Semiotics and Ethnic Marketing

by Lisa Radding lradding@ethnictechnologies.com

When I’m not looking up the ethnicities of names, I’m applying linguistic theory to names. No, not usually. But no, I’m not kidding. With my thesis advisor as co-author, I’m shortening my undergraduate thesis about the meaning of a toponym (place name) into an article for publication in a geography journal. One reviewer said I was missing a section on semiotics. Enter a week of linguistic theory punctuated by ethnic name research.

Crash course in semiotics: Ferdinand de Saussure (famous Swiss linguist) says a sign is the unification of two distinct pieces: The signifier is the form (sounds or letters) and the signified is the concept represented. He is writing about words, not specifically names. D-O-G is different from that furry thing that plays fetch, but together they are a sign, which has meaning in the context of the English language. The sign, however, is not static, but manifests itself differently with each signified: a golden retriever, a stuffed snoopy, etc. If you take this beyond the realm of language (as the French social and literary critic Roland Barthes does) that same sign can also be “a person regarded as contemptible” or “a person regarded as unattractive or uninteresting.” These meanings stem not from a linguistic context, but from a societal context. It gets way more complicated, but I think that’s plenty for the casual blog-reader.

Now I try to apply this to ethnic marketing:

1. I study signifiers. For example, I look at H-E-R-N-A-N-D-E-Z and determine that it is Hispanic. I look at just the form, the letters. I deal with signifiers.
2. Our clients care about signs. They want/have lists of individuals. Real person + name on list = sign. To those doing the marketing, unification of the person and the ethnic name is important.
3. Someone named Hernandez can be viewed differently in different societal contexts. The ethnic name has connotations that are both positive (diversity) and negative (racism). We must always be aware, when dealing with ethnic names, how they are being used.

I like the simplicity of a name and where it comes from. But I constantly remind myself that when this research is used, there are real people behind the names. People with purchasing power, and customs connected to various cultures. Based on my work with these signifiers, we can step outside the American mind frame into the land of semiotics and the ethnic consumer.

Too theoretical? Perhaps. But applying linguistic theory to this line of business was an interesting exercise for my brain.

AT: 08/06/2009 04:07:31 PM

Multicultural Name Identification

by Candace candace@ethnictechnologies.com

Conventional wisdom says that America is a melting pot of many different cultures. Try mixing up six different cheeses in a pot then try to find the different taste values of each. It is very difficult to do. The same idea applies to identifying the different cultures that make up our nation. The segmentation system that we habitually use simply divides the population into color or racial categories: White, Black, Hispanic, and Asian. Using this type of approach or methodology has its downfalls and in most cases antiquated census information is used, as it's sole input for development. A better approach is to see the diversity in America as a mixed salad, where each ethnicity is a different ingredient and can be identified. This method, if used properly applies to the many ethnicities and different cultures in our nation and each can be identified.

Marketers, researchers, advertising agencies and the media often market to Hispanics as a separate group from Whites, Blacks and Asians. When you take an in-depth look at the Hispanic population in the Untied States they often associate with one or more of the aforementioned racial groups and those racial groups can be correlated to their country of origin or cultural identity. An individual or family from Puerto Rico does not exhibit the same cultural identity or buying habits as those of a family that has immigrated to the US from Mexico. If that is the case then why do marketers, researchers, advertising agencies and the media often approach Hispanic's as a whole with the same exact offers, disregard their country of origin and then complain that their campaigns were not successful. Even the dialect of the Spanish language they speak differs.

The same issues arise and in greater depth when attempting to target the Asian community, the "One Size Fits All" mentality is often the method used and low response rates and product interests are the norm. With so many different Asian countries of origin and Asian languages of preference currently residing in the US, it is the smart marketer that embraces technology that allows them to identify all ethnicities, countries of origin and languages that are available. An offer tailored to a Chinese American living in San Francisco CA should differentiate from one being tailored to a Korean American living in Fort Lee NJ or a Vietnamese American living in Houston TX. Now if you add into the mix the different levels of assimilation and acculturation, the buying habits and traditional cultural customs the individual embraces are all over the chart.

An individual's ethnicity is not in all circumstances related to ones "Country of Origin". A Deepak Banerjee may have been born in England and then came to our country, but his ethnicity and cultural identity is Indian and in most cases his religion would be Hindu.

Many ethnic and religious groups in the United States maintain a strong cultural identity. They are often attracted to communities with their same ethnicity, communities in which many traditional cultural customs are maintained. Given that the ethnic diversity in the US is far more reflective of a global landscape, it is even more important for marketers to fully understand cultural differences, language preference, purchasing habits and other socioeconomic information and integrate those variations into their everyday marketing strategies and tactics. The time for the" One Size Fits All" methodology is gone that way of the dinosaur.

Erin or Aaron

by Lisa Radding lradding@ethnictechnologies.com

I’m back from the DMDays NY Show, where I got to discuss my work. The key word here is “discuss.” I look at, think about, and write about names daily, but I don’t say these names out loud. In this line of work, pronunciation only comes in to play when articulating my work, for example, at shows. But as a name nerd, it does come in to play in my life.

I have a good friend named Erin. When I used to live with her, I’d shout across the apartment, “Eh-rin, are you home?” Then our other roommates would make fun of my pronunciation of Erin. They didn’t like the “eh” beginning. (I apologize for my unconventional spellings here, but without IPA, writing phonetically is the simplest way to capture pronunciation nuances.) Since Erin actually introduces herself as “Air-rin,” that is what our other roommates call her. It’s a subtle difference you don’t always hear, but it matters to me.

I call her “Eh-rin” to differentiate her from Aaron, which I pronounce “Air-rin.” Although we didn’t have another roommate, or even a good friend named Aaron, in my mind, these are two separate names, which I would associate with different people. Erin, a girl’s name, is the Anglicized form of the Gaelic meaning Ireland. Aaron, a boy’s name, is of Hebrew origin, meaning mountain, exalted or strength. In the bible, Aaron is Moses’ older brother. My friend Erin is Irish Catholic. (She has a brother Sean… don’t get me started on spelling and pronunciation with that one.) She is a part of my college world, not the American Jewish world in which I was raised, where every other person had a friend or relative named Aaron.

When I originally explained my pronunciation to my roommates, I told them it was to differentiate Erin from the boy’s name Aaron, stressing the gender difference. As androgynous names proliferate our culture, I tend to keep names distinct. As I reflect on instances like Erin/Aaron, however, where pronunciation is important to me, I realize that I may have pigeon holed my thoughts into gender research or ethnic research. It is all these pieces together that construct the identity of a name, something central to the identity of a person. When I connect a name to a person I know, I’m that much more conscious of what the name means.

I don’t know Dziadzan, Zydrute, Kielo, or Shaghosgi. I looked at those names last week without ever articulating them. I am interested in assigning them ethnicity and gender purely as names, with potential to be connected to people, but not as individuals in my life with complicated identities. At the DMDays NY show I thought about pronunciation because my difficulties articulating this research stemmed from an inability to pronounce examples like these. Whereas pronunciation doesn’t usually affect my research, as a name nerd, it affects my life in a way most people don’t notice or care about (except maybe to make fun of me). When the name is connected to an individual, pronouncing a name a certain way is part of my connection to a person and my relationship with their identity.