Wednesday, June 18th, 2008
It is easy to romanticize the ideal of the noble savage, or argue that the hunter-gatherer Yanamamo tribe is happier, morally superior, or more in tune with their environment than the rest of us. It is equally easy to forget that we are only carrying forward a 10,000 year long tradition of nostalgia for the simple life. Roger Sandall, author of ‘The Culture Cult: Designer Tribalism and Other Essays‘, call it the ‘progress paradox‘ –
Life gets better, but people feel worse… people have been complaining about progress, and looking nostalgically back at the past, for as long as there’s been a past to look back at… the progress paradox has been with us for thousands of years.
One of its most striking sentimental manifestations is a widespread admiration for the tribal world. Anyone who thinks this began with Jean-Jacques Rousseau in the 18th century is deeply mistaken… there were numerous other thinkers from 2000 years ago who admired the simple life. And none of them liked stuff.
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Also tagged Diogenes, Epicurus, Hesiod, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Plato, Post Consumerist, Progress Paradox, Roger Sandall, Socrates, The Culture Cult, The Culture Cult: Designer Tribalism and Other Essays
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Wednesday, May 28th, 2008
In my earlier post about Patricia Martin’s book ‘RenGen’, I have written about how authenticity is one of the three big trends that are changing the very nature of consumption –
We want real and authentic experiences, instead of packaged formulaic one. Brands that resist the urge to reduce experiences (into formulas) and instead try to enhance them will build a cult following for themselves.
While authenticity looks like a no-brainer for brands, few brands can be called authentic. It was another episode of Susan Bratton’s Dishy Mix podcast that helped me pin down the problem. It’s a great podcast and Joseph Pine, the author of ‘Authenticity: What Consumers Really Want’ sets the tone in the first few minutes by saying that all economic offerings are in-authentic because something is only authentic if it is one not ‘of man’. So, the The only way to live an authentic life is to live like Rousseau’s ‘noble savage’ and go into the wild.
I totally loved the interview, so much so that it has set me on a wild goose chase on the concept of the ‘noble savage’. According to Wikipedia, the classical (18th century) characteristics of the ‘noble savage’ include –