Perfume consumption in India

Perfumes have been important in India for millennia and so have the stories connected with them. The perfume business in India is worth billions. A background from which the Indian perfume industry can be understood in terms of the Berger's STEPP model, the consumers' cognitive schemas, consumers' behaviors, and the story of the product, brand, and their customers' stories. Three sets of themes—product perceptions, concerns, and consumers' lifestyle—are identified, each with their own sub-themes that are antecedents to perfume purchasing behavior. Segments in the Indian perfume market are also identified. Each consumer segment has their own behavioral nuances and they consider different aspects of the perfume product taking into account their own income and aspects of the three themes and 19 sub-themes. It is important for perfume marketing managers to consider each aspect of the STEPPs modeland for the Indian government to locate and develop a “Place of Perfume” within India that will eventually challenge the region of Grasse in France as the global perfume marketplace

East-Asian philosophical concepts as analytical framework for interpreting non-western images in children’s picturebooks

In contemporary Western cultures, picturebooks are a mainstream means for young children to first attend to print and start learning to read. The use of children’s picturebooks has been reported as supporting intercultural awareness in children. Multiliteracies researchers suggest that other theoretical frameworks should be applied in addition to the semiotic approach of interpreting picturebooks, especially picturebooks from non-Western cultures. This chapter aims to theorize how Eastern philosophical concepts influence the meaning-making potential of illustrations in Eastern picturebooks. To do this, the authors first discuss the cultural constraints when applying a contemporary semiotic framework in analyzing non-Western images. Then, the authors introduce a framework developed based on philosophical concepts that have influenced East-Asian art forms, particularly that of painting, to understand the Eastern artistic traditions. After that, this chapter demonstrates how to apply this framework for interpretation of non-Western images to working with multicultural picturebooks

Homophobic Conduct as Normative Masculinity Test: Victimization, Male Hierarchies, and Heterosexualizing Violence in Hate Crimes

Homophobic violence can be considered as an expressive act. Violent behavior can be considered as anti-homosexual when victims are chosen because they are considered or perceived as homosexual. Following this reasoning, hate crimes as homophobic crimes have a communicative value, since they represent a range of “masculinization” practices within the processes of gender socialization, both in conventional and illegitimate social worlds. Every homophobic act aims to intimidate not just the victim, but the whole group associated with the, whether concretely or merely in the perception of the perpetrator. This chapter will take into account the main research on victimization from an international perspective; it will highlight how both the gender of the perpetrator and the cultural constructions of masculinity(ies), in a heterosexist and hegemonic system, seem to play a fundamental role in producing homophobic and anti-homosexual behaviour