AKIFUMI IIZUKA

CAPITALISM

AND

THE CULTURE OF GIFT GIVING

BA Design Year 3

The designer - planner is responsible for nearly all of our products and tools and nearly all of our environmental mistakes. He is responsible either through bad design or by default; by having thrown away his responsible creative abilities, by ‘not getting involved’, or by ‘muddling through’.

PAPANEK, VICTOR (1985, 54)

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Abstract

Contemporary Issues in Gift - g iving

Opt ion s in Da i l y l i f e and Gi f t s

Minimal i s t Culture and Gif t -g iv ing

Emotional Values in Gifts

Conc lu s ion

Re f e rence

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This context report aims to investigate the relationship between

gift-giving and consumer society, and to illustrate how design is

tested for its role involved in contemporary life. The culture of

gift-giving is essentially related to the development of communication

in human society. The traditional behaviour reflects personal

feelings towards others, and helps people build relationships

with each other through the giving or exchanging of objects.

Thus, gifts are separated from the concept of monetary value.

However, as the development of technology has contributed to

society, products have been designed and manufactured on a mass

scale. This dramatic change also affected the ways of gift-giving

since gifts are part of consumer activity when purchased in a

commercial market. This was the introduction of the values

as quality to society, and to the culture of gift-giving. On the

other hand, this trend doesn’t necessarily enhance the quality of

gift-giving culture. Hence the overflow of options confuses people by

encouraging them into an unnecessary rapid cycle of consumption.

Abstract

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1. Contemporary Issues in Gift - giving

Within contemporary society, gift-giving is a form of communication. The custom of exchanging gifts exists all over the world; gifts are given in different occasions in different forms. However the understanding of funda-mental nuances and traditions underlying gift transactions are being lost. Furthermore it can be argued that with the rise of consumerism in a variety of developed or even developing countries that the lines of gift and commercial exchange have become very blurred, almost at times intersecting and influencing each other. In this chapter I will explain the differences in gift and commercial exchange, and how they have influenced or affected each other.

- Fundamental Meaning of gifts -

First of all, to understand the culture of gift-giving, it’s important to state its clear dis-tinction from commercial exchange, and to define what makes things gifts. The significant difference between gifts and other transactions is that: “a gift transaction is the relationshipthat links transactors to each other and to

the object they transact… gifts are not alienated from the transactions” (Carrier, 2003: 20). It’s more than a simple exchange of objects or ser-vices, and the action includes multiple meanings. The exchange of gifts, such as gifts given on a Birth-day or Mother’s day, has been considered as play-ing an important role in human communication.

On the other hand, in the case of consum-er exchange, transactions only hold temporary economic aspects, and “the relationship comes to an end with payment and reception of a product” (Henaff, 2010: 102). For instance when a person enters the shop to buy a pack of milk, he isn’t concerned by the person at a register who he bought it from. It doesn’t change the quality of milk. In comparison to commercial exchanges, gift exchanges can be interpreted as alternative or special ways ofcommunication. The types of gifts reflect the relations behind the gift. In the Andaman Is-lands in the Indian Ocean, for example, each group of parents of a bride and groom start exchanging gifts from the first betrothal vow of the couple and continue as long as the re-lationship between a bride and groom lasts. However, both groups of parents are not allowed to talk to each other (Mauss 25).

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Carrier explains, gifts are morally transacted, therefore, they are not simply interpreted from the viewpoint of economy and emotion, although they may have economic and emotional impor-tance. Thus, “…dereliction it appears to those who see the request not made, the favour not reciprocated, the visit not returned, the obliga-tion not fulfilled”(Carrier, 2003: 22). The feel-ing of obligation is a key factor in the culture of gift-giving, and this is why gifts often escape the simple realm of economy. The extreme example that shows gifts as non-commercial trade based on this sense of obligation is the custom seen in another set of islands, the Trobriand Islands in New Guinea. The ‘kula’ in those islands is a trade where only the chief on each island ex-change gifts. It is a practice which is carefully separated from the commercial trades called ‘gimwali’. In ‘kula’ trade, one who receives a gift will be the one who gives a gift the next time. Those participants take a long journey on ships or boats to where the exchanges are solemnised. Figure 1(Damon, 2002 ) shows the routes of ‘kula’ exchange. The most unique form of ‘kula’ is called, the ‘Uvlaku’. In this expedition, those who participate are supposed to leave without any gifts to exchange (Mauss 28). In this case, the travel itself ultimately is a gift; the non physical form of obligation;

the fact they come for obligations.

