[Commlist] CFP: Postcolonial Marketing Communication and the Global South

Call for Papers

Postcolonial Marketing Communication: Images from the Global South

Knowledge Partner: Springer Nature

Editors: Arindam Das (Alliance School of Business, Alliance University, 
Bangalore, India); Himadri Roy Chaudhuri (XLRI-Xavier School of 
Mangement, Jamshedpur, India)
Ozlem Sandikci Turkdogan (University of Glasgow, Adam Smith Business 
School, Scotland, UK)

The Editors invite extended chapter proposals of approximately 350 words 
for an edited book focusing on postcolonial marketing communication. 
This volume aims to generate an exchange of ideas and insights between 
academics and professionals on the role of postcolonialty within the 
ambits of marketing, consumer literature, and communication. We welcome 
chapter proposals on any aspect of this theme.

Concept Note

The system of hegemonic domination and overpowering influence over the 
‘less developed’ countries/cultures exercised through a set of 
ideological measures and economic instruments by the more powerful 
countries (relatively from the Global North) continues till this very 
day. Sartre (1964) noted this trend as the European imperial powers 
continued to ideologically dominate most of their former colonies. 
Subsequent theorizations by Said, Fanon, Bhabha, Spivak et al. have 
thrown significant light on the phenomenon. However, it is not only the 
reactionary responses to the European imperialism or colonialism that 
comprise of the discursive postcolonial terrain, but even the responses 
to the recent neocolonial-capitalist-global power prerogatives that 
expand the scope of postcolonialism (Loomba, 2015).

The postcolonial condition (along with its trajectories of hybridity, 
ambivalence, mimicry, diaspora, deterritorialization, third space, 
orientalism, subalternity, or even the anticolonial resistances, and 
decolonial transformations) remains a dominant reality even today in the 
context of the larger global politico-economic paradigm. The attempts of 
transcending the aftermaths of colonialism and neocolonialism and its 
coercive or ideologically regulating processes by the 
colonized/subaltern/marginalized subjects are not to be missed. The 
normalization of socio-cultural-epistemic violence has always been met 
with the postcolonial “transformative reflexes” (McLeod, 2007, 5) that 
resist, challenge, negotiate or narrate the imperial/neocolonial 
hegemony. Even attempts towards decolonization, in the form of a 
“movement for moral justice and political solidarity against 
imperialism” (Duara, 2004, 2) or the anti-colonial counterculture of 
resistance (Gopal, 2019), are but postcolonial reactionary politics of 
insurgencies to imperialism. The more recent attempts at “preventing the 
financial powers of the developed countries being used in a way to 
impoverish the less developed ones” (Nkrumah, 1965, 30) is an 
anti-imperial agenda that owes to the intransigent discourses and 
unanswerability of the resistive subjects of the postcolonial condition.

Such post/anti/decolonial reactions are no less to be traced in the way 
the marketing tacts of the global south (the concept of the market in 
itself being a mimetic adoption of the colonial/imperial/global world 
order) communicate to its consumers. The site of marketing communication 
in the Global South witnesses the Western tropes of marketing 
communication being re-produced and re-presented through a mimetic 
subversion that is achieved through the deployment of eclectic tools in 
the media.  Thus, it is a truism to find how the Global South has 
adopted a marketing communication system, in its theorization and 
practice, that reflects Western motifs, icons, and narratives (Varman 
and Saha 2009), but this time mediated through the modernity of their 
own (Chatterjee, 1997). The cultural practices of the marketing 
communication of the Global South have been successfully able to 
devalorize the ‘innocent’ episteme of the West. The 
responsible-responsive politics of the marketing communication of the 
Global South problematizes the configurations of western images of the 
colonized subjects. The de-universalization of the Western episteme as 
propounded in the marketing communication of the (neo)colonizer is made 
possible through a nativist turn. Moving beyond the benign ahistoricity 
of the Western marketing communications, the marketing communication 
discourses from the vantage of postcolonial realities highlight the 
experiences of inequities and deep divide. However, it would be wrong to 
seek a coeval pan-image of reaction in the marketing creativities from 
the Global South to the varied forces of imperialism. When historically 
situated, the resentment of the margin in the cultural space of 
marketing communication ventilates the “local-native-indigenous reality” 
that “has been touched by the morphology of modernism and the dominance 
of nationalism and the nation-state” (Radhakrishnan, 2000, 37). Hence, 
beyond the slogans of all-pervasive, sweeping globalization, the marcom 
from the margin unleashes discursivity by narrating the hegemonic 
ideologues of culture, economy, politics, and privilege.
This collection intends to be one of its kind in creating the space for 
voices of critical marcom about the Global South. We invite incisive 
articles that help to catapult the discourse of marcom beyond the 
one-world global, stable, conventional narrative and consciously 
complicate cultural interconnectivities using the lens of postcolonial 
scholarship. Although, the lens of postcolonialism and marketing 
discourses have been effectively used (viz.  Kjeldgaard and Askegaard, 
2006; Varman and Saha, 2009; Üstüner and Holt, 2010; Sandikci and Ger, 
2011; Varman and Belk, 2012; Cova et al., 2013; Varman and Sreekumar, 
2015; Tadajewski, et al., 2018; Koegler, 2018), and there has been some 
dispersed meditation in the field of marketing images and 
postcolonialism (Varman, Cyla, and Sreekumar, 2011; Wulan, 2017; 
Ghandeharion and Morteza, 2017; Ghandeharion, 2018; Ghandeharion, 2019), 
yet our critical anthology intends to be the first to open a substantial 
dialogue in “postcolonial marketing communication”. However, there had 
been some noteworthy work on tourism images/advertisement of the Global 
South from the postcolonial lens (Britton, 1979; Weightman , 1987; 
Echtner and Prasad, 2003; Hall and Tucker, 2004; Hasseler, 2008; Wikes, 
2016; Atayi, 2020) that critique the privileged Western gaze, yet this 
is too focused an area to contribute to the holistic thesis of 
postcolonial marketing communication.

