if anyone who is either older, younger or my age who may follow what I am getting at.)

Absurdity: There is something very absurd about the lipstick pen. Apart from being a pen disguised as a lipstick, I find that it is the experience of buying it that makes it a logical contradiction of sorts. As mentioned it was $.1.50. It is all plastic and it is by no means flawless. The “gold” is chipping off the…er…the ”gilded part”, it doesn’t write very well and it has little dents here and there. In a way, I think $1.50 is just the right price. It should not have been more.

On the other hand it has a logo, and it was put in the most pretty little bag: All black (except for the Marc Jacobs logo written in white and grey) and it has real fabric/cloth-like strings. It looked like I had bought an expensive piece of jewelry. And the receipt! For one it’s really big and in real thick paper, and furthermore it describes in rich detail what I got, where and when I got it, who sold it to me, etc. In other words, they gave me the same kind of receipt that I would have got if I had bought a $600 skirt.

More Absurdity: In hindsight, my own behavior in the store also strikes me as a little interesting and inconsistent with what I was buying. When I was standing by the register ready to pay, I felt the need to justify my buying it, so I asked the shop assistant: “Just out of curiosity, how much do you sell of this every day? Like, what would you estimate?” “A lot!” she answered. I guess I was trying to say that I was not getting it because I wanted it, but rather that there was an intellectual reason for my getting it (wonder if she got that though!).

Then she told me she had to go get me some change, because with tax the lipstick pen came to $1.63, and apparently they did not have change behind the counter. And then I said it did not matter, doing a little “it doesn’t matter movement with my hand”, once again emphasizing that my reason for buying it outweighed the change. All though I do not consider myself cheap, it happens very rarely that I tell someone not to bother give me change back, even if it is only 37 cents. In other words, the entire shopping experience was absurd because everything about it was inconsistent with the dented lipstick pen that I was getting.

In terms of “tracing the object” in a very literal way, I have tried to inspect my lipstick pen to find out where it was produced. It does not say however, and so I take this as an omen that it really is not that important whether it was made in China, Taiwan or perhaps even the U.S. Instead I googled it, and found that the non-branded version of my lipstick pen is widely sold “business to business” as a promotional product, and on ebay I found that a Marc Jacobs lipstick pen including the bag had been auctioned off for $11.95 (by the way, on ebay they were also offering a “vintage gold poodle lipstick/pencil/pen tray” in case someone is looking for a wacky and complex object to carry out research on).

Branding seems to be a key word when it comes down to understanding the allure of the lipstick pen as well as practically any other object they sell at the store. And as I think I may have mentioned in class, there is so much branding going on at Marc Jacobs, not just in the actual store, but in multiple spheres that get interconnected by means of objects and “immaterial stuff”. For example artists Cindy Sherman and Rachel Whiteread, actresses Charlotte Rampling and Winona Ryder have appeared in adds for the company. A book has been published about the collaboration between Marc Jacobs, Cindy Sherman and photographer Juergen Teller. Marc Jacobs have designed “Hillary t-shirts” that you may have if you donate money for the “Hillary for Senate” campaign. Recently they had anti-Bush badges for sale for a dollar at the Bleecker street store. At one point last fall they invited customers to have their picture taken by a photographer after which it was put on display to passers-by. During the days around Valentine’s, they had a “Cosmic Love Clinic” in their storefront window, offering customers to have their charts read by two sextrologists. And most recently they have plastered the windows with portraits of the Marc Jacobs store crew, complete with names, positions as well as little – for lack of better words – intertextual/inter-connected statements about every employee.

However, I would like to address what I have touched upon above (the kitsch, the tongue-in-cheek, the familiar, the absurd, the too good to be true, the intimidating yet inviting, the pop, the art, etc, etc.) not specifically within a branding framework, but rather within one that has to do with understanding “value”. I realize that “branding” makes inroads into “value” and vice versa, but nevertheless I find it too restrictive if I start addressing my lipstick as simply “branding” or as a “brand extension”. I want to do something a little more original and different from what I could do in the marketing department at Stern.

Value, and the politics of value I think could be an interesting inroad to understanding the lipstick pen. I might try to make friends with Appadurai on this one. I am not quite sure yet, but the gift exchange does not seem like such a farfetched idea. As my shopping experience testified to, it was almost as if the pen was given to me. As if it was a little too good to be true that I got the entire package (i.e. the actual packaging plus a little branding someth’n, someth’n – depending on how much I know about the company and the designer) for a dollar and sixty-three cents. And the familiarity too. It is a little as if I’m going “awww, that’s so sweet they remembered I had one of these when I was a kid!”. As if they are giving me something THEY really want ME to have.