Departing from the above example we have stated that there is a strong obliga-tional aspect that makes gift giving makes it very distinctive to commercial exchange. On the other hand this aspect can be seen as super-fluous and lacking any sustenance to the act of gift-giving- as it bears no importance on the ac-tual act. Mari Douglas mentions that there is no ‘free gift’ since the concept of obligation always exists in the culture of gift-giving (Mauss, ix). Whether the word ‘free gift’ is appropriate or not, when things are exchanged without

fig. 1 Kula Ring

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any ‘strings’ attached, it creates disconnec-tion between people. However, on the con-trary to this idea some theories claim there are free gifts. Laidlaw proposes an objection to the idea there is no free gift. She explains such case, for instance when a person anonymous-ly donates money to a charity group, the do-nation can be a free gift (Dec 2000). On the other hand, taking a different perspective from Laidlaw and Mari Douglas, Eisenstien explains transactions that include money and the ones that don’t are initially the same as evidenced by referring to the words in some cultures;

Some culture, such as the Toaripi and Namau, had but a single word to desig-nate buying, selling, lending, and bor-rowing, while the ancient Mesopotamian word šâm meant both “buy” and “sell.” This ambiguity persists in many modern languages. Chinese, German, Danish, Norwegian, Dutch, Estonian, Bulgarian, Serbian, Japanese, and many others each have but a single term for borrowing and lending, perhaps a vestige of an ancient time when the two were not distinguished.

(Eisenstein, 2011: 7 - 8)

The development of gift giving has been derived from the exchange of necessity in everyday life. In this exchange, there was no concept of finan-cial value, and therefore, there is no distinction between giving and receiving. This shows the vagueness that essentially exist in exchanges in society. In fact, money is efficient when the one exchanging gifts wants to postpone the decision of what he wants or when he doesn’t want anything. This still keeps the basic struc-ture of exchange. (Eisenstein, 2011). In our society, gifts are often purchased in the mar-ket, therefore, unlike the traditional example of gift-giving, often appears in the study of Mauss such as a feast (2002), living in a industrialised society makes us familiar with monetary value.

- The contemporary issues in gift-giving -

Today’s world is convenient; Technology allows us to shop online and have the item you bought on the following day. MR. POR-TER, the fashion online shopping website (2004), allows customers to choose an item online and send it to someone with message as a gift. Digitally written words on a letter bring your thoughts to a recipient. {see fig. 2}However, it is a minimal communication to

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deliver thoughts. This is why when a let-ter comes with a gift it is often written by hand. The question here rises: when the pro-cess of gift-giving is made shorter and eas-ier, does the gift hold the values of a gift as they used to be? For this question, I would like to investigate the connection between process and quality of gift-giving more later.

Yanai Michihiko, Japanese creator, points out how communications in modern socie-ty has changed the act of giving and receiv-ing: “When I start typing ‘thank you’ on my phone, at some point before I finish typ-ing the words, it already shows the option of, ‘thank you,’ so people usually don’t type all the letters to send a text to someone and

fig. 2 MR. PORTER

communicate without following the whole process that has to be done. However, tech-nically saying, this ‘thank you’ is the ‘thank you,’ I typed and sent to someone before. It is not an original version sent to the person” (“Watashi no 10 no rule Yanai Michihiko 1/3”, 2009: 2:42-3:07). As Carrier highlights the idea of obligation, this convenience, namely the shortened processes of gift-giving brought by technology relates to the idea of moral.

Stiegler discusses how audio-visual me-dia us ing technology has dismissed individual sensitivities. He states the sen-sitivities of a group of people who are repeatedly exposed to the same informa-tion are eventually modified to similar ones. He explains the theory of John Locke, where the peculiarity in each individualis formed by having a connection to pecu-liar things. Therefore, a personality is built onthe relationship with an environment surround-ing one-self. However in a society where products are mass produced, the uniqueness that exists in people is categorized, which is the categori-zation of the process, where ‘singular’ becomes ‘particular’(Stiegler 30){see fig. 3}This method of mass control creates victims whose identi-ties are controlled by advertisements designed

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Facebook

Nike

McDonald’s

Steve Jobs

Mac Starbucks

Yes

Yes

Yes Yes

Yes

Yes

Y YY YY Y

An example of ‘singular’ becoming ‘peculiar’

- preference in life -

As making a choice on what you eat, wear, use, believe and so on,those choices symbolise your lifestyle, furthermore, creates the en-vironment you are exposed to when series of choices accumulate.

PERSON A PERSON B

fig. 3

Facebook

Nike

McDonald’s

Steve Jobs

Mac Starbucks

Yes

Yes

Yes Yes

Yes

No

Y NY YY Y

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In chapter 2, I will introduce the relationship between consumer society when empowered by technology and the relationship to gift-giving culture. I would like to focus on the process of gift-giving, in particular, the issues that arise when consumers choose gifts.

fig. 4 Michael Jordan

to encourage consumers to spend some money. Figure4. (Walter Iooss Jr./SI, 2014) shows a good example of what Stiegler points out. “The brand is still a marketing juggernaut. It controlled 58% of the U.S. basketball shoe market in 2012, according to research firm SportsOneSource,” (Badenhausen, 2013). A super player’s influence has a big impact on the market as an advertisement as you can see the case of Nike Air Jordan. This is the exact example of a successful case, where advertise-ment is used to stimulate consumers’ desires of possessions. Once paying attention to issues like this, it might be very optimistic to sep-arate from contemporary gift-giving culture from financial economy in modern society.

