Mambo Italiano: Italian Surfing Subcultures and Representations of Australian Cultural Identity
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Data di Pubblicazione:
2005
Citazione:
Mambo Italiano: Italian Surfing Subcultures
and Representations of Australian Cultural Identity / F. Boni. ((Intervento presentato al 3. convegno ACIS Biennial Conference tenutosi a Treviso nel 2005.
Abstract:
The paper aims to explore the ways an all-Australian surf lifestyle brand, Mambo, conveys the images and the representations of Australian-ness among two Italian surfing communities, based in Northern and Central Italy.
Essentially, Mambo is a Sydney based surf-wear label that specializes in bright t-shirts. Created in 1984, in less than a decade the label was generating an annual turnover of more than $10 million. While a Mambo montage might feature the conventional signifiers of Australian culture – like the beach, thongs, sprinklers, and Holdens – it is almost invariably underlined with a sharp satirical bite. The Mambo designers are generally obsessed with something that derives from, or connects with, the Australian experience. Also, Mambo has taken Australia’s blunt approach to life and glorified it, in pure surfing subculture style.
The paper tries to understand how and how much the different signifiers of Australian cultural identity conveyed by Mambo products are received by Italian surfers/consumers, also trying to explore how the Italian surfing subcultures make sense of these ironical markers of Australian-ness.
Tipologia IRIS:
14 - Intervento a convegno non pubblicato
Keywords:
social representations ; national identities ; Australian studies
Elenco autori:
F. Boni
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