A Celtic crossing: a personal, biographical exploration of the subjective meaning of the Celtic brand and its role in social identity formation

BRAND-MEDIATED IDENTITY AND AUTO-ETHNOGRAPHYIn the popular auto-ethnography McCarthy’s Bar a marketing professional from a busily exportingIrish Pub franchise describes the essence of his business: ‘We’re not saying that hospitality isunique to Ireland. But we’re unique in packaging and marketing it’ (McCarthy, 2000, p.331).The eponymous McCarthy (English by birth, Irish by descent) spent some weeks pursuing hisown Celtic odyssey and seemed protective of what he found: ‘…what the country has beenselling itself on is warmth and conviviality. The fear must be that the process will change thereality…. Marketing, of course, is eternal’ (McCarthy, 2000, p.331). Marketing eschatologistsmight cavil at the temporal infinity of marketing thesis, but this trivial squabble aside, whatprompts so many to seek an ersatz Celtic-ness? If brands have a symbolic role in identityformation (Elliott and Wattanasuwan, 1998), then can we conceive broadly of Celtic-ness as oneidentity-signifying star among marketing’s glittering galaxy? If so, does its popularity merelyreflect an air of affluence-accentuated postmodern angst, a displaced genealogical mania, aheightened need for roots, connections, source? Is it just cooler to hail from Waterford thanWarrington, from Cork than Kentucky? Moreover, is Celt now so cool that anything marketedwith the faintest Celtic shade is cool by association?Conveniently, there is data aplenty for exploring this complex issue. And some of it resideswithin my Celtic cranium. For like countless others I am a cultural hybrid, an Anglo-Celt. Iwouldn’t exactly say that being ambi-ethnic has given me identity problems. But then again if ithad, I’d be the last to know. I certainly prefer to identify with Celtic (spontaneous, creative,dangerous, mystical) than Anglo-Saxon (methodical, rule-seeking, circumspect, rational) virtues.