Abstract
Western brands are extremely adept at appropriating the Other. Whereas most consumer packaged goods appropriating minority cultures target non-minorities, occasionally they target the very culture being appropriated. While the former glorifies colonial imaginaries, reconstructing ethnocentric tourism via domestic regime, the latter brings these hegemonic ambitions to fruition, subjecting the racialized consumer to the racist simulacrum. Inspired by the culinary evolution of Italian gastronomy amidst globalization, this process of re-enculturation informed by Western, imperialist values is understood as the pizza effect. And although this theory was originally meant to describe the cultural appropriation and re-exportation of performative mechanisms, in graphic design, the pizza effect is applied quite literally. Package designers routinely appropriate the visual material of Othered cultures to facilitate the monopolization of the multicultural market. Generally, these colonial versionings are met with positive reception, with the cultural form garnering a heightened sense of social significance due to its popularity with the appropriating culture — a coolnessification, if you will. However, racialized and ethnicized consumers who are familiarized with the implications of their racialization and ethnicization — particularly diasporic enclaves within the Western context — historically object to the superficial commercialization of their cultural identities, therefore problematizing the pizza effect. A visual analysis of Golden Temple® Atta helps to further deconstruct this lens.
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Cultural Appropriation, Pizza Effect, Package Design, Graphic Design
