Dr. Magdalena Craciun Research Proposal Fake branded

Dr. Magdalena Craciun
Research Proposal
Fake branded headscarves: the articulation of economy and morality in contemporary
Turkey
In Istanbul, a trader in fake branded sneakers shared with me his discomfort: because
counterfeiting was a crime, he, a good Muslim, earned haram (impure) money. His solution
to this moral dilemma was to reconceptualise his work as ‘good work’ benefitting poor
people or as a service to the brand owners. In the same bazaar, another trader sold fake
branded headscarves. I took notice of his wares, but did not further enquire about that type of
fake and did not ask him at the time how he conceptualised his work. This project builds on
my doctoral research about ordinary people’s engagement with fake brands on a European
periphery (Romania and Turkey). However, by focusing on the fake branded headscarf, the
project expands this work in a new direction. The project considers the very existence of fake
branded headscarves as a means to illuminate ways in which economy and morality articulate
in contemporary Turkey, more specifically as a means to elucidate ways in which various
actors bring together or imagine others as bringing together the ethics of Islam and the
imperatives of global neoliberal capitalism.
Fake branded headscarves are peculiar objects. They are counterfeits, infringing on
intellectual property law. Moreover, they reproduce a commodity that stands at the centre of
Islamic fashion and materialises Islamic morality. As such, they might harm the economic
interests of ‘good’ Muslims (Tarlo 2010). Furthermore, as my doctoral research
demonstrates, fake brands might be understood as illegal but licit. Istanbulite producers and
traders in fake brands claim that copying is a common practice in the fashion industry and
that counterfeiting is normal entrepreneurship (Craciun 2010) (see also Balasescu 2005). In
many settings and sectors, perform economic activities that they consider legitimate despite
their illegality (Stoller 2002, Abraham and van Schendel 2006, Roitman 2006).
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Islamic fashion (tesettür) is a particular field too. It developed as a response to an increasing
demand for clothes that enabled Muslim women to claim simultaneously piety and
modernity. In the 1990s, the Islamic revival movement transformed itself from an anticonsumerist radical movement into a fragmented movement with identities increasingly
produced through consumption (Navaro-Yashin 2002). Moreover, this industry grew as part
of an expanding clothing manufacture sector fuelled by Turkey’s neoliberal policies (Tokatlı
2003) and as part of the ‘halal’ economy promoted by the new Islamic entrepreneurs (Yavuz
2003, Atasoy 2008). Today this is a lucrative sector, acting as a trendsetter in the growing
global Islamic fashion (Moors and Tarlo 2007). The leading companies construct for
themselves an Islamic identity, through means such as the choice of names or the messages
promoted in advertisements and fashion shows. However, as many critics stress, this also
functions as a marketing strategy, a way of ‘selling Islam’ (Kiliçbay and Binark 2002,
Sandıkçı and Ger 2007, Gökarıksel and Secor 2010). Islamic fashion is at the centre of
debates surrounding what it means to be Muslim, Turkish and modern. Islamic dress is often
seen through the lenses of competing ideologies, such as secularism versus Islamism,
tradition versus modernity (Göle 1997, Özdalga 1998, Saktanber 2002). However, Islamic
dress not only signifies, but also beautifies (White 1999, Sandıkcı and Ger 2005) and signals
social status (Öncü 1999, Secor 2002).
This research approaches Islamic fashion from a less explored angle, namely as a privileged
site for observing ways in which Islam and capitalism are brought together in contemporary
Turkey. Its originality consists in the particular way in which it proposes to bring to the fore
these articulations, namely through a focus on a peculiar object, the fake branded headscarf.
