“Language is power, life and the instrument of culture, the instrument of domination and liberation”
-- Angela Carter, novelist
Plaid Friday went swimmingly, don't you think?
It's all about educating consumers, but this year more than ever before, it occurred to me that independent small business owners themselves also are prime beneficiaries of an ongoing educational component of any Buy Local campaign.
We can begin by rejecting alien terminology. Words actually matter. If you are a small indie business owner, or if you support the panoply of indie business concepts, you must recognize that "Black Friday" is adverse terminology. It is degrading materialist Big Box Speak, intended to inculcate a sense of mega-chain empowerment. Consider refraining from its usage next year, and train your employees to think and speak in like fashion.
Eventually, we'll retrain the nation, but we have to start somewhere: With ourselves. Language is a good start for revolution, don't you think?
Everytime one our local independent businesses used the verbage "Black Friday" I cringed! Thought we had made enough posts on New Albany First facebook page and your blog for them to pick-up our verbage of "Plaid Friday". We will need to try harder next year to get the message out apparently!
ReplyDelete