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2. Options in Daily Life and Gifts

In the culture of gift-giving, what to give is of big concern. In today’s world, there are millions of options to choose from for gifts. In particular, in a season that gifts are exchanged, for instance during Christmas, shops provide a wide range of gift options. Since those seasons have such a huge economic impact, gifts are ar-guably related to consumerism. Advertisements are designed to attract consumers to purchase those products. Consumerism allows a society to have many more options to fulfil people’s desire.

In consumerism, gifts are also one of the big-gest categories of annual spending in society. Ac-cording to a research by Unity Marketing, objects and experiences purchased as gifts reached rough-ly ten per cent of the total retail market in 2012 in the United States (Unity Marketing, 2012) Therefore, it is important to investigate consum-er activities to address the gift-giving culture.

- An overflow of options -

In fact, the longing for multiple options is a natural and inherited thing for humans, to the degree that the lack of options affects

human health. Research on the relationship between health and pay grades was conducted over ten thousand British civil servants from different ages groups. Even though smok-ing habits, obesity rate, and the frequency of exercise were taken into account, a group of lower-grade employees are still twice at a risk of dying from heart disease. The signif-icant factor for this result was the degree of control that people are felt to have in their jobs (Marmot, 1978) This research found that having more options has positive effects on the human body. Therefore on the one hand the variety of options that exists in contem-porary society and the western world today is founded on the natural desire of human beings.However, there is also the negative side of hav-ing multiple options. As Stiegler’s terms, a hyper industrial age (2006), a supply of products in consumer society is a surplus in comparison to those demands. On the surface, supply of prod-ucts seems to allow people to have more options and possibilities, leading them to be able to make better choices. However, in reality consumers often face the problem of decision-making. George Loewenstein, professor of economics and psychology at Carnegie Mellon University, in his paper, “Is More Choice Always Better?” illustrates three risks of expanded options:

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(1) time

the opportunity costs of spending time making decisions that could be used for other activities

(2) error

the tendency to choose badly when peo-ple lack expertise

(3) psychic costs

anxiety about making decisions under conditions of uncertainty, and regret if they turn out badly.

(2000)

were twenty-four, whereas thirty percent of people bought a jar of jam from the option of six. She explains people cannot deal with so many options even though they often want more options (2010). In another experiment by Iyengar, one group was allowed to choose from thirty varieties of Godiva chocolate where-as the other group was asked to choose from six types. The one with more options felt less satisfied with their decisions (Goldstein, 2010). Therefore, as Loewenstien noted the risks of having more options, more options can create a situation people struggle with making decisions in contrast to their cravenness for more options.

- the desire to choose and advertising -

Living in a consumer society reveals the mul-tiplicity of options and prompts to create desire, and to consume. According to Yankelovich, a US market research firm, an average person living in an American city thirty years ago was esti-mated to see up to two thousand ads a day. In today’s world, the number is estimated up to five thousand (Story, 2007) These advertisements are wisely designed to stimulate the desire of having. In modern society, information is con-stantly provided whether that’s what a person wants or not. One of the successful products in

A series of studies has shown cases of deal-ing with those risks. American psychologist, Sheena Iyengar also investigated how choic-es affect people’s decisions by displaying two different options: all twenty-four differentflavours of jams and then six different fla-vours chosen from the twenty-four kinds of jams were displayed every few hours in turn. The results showed, only three per cent of people bought a jar of jam when the choices

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relationship between control (and restrictions) and wellness of being. Her investigation revealed that people who shaped their day-to-day activities around adher-ence to the religion were more likely to be health-ier than people who belonged to other conserva-tive or liberal types of religions. This experiment showed that restrictions don’t necessarily make people feel they have less control over their lives. Iyengar concludes her experiment, “how we understand control depends on the stories we are told and the beliefs we come to hold. Some of us come solely through the exercise of personal choices” (2010: 27). The lesser sense of control is often connected with stress and depression that can lead to health problems. However, it’s not simply derived from physi-cal options in a situation that one has control over, but it is more about a sense of control over belief in a situation, as Iyengar shows.