Posted by Sarah Carlson at 3:03 PM | Comments (3)

Grandma Safety Proof Bottle

In 2005, Target, amidst much hype and fanfare, introduced a new medicine bottle, ClearRx. The new design was the first major design shift in medicine bottles in over 40 years and was heralded by the press as a vast improvement over the small, standard-issue, amber-cast, difficult-to-read, traditional bottle. ClearRx garnered a tremendous amount of free press for Target, becoming one of Time Magazine’s Best Inventions of 2005 and winning a spot in the New York Museum of Modern Art.

Two related questions arise from the tale of ClearRx. The first is how did the re-design of a standard object come to pass? Second, and more popular among the press, is what took so long? The design of ClearRx seems to make so much sense and seem so simple that is has the press wondering why no one thought of it before. This is a typical response to designs that seem to “fit” so nicely into the world of objects.

The “official” history of ClearRx, recounted in numerous news articles, is the story of Deborah Adler, a 29 year old design student, and her grandmother, Helen. The story goes that after Adler’s grandmother had mistakenly taken medication intended for her husband, Herman, and got ill as a result. Adler, applying her creative prowess, designed a new bottle for a school art project that was more user-friendly, safer, and more aesthetically appealing. Target, the story goes, recognized the genius of Adler’s design and introduced the bottle to the masses. Thus, a great design was born.

But as Latour, Becker, and Harvey have astutely pointed out, the myth of the genius creator is too simplistic. While we should not demean Adler’s role in this story, how ClearRx “lashed up” or came to be is much more complicated. ClearRx, the object, is positioned at the intersection of a number of different networks – networks with different motives and interests. Among the relevant players, or creators of ClearRx, are Adler and her design school, the FDA, the Target Corporation, the AARP, and the pharmaceutical companies. In addition, ClearRx also sits in a network of objects, including the medicine cabinet and other pill bottles. Behind all of these actors and objects, pushing the design process forward, is the image of the visually-impaired, arthritic grandmother consuming a variety of different medications. It is for her, supposedly, that ClearRx was developed.

In my paper I will explore the intersection of these networks and their influence on the design process and the final “thing” that is the object. This analysis will show that the tale of Adler, the doting, concerned grandchild, is misleading. A number of different players had a hand in designing the object, either directly by making suggestions or indirectly by imposing constraints and regulations that had to be negotiated. The final design is not that of Adler’s art project, but an object that underwent numerous changes and a complex evolution. ClearRx, as it is seen today in Target pharmacies, exists as an outcome of its travel through various networks. The bottle had to be designed not only physically and tangibly as something that is manipulated by weak, arthritic hands, but visually as well. The visual design involved the privileging of some knowledge/information over others on the bottle’s label. How knowledge/information is arranged in a hierarchy of relevance is part of the design story.

In addition to creating an object, Target and other actors had to create, or at least bring attention to, a social problem – that of the elderly medical patient unwittingly consuming dangerous drugs. This involved an education program that included “scientific” statistical studies, the production of narratives, and advertisements. The networks that produced ClearRx not only develop a new object, they also promoted a new image of the consumer of medicines.

In my project, I plan to use the object of ClearRx to explore not only how a practical object gets made and promoted in the current global economy, but also as an insight into the complicated world of American pharmaceuticals and health care. ClearRx seems to “fit” so nicely not only because it addresses the concerns of an aging country, but also because powerful actors have carve a space for it in the world.

Posted by Owen Whooley at 12:38 PM | Comments (2)

February 14, 2006

replica "symbolic capital"

I just received a junk e-mail about Rolex replicas. The ad says “impress your friends and coworkers”. So supposedly people will think I am so business-smart that I can afford Rolex, and at the same time, this is (wearing a Rolex like any business-smart person) my “life-style”.

So maybe this is a replica- “symbolic capital”? Bourdieu’s term symbolic capital is, of course, a transformed kind of money capital, as David Harvey says; but in this case, there is no “real” capital, there is a replica of a capital.

I also wonder what happens when it is obvious that you are ‘wearing’ a replica of something. Fake nails, for example: everyone knows they are fake, and their users know that everyone knows this. What happens to the relationship between these two sides? Why would I say “I love your nails” even when I do know that they are not real nails, that they are not real nails belonging to her, and she, most likely, didn’t create them herself. Is this the same thing as appreciating a clothing? I don't think it is, but I am not sure why.

Posted by Ilgin Yorukoglu at 9:33 AM | Comments (1)