Partly primitive: discursive constructions of the domestic surfer

Abstract

Various studies highlight the importance of discourses in consumer culture, yet fewer explore the historical development of these phenomena. This paper examines a long-view of the meanings and uses of primitive discourse in consumer culture. An investigation of the changing representation of indigenous Hawaiian surfing within Euro-American culture between the late-eighteenth and mid-twentieth century illustrates the ambiguous and malleable articulations of marketplace discourses. We find that over the course of this period, primitive discourses are expressed differently by changing figurations of social actors in manners that serve colonial, celebratory, contemplative and countercultural intentions. Finally, we find that the construction of surfing as a partly primitive marketplace culture combines these discourses to offer consumers a distinct and domesticated theatre of liberatory othering. Illustrating the changing possibilities and potentials for otherness in consumer culture, this paper reaffirms that contemporary marketplace cultures have complex historical roots. These legacies justify extended contextual investigations. Implications concerning representation and the politics of marketplace primitivism are discussed.

Keywords:

• primitive
• consumption
• colonial
• discourse
• history
• other
• surfing

Acknowledgements

Thanks to the editors, our reviewers, the Surfing Heritage Foundation, Craig Lockwood, Avi Shankar, Clif Evers and Janet Borgerson for their comments on earlier versions of this manuscript.

Notes

1. Hawaiian word for foreigner.

2. LA Times, Sports, August 12, 1962.

3. Time, January 10, 1964.

4. Hawaiian word similar in meaning to “priest” or “shaman.”

5. Teen, “Partly Primitive” June 1966.