In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

106 FIVE FLYING WITHOUT WINGS Race, Civic Branding, and Identity Politics in Two Twenty-first-century American Cities On March 2, 2003, when readers of the Boston Globe opened their Sunday papers and turned to the Parade magazine inside, they may have noticed, with St. Patrick’s Day fast approaching, the full-page Franklin Mint advertisement on the back cover for the “Irish Blessing Charm Bracelet” featuring “the treasured symbols of Ireland captured in stunning 24 karat gold accents , and steeped in the traditions of Irish history and design.” However, readers of papers throughout the South—the Greensboro News & Record, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Birmingham News, Mobile Register, and Orlando Sentinel, for example—found quite a different Franklin Mint ad reigning in their Parade. “Lee. Jackson. Stuart,” it read. “Honor the spirit of the South’s favorite sons by wearing the . . . Pride of the South Civil War Ring.” The blurb on the lower left corner of the page read in full, Presented by The Civil War Library & Museum and The Franklin Mint, this powerful tribute is masterfully crafted in solid sterling silver. Its compelling design is based on the Battle Flag of the South [sic], artfully enhanced by an intricately sculptured rendering of a Bald Eagle. The unique shield design recalls the uniform buttons worn by Southern troops, and is complemented by the familiar crossed sabres of the cavalry. Richly accented with 24 carat gold, and featuring the famed “Southern Cross.” A compelling tribute to the heroes of the South! Order now! The Franklin Mint / Sharing Your Passion for Collecting. (24) The timing of the ads is notable, particularly in the Atlanta paper. Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue had recently won office by appealing to small-town and rural white Georgians who resented his predecessor’s having shrunk the presence of the battle flag of the Confederacy—first introduced in 1956 in response to the civil rights movement—on the state flag. Though some ob- Flying without Wings 107 servers expected him not to follow through on his campaign pledge, Perdue had in early February proposed a two-part nonbinding referendum on the flag. Voters were to be first presented with an up-or-down vote on the present flag. Then, if their vote was “no,” they would be asked to choose between two earlier flags, the pre-1956 flag or the 1956–2001 one. The Sunday before the ads appeared, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution had reported on a growing divide on this issue between Atlanta and much of “the other Georgia.” By Friday, February 28, newspapers around the world were reporting that Perdue , a Republican, had enlisted former Democratic Governor and U.S. President Jimmy Carter to help Georgians resolve their differences. It should not take a Nobel Peace Prize winner to solve what is essentially a graphic design problem. Clearly, however, it does, and this chapter is largely about why it does. In using not Slavoj Žižek but marketing theory—not hitherto a field known for its theoretical profundity—I do not mean in what follows to belittle issues of U.S. southern iconography, nor to trivialize by literalizing what George Lipsitz names the possessive investment in whiteness. Southern civic brand identities are a great deal more in flux than the old static, red-state “Mississippi” model allows. Second, it suggests that Birmingham and Georgia, while less glamorous than L.A., may nonetheless, in their negotiations of sharp internal conflicts between liberals and conservatives , better indicate at least some of the key issues that should be defining contemporary American studies as the nation emerges from one of the most bitterly divided, and spatially inflected, partisan eras in its history. Third and perhaps most crucially, a phenomenon like American Idol—based in Los Angeles but deriving much of its power, in several senses, from a rebranded southernness—points toward the complicated political, economic, and cultural relays that define twenty-first-century U.S. culture as much more than the (merely) coastal. Finally, the very act of analyzing civic brand identities within the field imaginary of American studies implies that this imaginary itself cannot claim to stand outside the branding process. What we have been schooled to call the field’s paradigm dramas may also be described—and critiqued —using the terms of marketing theory. Naomi Klein indicates the global political and economic power of design and branding in both the title of No Logo and its opening sentence: “The astronomical growth in the wealth and cultural...

Share