Origin labels: the making of a smaller world

I passed by a billboard for American Apparel last night in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. The most salient text in the ad is "Made in Downtown LA". A specific neighborhood, not just another [partially] Made in the [amorphous] USA. Many signified meanings spring forth from the American Apparel ad, one being that we should care about specific made-in locations, and it seems more and more people do.

Perhaps we (and especially New Yorkers) feel so isolated and disempowered by the consumerism that is central to this modern world that we yearn for that extra knowledge about where our otherwise commodity good is coming from and a glimpse (or hint to) the story behind it. Perhaps we jump at the opportunity to reclaim moral or just plain consumer control by shopping at the Union Square Greenmarket or buying produce that's marked in big letters as being local. Whole Foods marks its local produce with green signs and big letter noting which nearby state it is from (though they see more of your dollar than the farmer ever does). A recent talk by Amy Lerner about the history and origins of chocolate noted that many high-end chocolatiers are branding certain cacao-producing regions in Venezuela, i.e. Chuao, as embodying certain flavors and essentially a narrative. And it's very common to find coffee branded by its specific country of origin.

It's not a bad thing to want to know more about the story behind the food or clothing we buy. On the contrary, it reminds us that there was a farmer that grew those tomatoes and that our shirt didn't just sew itself together. It's a healthy and normal mindset for ourselves and our world.