Left Coast Press publishes a new volume – of particular interest to specialists in mark studies – in the series Publications of the Institute of Archaeology, University College London.
Bevan, Andrew; Wengrow, David (Eds.), 2010. Cultures of Commodity Branding. Publications of the Institute of Archaeology, University College London. Left Coast Press, Walnut Creek. 267 pp. ISBN 978-1-59874-541-2 (hardcover)
From the publisher’s summary:
“Commodity branding did not emerge with contemporary global capitalism. In fact, the authors of this volume show that the cultural history of branding stretches back to the beginnings of urban life in the ancient Near East and Egypt, and can be found in various permutations in places as diverse as the Bronze Age Mediterranean, and Early Modern Europe. What the contributions in this volume also vividly document, both in past social contexts and recent ones as diverse as the kingdoms of Cameroon, Socialist Hungary or online EBay auctions, is the need to understand branded commodities as part of a broader continuum with techniques of gift-giving, ritual, and sacrifice. This volume obliges specialists in marketing and economics to reassess the relationship between branding and capitalism, as well as adding an important new concept to the work of economic anthropologists and archaeologists.”
The volume includes the following studies:
• David Wengrow – Introduction: Commodity Branding in Archaeological and Anthropological Perspectives
• Andrew Bevan – Making and Marking Relationships: Bronze Age Brandings and Mediterranean Commmodities
• Magdalena Craciun – The Work of an Istanbulite Imitasiyoncu
• Rosana Pinheiro-Machado – The Attribution of Authenticity to “Real” and “Fake” Branded Commodities in Brazil and China
• Ferenc Hammer – The Real One: Western Brands and Competing Notions of Authenticity in Socialist Hungary
• Jean-Pierre Warnier – Royal Branding and the Techniques of the Body, the Self, and Power in West Cameroon
• Jason Yaeger – Commodities, Brands, and Village Economies in the Classic Maya Lowlands
• Gracia Clark – Lincoln Green and Real Dutch Java Prints: Cloth Selvedges as Brands in International Trade
• Marcos Martinón-Torres – Of Marks, Prints, Pots, and Becherovka: Freemasons’ Branding in Early Modern Europe?
• Alison J. Clarke – The Second-Hand Brand: Liquid Assets and Borrowed Goods
Order: Left Coast Press [Hardback], US$89.00