Since these consumer activities exist with options as products, in particular, mass pro-duced items, designers are arguably responsi-ble for this situation. These products have to be sold every time as they are designed and manufactured. Stiegler explains this cycle; as the introduction of technology that allows

terms of sales that advertisement contributed to is Air Jordan from Nike. James Berger explains the Nike Air Jordan shoes contain the image of Micheal Jordan, and in a sense, people maybe also buy the identities the sneakers have, that is, “This desire to imitate the desire of others - especially celebrities and heroes of one sort or another” (Berger, 2004:163). It is scepti-cal if products purchased reflect consumers’ personal decisions, when well designed market-ing methods using advertisements is involved. In fact, Darian Leader explains women prefer the clothes other people don’t have while men prefer to have the same clothes other people have. In a sense, the choices are affected by other people’s values since people compare their choices with others. Especially, when one doesn’t have a specific criteria about what he is trying to buy (Salecl, 2011). In a sense, the more options are provided, the more people are confused by overflow of options and likely to be affected by other people’s influence.

As the former study by Marmot shows, people tend to be mentally and physically healthy when they have more control in their lives. However, control is such a vague definition. This is reflect-ed in another research by Iyengar; focussing on nine different religious groups she explored the

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mass production, the need to sell those itemsmanufactured in a large amount arises. This leads society to control consumers (2006: 36). For instance, advertisements are designed to encourage people to purchase items according to the cycle of manufacture. David Clarke in his book,”The consumer society and the post-modern city,” describes this system of market;

The market does not, of course, exist for benevolent reasons. In puling off the bal-ancing act it does, the market ensures that the system reproduces itself over time, and generally at an expanding rate.

(2003: 158)

Therefore, as part of this cycle of production, designers are often asked to design something new. However, Enzo Mari, the Italian designer shows his sceptical attitude toward this situa-tion and those designers. He explains there is no need to renew design so often by referring to human hands. The shape of human hands has been the same shape for a long time. Tak-ing them as the example of great design, he ex-plains designers in today’s world confuse qual-ity with newness (15 June 2010, No 269: 32).

At the same time, it is true that designers

are also the victims of consumer socie-ty since this rapid cycle asks designers to produce new things all the time. Japanese designer, Naoto Fukasawa talks about the downside of industrial design. When new electronic devices are produced, the designs of the products have to be renewed. Even the design of a device itself is great, com-panies change the design as they renew the technology (Fukusawa, 2005). In this situa-tion, design itself is treated as a consumable thing. Designers are asked to design a tem-porary thing that lasts for the short term.In particular, in the culture of gift-giving, since an item is considered as a communi-cation form as discussed in chapter 1, it is important to choose appropriate gift. Un-der these circumstances where advertise-ments attract people and so many options are surrounding them, it is hard to make a decision in choosing a specific gift. In particular, since designers are involved in this situation, designers have to be aware about this issue. Leif Huff, the Manag-ing Director at IDEO Munich, explains;

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Designers are in the business of making stuff. When done well, this makes people consume more in order to help business grow. This simple equation used to be the very definition of successful design, but it was also, in many cases, undeni-ably narrow-minded as well, helping to encourage a culture of consumption that currently threats literally to con-sume itself.

(Reis and Wiedemann, 2010:18)

Then how can design contribute to consumer activities, including the culture of gift-giving? In the next chapter, I would like to focus on the concept of quantity and quality, and to illustrate the design approach in practice to-ward consumer society.

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- Gifts can be problematic too -

The gift is the biggest spending category among holiday expenditure in the United States, according the research firm, IBIS world, the spending for gifts in 2013 was expected to be 53, 291 million US dollars (Media Center, 2013). The gift market has a big impact on economy in western culture. On the other hand, some examples indicated that having too many things can cause problems in ordinary lives. When considering these two studies, the gift also can be problematic. Unlike the items people buy for themselves, gifts are usually chosen from ob-jective viewpoints. In a sense, gifts might have a different stance from essential objects in life. In fact, gifts are not always appreciated by the receiver, even though gifts should be treated with some respect in the context of emotion values. However, there is always a risk of giving things that can trouble reciprocators. The Huffington Post showed the statistics of the unwanted gifts for Christmas received in the United Kingdom in 2011 was worth 2.4 billion British pounds (Hu-fington Post UK, 11: 2011) Although there arebillions of options available in society, people still fail to choose appropriate gifts for others. This is exactly the case when quantity doesn’t necessarily bring any improvement in qualityfig. 5 Stuffed Garage

3. Minimalist Culture and Gift-giving

As chapter two discussed, the overflow of op-tions in society decreases the quality of choices. These products purchased under unnecessary needs also affect people’s lives. A research con-ducted among thirty-two middle class American Families in 2011 revealed a cultural problem in the United States; seventy-five per cent of them couldn’t park their cars in their own garages since they keep so many things in their garages. {see fig. 5} Also stress hormones of all the mothers in those families were found to be remarkably high when they spent time managing things they own at home (Hill, 2009) . This example clearly indicates how objects people consume can generate the complexity in everyday life. Gifts are also not exceptional or those issues.

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of life.

