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Dear friends,
At the 2 August iCommons Board Meeting, the board decided to make some difficult but necessary changes at iCommons. It has become clear over the past months that our vision for iCommons is different from the... more
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What's In A Name? The Double-Binds Inherent in Controlling Cultural Terms
alli.fish · Tucson/Irvine/Bangalore (India) (United States) · Jun 30th, 2008 5:11 pm · 38 votes · no comments made
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Images
Aerial view of the island of Lesbos CC BY 3.0
What kind of copy is this? Are children dressing up as Harry Potter next? CC BY 3.0
Sermons as sites of innovation. CC BY 3.0
Almost every morning as I drink my first cup of morning coffee I go online to read the news, visit a few blogs (usually the less-than-thought provoking gossip blogs), and scan through my email. Without fail I collect several stories from each of these sources (even the gossip blogs!) relating to the bizarre attempts of various individuals and groups to determine who has the legal right (often, in the story, this is closely associated with some moral right) to use an invention or control a name. However, sometimes there is no clear, logical answer as to what is ‘right’ and what is ‘wrong’. A confusion that usually increases the level of the absurd. For example, one morning a few weeks ago I came across the following stories:
1. The clothing company Juicy Couture, a women’s leisure and sportswear clothing company, is suing Victoria’s Secret, a women’s lingerie and leisure clothing company. The former claims that the latter has violated its trademark rights and pioneering concept of attaching large brand name labels to the backside of women’s sweatpants.
2. The Polish Catholic Church is concerned that its priests may be committing acts of plagiarism through composing sermons that heavily borrow from various sources. The church has recently printed and distributed a manual advising the clergy how to avoid such acts.
3. JK Rowling, author of the popular Harry Potter series, is suing a fan for copyright infringement because he has attempted to publish an encyclopedia of the fictive world evoked by the novels. In court the plaintiff, Rowling, and the defendant, described as a mousy librarian, break down and sob uncontrollably while giving testimony. The former claims that the encyclopedia represents the theft of her ideas, whereas, the latter claims that the work represents his own labour of love and is a creative arrangement of objects found in the imaginary world of Hogswarts Academy.
4. Conservative Hindu organizations in the United States and India are deeply offended by the light treatment South Asian spirituality receives in an upcoming Mike Meyers comedy, The Love Guru. The film’s plot revolves around a swami who travels to the United States to break into the thriving New Age-y self help market using techniques he has trademarked - GURU™ (Gee, yoU aRe yoU). And...
5. Three residents of the island of Lesbos have filed suit against a non-profit homosexual rights group in Greece for the misuse of the term “lesbian”. One plaintiff is especially upset that his sister cannot, in his estimation, respectably call herself a Lesbian.
While each of these stories, at least in my mind, may cause the reader to stop and laugh, I believe that the apparent absurdity springs from the ethical disjunctures, or double binds, that these situations provoke. Thus, while it appears ridiculous to argue over whether or not putting a name on the butt of sweatpants is creative, I must admit that this is a recognisable fashion statement nearly as ubiquitous as plastic surgery in Orange County where I presently reside. On a more serious note, however, are the latter examples in my list, specifically the fourth and fifth incidents. These examples evoke an essence that, at some level, subverts mainstream liberal discourse on cultural patrimony and traditional knowledge. These ‘mainstream’ arguments tend, out of respect for the origin culture, to favour the collective’s right to determine the use and public circulation of traditional practices and objects that they claim as their own.
In contrast, in the Love Guru controversy and the Lesbos dispute, I understand the absurdity as springing from the unsupportable acts of the origin communities in question. In both situations, the cultural object that has come into international circulation, South Asian spirituality and the name of the culture and it’s geographic homeland, is the subject of a dispute in which I would distinctly argue against the position of the origin community. Thus, while the Love Guru’s lampooning of South Asian spirituality seem in bad taste, I come out in favour of Mike Meyer’s. In this situation I automatically assume the right to free speech prevails, despite feeling that such mockery often reinforces long-term, post-colonial patterns of subtle violence. Secondly, in terms of the Lesbos dispute, I unequivocally support the right of the gay and lesbian people to use the term freely. However, in contrast to this, my own long-term research on the commodification of South Asian medical systems, I do find that the Indian state does have some standing to argue against the widespread misuse, including trademarking, of Sanskrit terms. Thus, I cannot say why I feel one government has the right to request specific linguistic terms be used in a certain manner and that another cannot. In the end, it seems that one rule will not provide adequate solutions – I must simply take the easy way out and say that the world is more complicated than that.
tags: irvine united states education
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