Brand, Citationality, Performativity

Abstract

This article provides a semiotic account of the performativity of the brand. It argues that the brand's performativity is a function of its citationality: the ways in which (fractions of) brands are reanimated, or cited, while being reflexively marked as reanimations or citations. First the article argues that the intelligibility and coherence of brands turns on the calibration of a number of gaps in the brand's form: between brand tokens, brand types, and a brand ontology. Such calibration is achieved through moments of citing brand type and brand ontology. The article then discusses three forms of brand citationality that exceed the brand by situating themselves in, and exploiting, these gaps: brand counterfeits, "remixes," and simulations. The article concludes by discussing the relation between citationality and performativity, arguing that the performativity of brand turns on the (meta-)semiotics of citationality and the excesses it continually generates. [brand, performativity, citationality, counterfeits, semiotics] RĖSUMÉ Cet article propose un compte-rendu sémiotique de la performativité des marques en affirmant que cette dernière est une fonction de sa citationnalité: comment les marques sont,à la fois, réanimées, ou citées, et caractérisées comme réanimations ou citations d'elles-mêmes. Tout d'abord nous soutiendrons que l'intelligibilité et la cohérence des marques dépendent de l'étalonnage d'un certain nombre d'écarts dans leur forme: entre leur occurrence, leur type et leur ontologie. Cetétalonnage est réaliséà travers des moments de citation de leur type et de leur ontologie. Ensuite nous examinerons trois formes de citationnalité des marques qui dépassent celles-ci en se situant dans et en exploitant cesécarts: des contrefaç ons de marque, des «remix», et des simulations. Enfin nous conclurons enétudiant le rapport entre citationnalité et performativité, et soutiendrons que la performativité des marques dépend de la (méta-)sémiotique de la citationnalité et des excès qu'elle génère en permanence. [marque, performativité, citationnalité, contrefaç ons, sémiotique] Laikwang Pang (2008:127) has said: "Brand at heart is performative."

US accreditation in Mexico: quality in higher education as symbol, performance and translation

“…His statement supports the argument I made earlier in this paper. Just like one can explore the production and use of texts, it is also possible to explore the production and use of brands (Nakassis, 2012). Examples of production include documents generated by the US accrediting agencies and the interviews I conducted among their staff members.…”

“…The power of brands resides in citationality, which is a kind of intertextuality (Nakassis, 2012). Put simply, brands connect products with other products that are alike while separating some from others that are dissimilar.…”

Counterfeiting What?: Aesthetics of Brandedness and BRAND in Tamil Nadu, India

“…I contrast this with a reckoning of commodities, or elements of them, by their ability to authoritatively differentiate themselves from other commodities, or elements of them, vis-à-vis their production/brand origin (e.g., through forms of intellectual property such as trademarks), and by virtue of such differentiation invoke a unique and authentic brand image/identity (coombe 1998, Lury 2004, Manning 2010, Mazzarella 2003, Moore 2003. It is this indexical link between commodity tokens and their brand type ("image," "essence," or "personality" as put by marketers) that constitutes the anchor for this classification, or social ontology, which I refer to with small-caps as "brand" (Nakassis 2012). Of course, these two commodity ontologies-brandedness and brand-need not be in tension.…”

“…10 Of course, some concept of iconism between that which is counterfeited and the counterfeit must be assumed to be in play in order for the concept of "counterfeit" to be intelligible in the first place. but the larger point is that the conditions of possibility for such iconism, however construed, depend on a structure of (indexical) authorization which is variously distributed across the commodity chain (Nakassis 2012). Put differently, we might ask, to whom and under what conditions is this iconism felt to hold?…”

Advocating commodification: an ethnographic look at the policing of Irish as a commercial asset

“…Similarly, the owner of a local coffee shop in Ballyroe had chosen the name Maidin Mhaith ('good morning') for his establishment despite not speaking any Irish himself because, as he explained, the phrase sounded ''eh'' in English but much nicer in Irish, and ''everyone pretty much knows what it means.'' While highlighting the valorization of minority languages for their symbolic added value rather than their strictly referential function (see above), these merchants' comments also point to what they saw as part of the branding power of a simple word or phrase as Gaeilge ('in Irish'): any passing person who had studied Irish would recognize these terms, thereby potentially laying the foundation for the affective relationship between brand and customer at the heart of branding efforts (Nakassis 2012).…”