The Present edited volume seeks empirical and conceptual work on such 
topics to better understand and analyze the phenomenon of postcolonial 
marketing communication, how it is experienced, and its impact on Global 
South will be given preference. For empirical papers, all methods will 
be considered. The editors welcome submissions from academics and 
researchers in the field of Cultural Studies, Critical Communication, 
Marketing, Consumer Research, and Macromarketing. Please consult the 
suggestive list (indicative not exhaustive) of topics below:

1.     Marketing communication and the Imperial 
History/Genealogy/Archaeology

2.     Marketing Communication and the Narratives of Nationalism

3.     Marketing Communication and the Subaltern Cultural Politics

4.     Marketing Communication and Ethnonationalism

5.     Aboriginal/Fourth World Marketing Communication

6.     Can the Subaltern Speak through Marketing Communication?

7.     Marketing Communication and its Fragments

8.     Provincializing Marketing Communication

9.     Dalit Marketing Communication

10.  Diasporic Marketing Communication

11.  Marketing Communication and Postcolonial Displacements

12.  Borders, Nation-State and Marketing Communication

13.  Marketing Communication and the Black Identity

14.  Marketing Communication and Nativism

15.  Marketing Communication and Issues of Postcolonial Gender Identity

16.  Marketing Communication and Digital Postcolonialism

17.  Marketing Communication and Decolonization

18.  Marketing Communication and Anti-colonialism

19.   Marketing Communication, Disparities, and Capitalism/Globalization

20.  Marketing Communication and Whiteness Studies


Email IDs for submission of Abstracts (350 words)

Arindam Das: (arindam.das /at/ alliance.edu.in)

Himadri Roy Chaudhuri: (himadri /at/ xlri.ac.in)

Ozlem Sandikci Turkdogan: (Ozlem.SandikciTurkdogan /at/ glasgow.ac.uk)


Key Date

Last date of submission of Abstracts: 20 October 2021

Decision on Abstract: 10 November 2021

Last date for full Paper submission: 15 February 2022


Works cited:

Atayi, H. (2020). “Unlocking the garden of Eden: a postcolonial reading 
of tourists’ and locals’ image of Seychelles.” Diss. Leicester: 
University of Leicester. 
file:///C:/Users/arindam.das/Downloads/2020AtayiHPhD.pdf.
Britton, Robert A. (1979). “The image of the Third World in tourism 
marketing.” Annals of Tourism Research. 6(3): 318–329.

Chatterjee, Partha. (1997). Our Modernity. Rotterdam/Dakar: SEPHIS 
CODESRIA. https://ccs.ukzn.ac.za/files/partha1.pdf.

Cova, Bernard., Maclaran, Pauline., and Bradshaw, Alan. (2013). 
‘‘Rethinking consumer culture theory from the postmodern to the 
communist horizon.’’ Marketing Theory. 13 (2): 213-25.

Duara, Prasenjit. (2004). “Introduction: the decolonization of Asia and 
Africa in the twentieth century.” Decolonization: Perspectives from then 
and Now. Ed. Prasenjit Duara. London and New York: London.

