Introduction

Abstract

Princess Diana wore one, Bill Clinton wore one, and Kramer, a character in the hit sit-com Seinfeld, got beaten up for not wearing one. Since its emergence in 1991, the awareness ribbon has achieved the kind of cultural status usually reserved for religious symbols and big-brand icons. Drawn onto people’s hands to protest the Madrid bombings, emblazoned across wine bottles, t-shirts, and mugs, tied to tree branches, and (of course) worn on people’s lapels, the ribbon symbol is one of the most visible and well-recognised symbols in the world. Even eBay, the online marketplace, makes use of the looped ribbon motif to identify charity auctions. In the USA, the birthplace of the awareness ribbon, the range of causes for which people ‘show awareness’is staggering: people can wear a ribbon to ‘show awareness’ of the Oklahoma bombing, male violence, censorship, bullying, epilepsy, diabetes, brain cancer, myalgic encephalomyelitis (M.E.), autism, racial abuse, childhood disability, and mouth cancer, to name just a few.¹ In many instances, the US-based ribbon campaigns have provided the blueprint for those launched in the UK, where ‘showing awareness’ gained popularity a little later than in the USA.