Following our discussion from the
first class meeting, it became very clear to me that the term “commodity” can
have a wide range of definitions, many of which are ambiguous and constantly changing. In Arjun Appadurai’s introduction to The Social Life of Things, I believe
this point was reinforced many times, especially in the sections where he
examined the differences between bartering, gift exchange and the actual
purchase of goods or services with money.
It is interesting that trade and exchange can be divided into so many
subcategories, with rules governing whether or not genuine commodities are being
moved from one person or group of people to another. His introduction actually
raised many more questions for me, rather than providing answers as I had
hoped. On page 16 he states "But the important point is that the commodity is not one kind of thing rather than another, but one phase in the life of some things." Did any of the other students with more experience in economics and
trade history come up with a more concrete definition of what a commodity is? Or,
are there too many other factors that weigh upon the good or service (class,
demand, scarcity, value, control, individual against cultural perceptions, etc.) for it to ever have a concrete and well-defined designation? While Igor Kopytoff argues that a commodity is "anything that can be bought for money" on page 69, I still may be missing something important. I understand his argument regarding how commodities move in and out of singularity and commoditization based on cultural and individual perceptions, but where do we draw the line at what is and what is not a commodity? Or, is every single good or service on this earth available for commoditization as long as people believe them to be so?
After reading the
introduction of From Silver to Cocaine,
I am very interested to see how the essays will highlight the inputs and
interactions from the producers and consumers on both ends of the commodity
chain. As we discussed in class, the history
of commodities goes hand in hand with slavery, but the authors seem to have a
different outlook on the situation.
Instead of emphasizing the exploitation of slave labor they seem to lean
more towards revealing how the producers at different points in history
actually had control and power over the markets and demands (ability to set
prices, etc.). However, they did not
provide very many examples to reinforce their argument. If they do in fact
provide more examples, I believe it will be a beneficial perspective for us to
examine. In a random thought to end this
blog post, I found the section where the authors discussed how French
revolutionaries sat in coffeehouses and planned their next moves while sipping
cups of a drink that was grown by slaves to be fascinating and incredibly
thought-provoking!