In theoretical terms, this research aims to study objects as agents in the world (Hoskins
2006). More precisely, it aims to investigate the agency of the fake branded headscarf, that is,
its effects on manufacturers, traders and observers of its existence. I take inspiration from
Tarlo’s (2010) study of the agency of hijab. I draw on Gell’s (1998) theory of agency: objects
do not just point back to the actor or facilitate his actions, but also expand, even bring into
existence, the actor. Moreover, this project aspires to be an account of moral reasoning
(Sykes 2009): how people reason through the limits of shared logic and unshared values. The
project puts at its centre the theoretical proposition that economy is always moral (Browne
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2009). I follow Maurer (2005) in seeing Islamic and conventional finance as parts of one
field, namely contemporary economics. I draw upon studies that address the debate over the
relationship between Islam and capitalism, and detail and problematise the concomitant rise
of Islamic movements and neoliberal capitalism in many places around the world (Tripp
2006, Kuran 2010, Rudnyckyj 2010).
This research identifies and develops lines of original enquiry and aims to contribute to
various bodies of literature. The first is the anthropology of Turkey (Kandiyoti and Saktanber
2002, Navaro-Yashin 2002, White 2002). The second is the anthropology of Islam, more
precisely the study of Islamic consumer culture and the anxiety over the mingling of religion
and commerce (Yaqin 2007, Fealy and White 2008, Fischer 2008, Pink 2009, Jones 2010).
The third is the anthropology of fake, namely the study of people’s engagement with different
types of fakes (Vann 2006, Brandtstädter 2009, Craciun 2009, Pinheiro-Machado 2010, Lin
2011).
Methodology
The fieldwork will be carried out for a total period of nine months in Istanbul, the city
accommodating a thriving clothing industry and a significant Islamic fashion sector. I will
conduct semi-structured interviews with manufacturers and traders of officially and
unofficially branded headscarves (with a particular emphasis on the official and unofficial
production and distribution of the leading brand Armine, whose official website warns its
customers against being cheated and being sold fake versions of its products). I will also
discuss these objects with manufacturers and traders in fake branded clothing and with
consumers of (fake) branded headscarves. I will also enquire about foreign designer
headscarves and the moral dimensions of their counterfeiting. In addition, I will collect
biographies of fake branded headscarves. My main questions are: What kind of relationship
do people, especially the religiously committed, have to this object? In what terms do they
explain its existence (e.g. moral, economic, political)? What kind of actor do they relate to
this object? What do they consider economically moral/religiously acceptable? Other
questions target specific groups. For the manufacturers of fake branded scarves: How do they
manufacture these objects? Why do they engage in this activity? For the manufacturers of
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branded scarves: Do they consider this object as part of Islamic fashion? The fieldwork will
be dialogical, with the opinions of one group recounted to the others by the anthropologist, in
the attempt to procure a deeper understanding of these competing moral orders and
presumably conflicting identities. Moreover, the fieldwork will be multi-sited: I will move
between different manufacturing and retailing areas, but will also stay in the traditional
marketplace for conservative clothing in Eminönü, a district where the old and new
characteristics of the market for headscarves can be captured through ethnographic
observation and discussions with small-scale firm owners. I will also gather primary data
about firms operating in Islamic fashion, and will also use written and visual material about
Islamic fashion (especially articles and pictorials from the two Islamic fashion magazines
launched in the summer of 2010).
My previous experience will be instrumental in facilitating my access to fieldwork. This
project draws upon doctoral fieldwork conducted in Istanbul, when I acquired in-depth
knowledge of the clothing industry, established my credibility as a researcher and developed
a network of informants. Moreover, my entrance to the field will be further prepared during
the pilot research to be conducted in my capacity as the Postdoctoral Research Fellow of the
British Institute at Ankara for 2011/2012. During the pilot research, I will revisit my former
research participants to trial my new topic. Moreover, I will identify possible informants
involved in the informal sector through my existent acquaintances. Furthermore, I plan to
survey the formal Islamic fashion industry and to establish first contacts with official
designers, producers and retailers of branded headscarves. The pilot research will therefore
allow me to refine my methodology and better design the research programme for the nine
month fieldwork.
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