Imsukuhum Kulhum!Kids, Commodities and Transnational Identities

Mark Allen Peterson, PhD

Simulacra:

Identical copies for which there is no original

Pokemon in Cairo

Schools as Sites

American School in Cairo

Commodities as Class Markers

A sign is something that stands for something else in some respect to someone

something Signifier; Sign vehicle

something else Signified; Object

in some respect Interpretant

someone Interpreter

Signifying Relationships(interpretants)

Icon Signifying something by resembling it

IndexSignifying something by being connectedto it

Symbol

Signification according to an arbitrary code

Indexicality

1. Commodities index their place of origin

2. Places of origin are hierarchically organized

3. Language serves as sign-vehicle4. Labor, use and aesthetic values

are subordinated to status values to some (but not all) interpreters.

Pokemon in all its forms is acquisition about acquisition…

Gotta Catch ‘em All

VALUE EXPATRIATES EGYPTIANS

Labor Value Bringing the cards from the U.S.

Getting the cards from the U.S. or Europe

Use Value Play Play

Exchange Value

Card tradingCard trading

Market Value$3/packet U.S.Collector Values

$9/packet EgyptCollector Values

Signifying Value

Home, “cool,” resistance

Foreign, status, wealth

Aline: Card collecting as identity management

Distinctions

“Languages”/ArabicForeign/Local

Expensive/Cheap

“Tastes … are asserted purely negatively, by the refusal of other tastes.”

-- Pierre Bourdieu

The new children’s television

High quality foreign pirate copies

Low quality local pirate copies

The Modern Language School

Being a modern Arab child…

Collecting and playing Tazu got “out of hand”

Pokemon may be morally dangerous

Potentially dangerous characters

For Yasseen’s mother, the skills outweigh the risks

For Dr. Reem, moral concerns must be paramount…

Semiosis: IndexicalityPokemon artifacts point to one another

“simulacra”

Pokemon artifacts point to their sources “Global”/“Cosmopolitan” “American”

Pokemon artifacts point to their cost Class Status/”taste”

In so pointing, they become subject to the symbolic meanings associated with these referents

Reference

Peterson, Mark Allen. 2010. Isukuhum Kulhum! Modernity and Morality in Egyptian Children’s Consumption” Journal of Consumer Culture 19(2): 233-253.