- Interview A -

Applying design basic method of sur-vey from the book, “Universal meth-ods of design”(Martin and Hannington, 2012: 173), to the way of interviewing, I conducted interviews with twenty-eight peo-ple and asked what were the worst gifts they had ever received. There were two major rea-sons gifts are unwanted in this interview {see fig. 6}. One case is that a person tries to give a present based on his or her own values that don’t fit to the others’ value, for instance, clothes from a mother to her daughter. According to the same article in the Huffington Post, one in five people said a gift from a mother is likely to be an unwanted gift. The other case in my research was found to be simply a lack of un-derstanding of the other’s tastes or lifestyles. In this case, a person considers the other’s taste, however the knowledge about the person’s lifestyle or what the person likes is simply not enough. From this interview, the problems seem to be not only options themselves that people can have, but also the lack of appropri-ate approach in making decisions.

- Practices of minimalist culture in life -

The idea of minimalist culture can be argued as a response to this aspect of gift/consumer exchange. Ram Dieter, the Ger-man industrial designer criticizes the current design scene in consumer society; in today’s world, not many companies take design seri-ously, and so many designs have unnecessary elements. He defines one of the principles of good design as, ‘durable’ (Ueki-Polet and Klempt,:589). This is apparently against the mainstream of consumer society, however ide-ally a massive amount of options in consumer society and problems caused by those optionsderived from short cycle of consum-ing product. Therefore, ideally speaking, when this philosophy is applied more to design productions, this will change con-sumer activities from quantity to quality. There are some examples this theory is applied to. These problems could arguably rise the trend of minimalist culture. Joshua Fields Millburn, one of the authors of the book, Minimalism: Live a meaningful life, explains his experienc-es with superfluous things in his life. After two losses in his life; his mother’s death and a divorce with his wife, Millburn started to revalue his priorities in his life and discarding

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things that he didn’t think he needed any more. After eight months, ninety per cent of his pos-sessions were removed. (Plumb, 2012) Graham Hill, the founder of the blog dedicated to living a minimalist life, points out American social issues: “we take up more than three times the amount of space per capita than we did 60 years ago”(2013). This number seem to show how much society has become more materialistic.

Adapting the idea of minimalism to their work policy, some American companies have been successful. Since 2010 Netflix Inc., the American provider of on-demand Inter-net streaming media, have started to allow employees to take as many holidays as they need. Behind this policy, their attitude toward work can be seen; the work is assessed by the work actually done rather than work hours (Pink 2010). This is a reverse thinking that flexibly adapted to the current situation in society. Many companies are likely to pursuequantity as they believe that leads them to a success. Matthew E May, the founder of EDIT, the innovative strategy company, and the author of The Laws of Subtraction, analyses society with a surplus of options. He explains what society should really focus on are “what to ig-nore”, “what to leave out”, and “what to don’t”

(Simon,2012). On the contrary to the situation where more and more options are produced in contemporary society, this idea is to eliminate the least important options. Considering so many options are impos-sible, it is important for each person to realize that a lot of options can bring a problem in life (Schwaltz, 2004).When qual i ty i sn’t a lways proport ional to quantity, it might not be just options because more options means more time consumption. In fact , people often struggle with making decisions over gifts.

Is the time worth it ?

Based on the question, “if making a decision in choosing a gift can lead people to wrong re-sults, is the process worth it?”, I conducted inter-views with twenty-eight people and asked what were the worst gifts they had ever received to be measured by applying the design basic meth-od of survey from the book, “Universal meth-ods of design”(Martin and Hannington, 2012: 173), to the method of interviewing.) This research aims to reveal if the time spent for choosing a gift is worth it or not. This would then influence the design method. Pairs are asked to follow the tasks shown

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1. Object of a salamander, African taste - I didn’t like to put in my room, but couldn’t throw it away

2. Earrings - I didn’t like the design

3. Clothes - It was the wrong size and different taste.

4. A large amount of meat - I couldn’t eat all of them.

5. Slippers - I just don’t like it. 6. Character key chain - The character wasn’t cool.

7. Gay book - I’m straight.

8. Hand bag - I hate design and use.

9. Hair curlers - My hair is naturally curled.

10. Hand-towel with stitching of a flower - I didn’t like the design.

11. Funny goods: - It was temporarily fun, but don’t know what to do afterwards.

12. Figurines that people buy when they travel: - I don’t travel there, not important and meaningful.

13. Huge traditional dish: - I don’t cook that much, and doesn’t fit to my house either.

14. A necklace that her boyfriend’s face engraved: - It was just creepy even though I could understand his feeling

fig. 6 Interview A

Unwanted gifts and the reasons for being unwanted.

