4 ms·

It's called cultural appropriation, and IMHO this example of it is offensive plain and simple -- nothing borderline about it.

by jomar 15y ago

Groxx 15y ago
How is this cultural appropriation? Wikipedia defines it as: >Cultural appropriation is the adoption of some specific elements of one culture by a different cultural group. They're using the fruit as their logo. What part of New Zealander culture did they appropriate for this site?
- jomar 15y ago
  > They're using the fruit as their logo. What part of New Zealander culture did they appropriate for this site? People can hold in their heads that grapes and grapefruit are different things, so it always bemuses me when they can't do the same thing with kiwi and kiwifruit. Sure, if you don't know otherwise, "kiwi" may look like a useful contraction of kiwifruit. However, once informed that The kiwi is a bird native to New Zealand; the word "kiwi" comes to English from the language of the indigenous people of New Zealand; the bird is a national symbol of the country; New Zealanders colloquially refer to themselves as Kiwis, after the bird, with a history going back a century or more; the term "kiwi-land" is occasionally used fondly as a name for the country; the term kiwifruit was coined only in the 1960s then continuing to use the term "kiwi" for the fruit is factually wrong, and even disrespectful. Sure, you yourself might not care -- but you can see why New Zealanders might and do care. This website uses a stylised kiwifruit as its logo, but let's also look at the terminology they're using: "Latest kiwis", "Kiwi of the day", "Welcome to kiwi land" Are the people behind the website New Zealanders, or associated with New Zealand in some way? Not as far as I can tell. Ergo, appropriation. (Even if the website authors were New Zealanders themselves, the usage would still not be appropriate, of course. But New Zealanders would not have used such terminology on their dinky website because for them it already has established meaning and mana, rather than being just a random cool word to be stolen.)
  - Groxx 15y ago
    Do you also take offense to calling it a kiwifruit? By your logic, it's just as disrespectful, and just as much of a cultural appropriation - dropping 'fruit' from the name of a fruit is merely rational and efficient (edit: once a large amount of the population knows it's a fruit, hence its inclusion at the beginning).
  - vorg 15y ago
    For memory... Kiwis are called "kiwifruit" in Australia and NZ, and "kiwis" in most other places. Before the 1970's they were called "Chinese gooseberries", coming from the Yangtse river basin. Because they also grew well in NZ, the NZ fruit marketing board gave them a new catchy name to promote exports them during May to August, when they were out of season in the Northern hemisphere. By your same argument, perhaps kiwifruit should be renamed back to "Chinese Gooseberries".
    - knz 15y ago
      In the 90's there was an attempt to rebrand kiwifruit grown in New Zealand as "Zespri".
      - Groxx 15y ago
        I'm going to guess it failed because it had 20 years of "kiwifruit" and increased American-audience-awareness that it was a fruit going against it. Otherwise I'd be all for it, though I must ask: why "Zespri"?
        knz 15y ago
        They still brand and export all kiwifruit from NZ as Zespri (http://www.zespri.com/ http://www.zespri.com/). Country of origin labeling has no doubt made this irrelevant to the average consumer though. If I remember correctly, the name was a bit of a mystery to most kiwis at the time.

It's called cultural appropriation, and IMHO this example of it is offensive plain and simple -- nothing borderline about it.

by jomar 15y ago

It's called cultural appropriation, and IMHO this example of it is offensive plain and simple -- nothing borderline about it.

Groxx 15y ago

How is this cultural appropriation? Wikipedia defines it as: >Cultural appropriation is the adoption of some specific elements of one culture by a different cultural group. They're using the fruit as their logo. What part of New Zealander culture did they appropriate for this site?

jomar 15y ago
> They're using the fruit as their logo. What part of New Zealander culture did they appropriate for this site? People can hold in their heads that grapes and grapefruit are different things, so it always bemuses me when they can't do the same thing with kiwi and kiwifruit. Sure, if you don't know otherwise, "kiwi" may look like a useful contraction of kiwifruit. However, once informed that The kiwi is a bird native to New Zealand; the word "kiwi" comes to English from the language of the indigenous people of New Zealand; the bird is a national symbol of the country; New Zealanders colloquially refer to themselves as Kiwis, after the bird, with a history going back a century or more; the term "kiwi-land" is occasionally used fondly as a name for the country; the term kiwifruit was coined only in the 1960s then continuing to use the term "kiwi" for the fruit is factually wrong, and even disrespectful. Sure, you yourself might not care -- but you can see why New Zealanders might and do care. This website uses a stylised kiwifruit as its logo, but let's also look at the terminology they're using: "Latest kiwis", "Kiwi of the day", "Welcome to kiwi land" Are the people behind the website New Zealanders, or associated with New Zealand in some way? Not as far as I can tell. Ergo, appropriation. (Even if the website authors were New Zealanders themselves, the usage would still not be appropriate, of course. But New Zealanders would not have used such terminology on their dinky website because for them it already has established meaning and mana, rather than being just a random cool word to be stolen.)
- Groxx 15y ago
  Do you also take offense to calling it a kiwifruit? By your logic, it's just as disrespectful, and just as much of a cultural appropriation - dropping 'fruit' from the name of a fruit is merely rational and efficient (edit: once a large amount of the population knows it's a fruit, hence its inclusion at the beginning).
- vorg 15y ago
  For memory... Kiwis are called "kiwifruit" in Australia and NZ, and "kiwis" in most other places. Before the 1970's they were called "Chinese gooseberries", coming from the Yangtse river basin. Because they also grew well in NZ, the NZ fruit marketing board gave them a new catchy name to promote exports them during May to August, when they were out of season in the Northern hemisphere. By your same argument, perhaps kiwifruit should be renamed back to "Chinese Gooseberries".
  - knz 15y ago
    In the 90's there was an attempt to rebrand kiwifruit grown in New Zealand as "Zespri".
    - Groxx 15y ago
      I'm going to guess it failed because it had 20 years of "kiwifruit" and increased American-audience-awareness that it was a fruit going against it. Otherwise I'd be all for it, though I must ask: why "Zespri"?
      - knz 15y ago
        They still brand and export all kiwifruit from NZ as Zespri (http://www.zespri.com/ http://www.zespri.com/). Country of origin labeling has no doubt made this irrelevant to the average consumer though. If I remember correctly, the name was a bit of a mystery to most kiwis at the time.