Echtner, C.M. and Prasad, P. (2003). “The context of third world tourism 
marketing.” Annals of Tourism Research. 30(3): 660-82.

Ghandeharion, Azra., and Yazdanjoo, Morteza. (2017). “Governmental 
discourses in advertising on Iran’s state television.” CLCWeb: 
Comparative Literature and Culture, 19(3): 2–9.

Ghandeharion, Arza. (2018). “Iranian advertisements: a postcolonial 
semiotic reading.” Kasetsart Journal of Social Sciences. 39(2): 334-42.

Ghandeharion, Arza. (2019). “How detergent advertisements can bleach 
national identity: postcolonial content analysis of Iranian TV 
advertisements.” Cogent Arts and Humanities. 6(1): 1-17. 
doi.10.1080/23311983.2019.1626204.

Gopal, Priyamvada. Insurgent Empire: Anticolonial Resistance and British 
Dissent. London and New York: London.

Hall, M.C. and Tucker, H. (2004). Tourism and Postcolonialism: Contested 
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Hasseler, T. A. (2008). “The promise of tourism: colonial imagery in 
advertising.” The Radical Teacher. 82: 19-24.

Kjeldgaard, Dannie., and Askegaard, Søren. (2006). “The glocalization of 
youth culture: the global Youth segment as structures of common 
difference.” Journal of Consumer Research. 33(2): 231-47.

Koegler, Caroline. (2018). Critical Branding: Postcolonial Studies and 
the Market. London and New York: Routledge.

Loomba, Ania. (2015). Colonialism/Postcolonialism. 3rd end. London and 
New York: Routledge.

McLeod. John. (2007). “Introduction.” The Routledge Companion to 
Postcolonial Studies. Ed. John McLeod. London and New York: Routledge. 1-18.
Nkrumah, Kwame. (1965). Neo-Colonialism: The Last Stage of Imperialism. 
London: Nelson Books.

Radhakrishnan, R. (2000). “Postmodern and the rest of the world.” The 
Pre-occupation of Postcolonial Studies. Eds. Fawzia Afzal-Khan and 
Kalpana Seshadri-Crooks. Duke University Press: London and Durham. 37-70.

Sartre, Jean-Paul. (1964). Colonialism and Neocolonialism, translated by 
Steve Brewer, Azzedine Haddour, Terry McWilliams; Paris: Routledge.

Sandikci, Ozlem., and Ger, Güliz. (2011). “Islam, consumption and 
marketing: going beyond the essentialist approach.” Handbook of Islamic 
Marketing. Eds. Özlem Sandıkcı and Gillian Rice. Cheltenham (UK): Edward 
Elgar. 484-502.

Tadajewski, Mark., Higgins, Matthew., Denegri-Knott, Janice., and 
Varman, Rohit. (2018). Routledge Companion to Critical Marketing. 
London: Routledge.

Üstüner, Tuba., and Holt, Douglas B. (2010). “Toward a theory of status 
consumption in less industrialized countries.” Journal of Consumer 
Research. 37 (1): 37–56.

Varman, Rohit., and Saha, Biswatosh. (2009). “Disciplining the 
discipline: understanding postcolonial epistemic ideology in marketing.” 
Journal of Marketing Management. 25(7/8): 811–824.

Varman, Rohit., Cayla, Julien., and Sreekumar, Hari. (2011). “Mimicry 
and postcolonial advertising.” E-European Advances in Consumer Research. 
Vol. 9. Eds. Alan Bradshaw, Chris Hackley, and Pauline Maclaran. Duluth, 
MN: Association for Consumer Research. 544.

Varman, Rohit., and Belk, Russell W. (2012). “Consuming postcolonial 
shopping malls.” Journal of Marketing Management. 28(1-2): 62-84.

Varman, Rohit., and Sreekumar, Hari. (2015). “Locating the past in its 
silence: history and marketing theory in India.” Journal of Historical 
Research in Marketing. 7(2): 272-279.

Weightman, B. A. (1987). “Third world tour landscapes.” Annals of 
Tourism Research. 14(2): 227–239.

Wikes, K. (2016) “Resurrecting colonialism: tourism in Jamaica during 
the nineteenth century and beyond.” In Whiteness, Weddings and Tourism 
in the Caribbean. Birmingham: Palgrave Macmillan.

Wulan, Roro Retno. (2017). “The myth of white skin: a postcolonial 
review of cosmetic ads in Indonesia.” International Conference on 
Communication and Media: An International Communication Association 
Regional Conference (i-COME’16). doi:10.1051/shsconf/20173300048.

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