15. Make up thing - I don’t used them

16. Self-made CD - I never listen to it, it was a terrible quality.

17. Cosmetics - I don’t know if it fits or not on my skin, so I never use.

18. Clothes my mom buys - It was not my taste.

19. Books: - I simply never gonna read such a long story.

20. Things I cannot eat: - That’s the reason.

21. Face cream - It makes me feel old.

22. Cup a camel printed on - I hate the design.

23. American football team cap - I have a favourite team.

24. Photo frame - Since I’m a photographer, I have many to use for myself.

25. Shiny watch - The watch was so shiny, and ugly.

26. Stationery - Tools for my work are things I wanna choose by myself.

27. Hamster - I can’t touch them.

28. A ring - It’s an awkward gift from a friend.

below. Pairs are asked to follow the tasks below. Twenty-four pairs of people who have known each other for more than six months and who both agree that they are friends participated in this research. (Two people out of a group of three are also considered to be a pair, in this case one person can form two groups.)

Task (for person A) 1. In thirty seconds, pick a number from one to ten.

2. In five minutes, choose a gift that you think your partner would appreciate the most. The number picked in task one corresponds to a specific gift from those ten options. This is not told to either person A or B. After this process person B in a differentroom was asked to evaluate two gifts chosen randomly by the number andperson A in the scale of one to five, five as the best. The result of this study showed that the average degree of appreciation towardsa gift chosen randomly was 2.458, and that of a gift chose by person A was 2.792 {sse fig. 7 and 8}. Therefore even though gifts that are chosen are appreciated slightly more, the degree of

appreciation in both gifts aren’t significantly different. After that, person B was asked to pick the gift he/she thinks their partner will appreciate most over those ten choices. The cases that per-son A could chose the most appreciable person, B thought best for his/herself in those ten choic-es were only seven cases among twenty-four. it might not be worth spending a large amount of time. Therefore, from the above examples described, it seems difficult tomake a meaningful choice for others.

fig. 7 Is the time worth it?

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a) When a gift is chose by person A

b) When a gift is randomly chosen

fig. 8 Comparison from “ Is the time worth it ?”

1

2

3

4

5

x

x

x

x

x

3

6

10

3

2

=

=

=

=

=

3

12

30

12

10

Degree of Appreciation

Number of People

67/24 = 2.792

67

1

2

3

4

5

x

x

x

x

x

5

8

8

1

2

=

=

=

=

=

5

16

24

4

10

59

59/24 = 2.458

By dividing total points voted for each gift by the number of participants, namely the number of trans-actions, it results in the average number of the de-gree of appreciation.

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4. Emotional Value in Gifts

- The Memorial Value in a Gift -

Although a certain amount of gifts can be unwanted, useless or under-appreciated, it is also true that there are appreciated gifts too. What, in particular, makes the difference between gifts appreciated and unappreciated? In particular, in this chapter, I would like to investigate the unique value a gift has to a specific person. Those values cannot neces-sarily be standardized in society. When con-sidering the fundamental meaning of gifts, gifts are part of communication, therefore, the quality of the product doesn’t always cor-respond to the quality of gift. If a gift was a language, it has to be properly spoken and communicated depending on the situation.

Chris Ratcliffe, a graphic designer, talks about an ordinary box of chocolates from Germany that has a special meaning to him. His friend Lucy has given him twenty boxes of the German chocolate, ‘Katzenzungen.’ {see fig. 9} They have been good friends since they were fifteen, however, they have lived in differ-ent places from the age eighteen. This box of chocolates reminds him of her (24 Dec 2013:

23).This box of chocolates symbolizes their rela-tionship and triggers the memories they shared. In a sense, this communication only exists with-in the relationship between Chris and Lucy.

fig. 9 ‘Katzenzungen’€ 1,99 at Amazon.de

Sandra Zu (2013) talks about her priceless brace-let from her mother. {see fig. 10} The bracelet she is wearing now was the one her mother used to wear all the time. However, her mother passed away a few years ago. She explains the feeling of being close to her mother through the bracelet. These gifts wouldn’t have a significant meaning to other people. In this case, these gifts are inter-preted within the relationship between people. Henaff defines the values of gifts: “what is pre-cious is what was given and received in a rela-tionship of reciprocal recognition” (2010:108).

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- Interview B -

To highlight the features of gifts that have a specific meaning to a specific person, the structure of the design method as of interview A, I con-ducted interviews with one hundred and three people(Martin and Hannington, 2012:172). The following were asked in the interviews;

What was the best gift you have ever received?

When and by whom?

fig. 10 The Sandra’s braceletHer mother’s name is engraved on the panel. She is thinking about having her brother’s name engraved on the back side of the panel.

Why was it the best?

People often mention an emotional value associated with certain gifts. The best gifts people talked are were most likely to be memorable with emotive stories attached, and are not always related to the monetary value of gift. Ruffle explains that emotions significantly can affect how much recipi-ents appreciate gifts (1999:403). Donald Norman analyses three aspects in design that focuses on the emotional response of the receiver, using the moment when he re-ceived a gift from his friend as an example: a stainless-steel set of old mechanical drawing instruments in a leather case. He explains this gift is composed of three elements:

Visceral design > Appearance

Behavioral design > The pleasure and ef-fectiveness of use

Reflective design > Self-image, personal satisfaction, memories

(2004:39)

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The former experiment I conducted showed, friends in a close relationship are likely to un-derstand the preferences of things. Therefore, gifts given in those relationships tend to have a better visceral level of design. {see chart 1 and 2}

Then this also affects the reflective lev-el of the gift. Since the gifts are given by someone close, the gift refers to the mem-ory they shared, and it can be imaged the gift would be appreciated in the future too whether it is an object or experience as a memory as the case of Sandra shows, the bracelet given by a mother significant-ly has an emotional attachment in the gift. (2) ;When a gift is given with a surprise, it is likely to remain as an outstanding memo-ry. During the interview I conducted, people talked about their gift stories, one of the important features was surprise as Ca-plow notes, “a Christmas gift should sur-prise the receiver….” as one of the selec-tion rules for Christmas gift (1984: 1313). We can also recognise this fitting into the reflective aspect of Norman’s theory.

(3);The intention of gifts are, in general,to please recipients. When those thoughts

The visceral level is the initial image of de-sign. In his experience, the well-designed draw-ing instruments in a leather case gives him the impression of joy. He explains visceral design also affects a reflective level since the appear-ance of design prompts the relevant memo-ries associated with it. Then the behaviour-al level is the practicality that exists in design.(2004:39). That is to say emotional values are delivered through particular reasons. From the interviews I conducted, I found that with the theory of Norman above, the three types of design can be applied to my analysis from the viewpoint of emotional elements in gift-giv-ing. My analysis is: A gift should be (1) given by a person who is in a close relationship with a recipient; (2) presented with a surprise on a special or unexpected situation, in this case, a surprise might be contained in a gift itself; (3) delivered with an intention to understand and please a recipient. {see chart 1 and 2}

(1) ;Who gives a gift often matters to a re-cipient. Applying the theory of Norman, this can be related to the visceral and reflective features of the gift. A type of gift is likely to follow a type of relationship. In the inter-views I conducted, the best gifts are most-ly given by parents, lovers or best friends.

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Chart 1 Who gave the best gift to you?( Relationship )

Parents

Lovers

Siblings

Best/close friends

Others

52

31

8

7

5

0 50 80

( Numbers of answers )

Chart 2 When is the best gift given?( Occasion )

Birthday

Christmas

Other specialoccasion

Ordinary occasion

Anniversary

41

35

16

8

5

0 50 80

( Numbers of answers )

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a

Reflective aspect

c d

are reflected on a gift, and a recipient ap-preciate the carefulness of the giver, it in-creases the value of the gift since it adds an emotional dimension to the gift: “choice is what enables us to tell the world who we are and what we care about” (Schwartz,100). When people are asked to talk about the story of the best gifts they have ever re-ceived, they often raise a reason that they appreciated it a lot because they could feel how givers care about them through gifts.

When comparing the analysis of the in-terviews with the theory of Norman, the gifts that make a difference in terms of apprecia-tion have great design aspects. {see fig. 11} At the same time, the way of conveying those elements effectively is also well designed. Even when factoring personal preferences of products or services, a better gift choice is likely to be made in a close relationship, to enrich the value of gift, it has to be presented under a well-designed situation.

WHY(INTENTION)

WHO(GIVER)

WHEN(OCCASION)

Visceral aspect Behavioural aspect

b

fig. 11

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“any gift we receive will be a mass-pro-duced item, the price of which can be ascer-tained on our next shopping trip” (Clarke, 2003: 31). The service seen in contempo-rary society questions the traditional view of gift-giving culture which separates gift ex-change from the commercial one; gifts given are sometimes brought back to the store and exchanged for equal price of the item.

In this unprecedented age where con-sumer activities affect the sacred meaning of gift exchange, designers are in charge of where society heads. Mass control by infor-mation is related to the rise of advertisement, and designers create those not only based on aesthetic value but also on marketing value. In a sense, as Stieger often points out, de-signers are responsible for this ‘hyper-indus-trial age’ and thus their views on gift-giv-ing culture are important. In addition, mass produced products that those advertise-ments show are also created by designers.

I personally as a designer, suppose the lack of emotional value in gift-giving culture can decrease the emotional value in com-munication itself through gifts. People still appreciate hand-writing, and when things

Conclusion

This context report discussed the economic and explored the emotional aspects in gift-giving culture. As the series of studies conducted by Mauss showed some examples of gift-giving traditions, I focused on gifts as primarily and traditionally related to human communication. Thus, in general, I found the definition of gifts entails a sense of ob-ligation. However, as chapter one discussed, Eisenstein implies the inherit connection between monetary and obligatory exchange. This view can loosely be seen as leaving a gap where money can be interpreted as of temporary value and postpone the decision when one is in a relationship of gift exchange but at the stage of not wanting anything yet.

On the other hand, Stiegler illus-trates how mass production affects people’s preference in society. In his comprehensive view, consumer activities are always exposed to the risk of information intentionally brought by technological control. After all, when gifts are given, it has unique value though, when it is purchased as a product with money in a shop before being given away, it nevergoes off the realm of consumer activity:

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lose peculiarity, as in the case of a MR. POR-TER gift card as discussed in chapter one, a gift card lacks one of the unique characteristics of a gift being digitally printed. Chapter five introduced the set of criteria for great gifts: gifts appreciated when the giver’s thoughtfulness to-ward the recipient can be ascertained. Unlike the printed message by a printer, hand-writing needs more time and leaves the sense of per-sonal attachment to the giver in gifts. There-fore, ideally speaking gifts should contain as much unique value as possible because it en-riches human life. When the interview about the best gifts was conducted, the memories of the best gifts are vividly told as the experience of people who emotionally appreciated them. In the end, the designer’s role would be how to embody this concept in this consumerist reality.

- Looking forward -

Since the experiment, “Is the time worth it?” was conducted only for a limited number of people under a specific condition, I was unable to compare difference situations. For further research, I would like to intro-duce categories of friendship, different time lengths and a different number of options. This would reveal a more detailed relationship

between time and decision-making. This re-port aimed to reveal the gift-giving in to-day’s society, in particular the economic as-pect and emotional aspect. Even though these two elements seemingly contradict each other, it is true that both of them are part of gift-giving culture and strongly related to each other.

- Perspectives -

As chapter five showed, great prod-ucts don’t necessarily make great gifts, hence it depends more on the relationship established between a giver and recipient of a gift. There-fore, the chance design that can make a better situation in gift-giving wouldn’t be designing a gift itself. To me, it seems more natural to focus on intervention in the process of gift-giving such as a way of presenting a gift. Since the relationship that exists in gift-giving is based on each individual relationship. My personal interests in the design possibilities for the cul-ture of gift-giving are the following:

1. Approach to an efficiency in choosing a gift.

The overflow of options in society leads people to wrong decisions. In particular, when a

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person doesn’t know the recipient well and what he should give, it is almost a gamble to choose a right gift. From this viewpoint gift-giving is a time-consuming issue, which requires design to pursue the efficiency in gift-giving.

2. Approach to an emotion in choosing gift.

As chapter five showed, there is a certain amount of criteria for when gifts are appre-ciated. Since the value of a gift depends on a recipient’s view, how well a gift can commu-nicate is ultimately the paramount concern. Therefore, other design possibilities to focus on include how to enhance the quality of com-munication, that is to say how design can make a gift unexpected and how design can reflect personal feeling.

- Ongoing research -

The theory of Stiegler discussed how industrialised society controls our identities with information that is recursively provided through technology at the same time all over the world making people’s experience quite similar. Therefore, this experiment was con-ducted to focus on the financial economicaspect of gift-giving culture, as if the concept

of monetary value dominates the custom of gift-giving. This attempt has aimed to gain more monetary value by introducing emo-tional aspects as service. Calculating every gift exchange as monetary exchange, I have investigated the economic side of gift-giving. In a way, a sense of obligations and emotions are tactfully used to gain more financial profit.

fig. 12 £2 fake smile

At the Christmas Party in 2013 in Maryle-bone, I felt I was sometimes expected to smile even though I wasn’t willing to. My friend introduced some people to me, but some of them were overjoyed in the party, to fake my mood, I had to smile. The price I give for my single fake smile was £ 2. {see fig. 14} My interests was how to transfer vague activities and relationships into monetary values.

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fig. 1 Kula Ring(2002?). At: http://www.cairn.info/revue-l-homme-2002-2- page-107.htm [Accessed: 8 Jan 2014]

fig. 2 A screenshot at MR.PORTER [logged - in ] : https://www.mrporter. com/intl/signinpurchasepath.mrp[Accessed: 8 Jan 2014]

fig. 3, 6, 8 and 11, Chart 1 and 2 Illustrated by me

fig. 4 SI’s 100 Best Michael Jordan Photos. Walter Iooss Jr./SI Available at: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/nba/photos/1302/sports-illustrat ed-100-best-pictures-of-michael-jordan/5/ [Accessed: 4 Jan 2014]

fig. 5 Men of many parts. ALAMY. Available at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/te legraph-view/8860542/Men-of-many-parts.html [Accessed: 3 Jan 2014]

fig. 7, 10, 12 all photographed by me

fig. 9 ‘Katzenzungen’ (2014?) Available at http://www.amazon.de/Sarotti- Katzenzungen-100g/dp/B003SED7AK/ref=pd_sim_sbs_grocery_1 [Accessed:20 Dec 2013]