Ramadan For Sale: A Semiotic Analysis of Ramadan Fashion Bazaar Promotion on Social Media
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.38035/dijemss.v6i6.4919Keywords:
Ramadan, Consumerism, Social Media, Religious Symbols, SemioticsAbstract
This study explores how the promotion of Muslim fashion bazaars during Ramadan serves as a medium for reproducing consumerist ideology on social media. The object of this research is the promotional content of Glamlocal Wonderful Ramadan 2025, published on Instagram and TikTok. The study aims to understand how capitalism appropriates religious symbols to construct new meanings of the Ramadan celebration. The method employed is digital text analysis using Roland Barthes’ semiotic approach, focusing on the construction of meaning through signs (signifier and signified) at both denotative and connotative levels, as well as the formation of myths within specific social and cultural contexts. The analyzed promotional content was posted by the @glamlocal.id account and features consumerist narratives encouraging consumption during Ramadan. The findings reveal that religious narratives in these promotional contents have been recontextualized into consumerist imagery that emphasizes material gratification and symbolic identity. This phenomenon risks shifting the meaning of Ramadan from a period of spiritual reflection into a legitimized consumption ritual marked by religious symbols. These findings highlight the dominance of sign logic in modern consumer society and underline the urgent need for critical awareness of the manipulation of religious symbols by capitalist forces.
References
Barthes, R. (1972). Mythologies. Noonday Press
Baudrillard, J. (1975). The Mirror of Production (Vol. 17). Telos press St. Louis.
Baudrillard, J. (1994). Simulacra and Simulations. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003060963-37
Baudrillard, J. (1998). The Consumer Society: Myths and Structures. SAGE Publications. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781526401502
Baudrillard, J. (1999). Revenge Of The Crystal-Classic Edition: Selected Writings on the Modern Object and Its Destiny, 1968-1983. Pluto Press.
Baudrillard, J. (2020). The System of Objects. Verso.
Croteau, D., & Hoynes, W. (2019). Media/Society?: Technology, Industries, Content, and Users. Sage Publications.
Crow, K. D. (2015). Consuming Islam: Branding 'Wholesome' as Lifestyle Fetish. Islamic Sciences, 13(1).
Cutts, J. (2019). Herbert Marcuse and" False Needs". Social Theory and Practice, 353–370.
Einstein, M., & Taylor, S. M. (2024). Selling the Sacred. Routledge.
Fattah, H. M. (2005, October 12). The new Ramadan: It’s beginning to look a lot like. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/12/world/africa/the-new-ramadan-its-beginning-to-look-a-lot-like.html
Febriani, G. A. (2025, March 5). Berburu Baju Sarimbit Lebaran di GlamLocal, Harga Mulai dari Rp 150 Ribu. Wolipop. https://wolipop.detik.com/hijab-update/d-7808321/berburu-baju-sarimbit-lebaran-di-glamlocal-harga-mulai-dari-rp-150-ribu
Gauthier, F., Martikainen, T., & Woodhead, L. (2011). Introduction: Religion in Consumer Society. Social Compass ,58(3), 291-301. DOI: 10.1177/0037768611412141
Gauthier, F., Martikainen, T., & Woodhead, L. (2013). Acknowledging a Global Shift: A Primer for Thinking about Religion in Consumer Societies. Implicit Religion, 16(3).
Gauthier, F., & Martikainen, T. (2013). Religion in consumer society: Brands, consumers and markets. Ashgate. https://doi.org/10.1080/13537903.2015.986995
Glance. (2025). Ramadan 2025 at a Glance [White Paper]. Retrieved March 24, 2025 from Glance: https://glance.com/id/advertising/insights/ramadan-marketing-guide-2025-indonesia#landing-tile
Godazgar, H. (2007). Islam versus consumerism and postmodernism in the context of Iran. Social Compass, 54(3). https://doi.org/10.1177/0037768607080835
Gökar?ksel, B., & McLarney, E. (2010). Introduction: Muslim Women, Consumer Capitalism, and the Islamic Culture Industry. Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies, 6(3), 1–18. https://doi.org/10.2979/mew.2010.6.3.1
Gökar?ksel, B., & Secor, A. (2010). Islamic-ness in the life of a commodity: Veiling-fashion in turkey. Transactions - Institute of British Geographers (1965), 35(3), 313-333. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-5661.2010.00384.x
Han, B.-C. (2015). The burnout society. Stanford University Press.
Han, B.-C. (2023). Vita Contemplativa: In Praise of Inactivity. John Wiley & Sons.
Heidegger, M. (1996). Being and Time. State University of New York Press.
Hesmondhalgh, D. (2019). The cultural industries.
Horkheimer, M., & Adorno, T. W. (2002). Dialectic of enlightenment. Stanford University Press.
Kavakci, E., & Kraeplin, C. R. (2017). Religious beings in fashionable bodies: The online identity construction of hijabi social media personalities. Media, Culture & Society, 39(6), 850-868.
Kurenlahti, M., & Salonen, A. O. (2018). Rethinking Consumerism from the Perspective of Religion. Sustainability, 10(7), 2454. https://doi.org/10.3390/su10072454
Makiah, Z., Hasan, N., Aisyah, L., & Sodiqin, A. (2022). A convergence in a religion commodification and an expression of piety in halal certification. Khazanah: Jurnal Studi Islam Dan Humaniora, 20(2), 153–170.
Maschio, T. J. (2016). Culture, desire and consumer culture in america in the new age of social media. Qualitative Market Research, 19(4), 416-425. https://doi.org/10.1108/QMR-04-2016-0038
Mujtaba, U. S. (2016). Ramadan: The month of fasting for Muslims, and tourism studies — Mapping the unexplored connection. Tourism Management Perspectives, 19. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tmp.2015.11.001
Odabasi, Y., & Argan, M. (2009). Aspects of underlying ramadan consumption patterns in Turkey. Journal of International Consumer Marketing, 21(3). https://doi.org/10.1080/08961530802202891
Pawlett, W. (2007). Jean Baudrillard: Against banality. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203937365
Sandikci, O., & Omeraki, S. (2007). Globalization and rituals: Does ramadan turn into Christmas? Advances in Consumer Research, 34.
Schielke, S. (2009). Being good in Ramadan: Ambivalence, fragmentation, and the moral self in the lives of young Egyptians. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 15(SUPPL. 1). https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9655.2009.01540.x
Srikasem, C., Sureephong, P., Dawod, A. Y., Chakpitak, N., & Chanaim, S. (2024). Impact of Ramadan on Halal Food Marketing Strategies in the Chinese Market: A Data Analytics Approach. International Journal of Religion, 5(10), 1189–1202.
Stolz, J., & Usunier, J. C. (2019). Religions as brands? Religion and spirituality in consumer society. Journal of Management, Spirituality and Religion, 16(1). https://doi.org/10.1080/14766086.2018.1445008
Wong, L. (2007). Market Cultures, the Middle Classes and Islam: Consuming the Market? Consumption Markets & Culture, 10(4), 451–480. https://doi.org/10.1080/10253860701566440
Xavier, M. (2016). Subjectivity under consumerism: The totalization of the subject as a commodity. Psicologia e Sociedade, 28(2). https://doi.org/10.1590/1807-03102016V28N2P207
Za?uski, W. (2019). On the Relations between Vita Contemplativa and Vita Activa. Avant, 10(1). https://doi.org/10.26913/avant.2019.01.02
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2025 Muhammad Fachri Shandika Iman
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Authors who publish their manuscripts in this journal agree to the following conditions:
- The copyright on each article belongs to the author(s).
- The author acknowledges that the Dinasti International Journal of Education Management and Social Science (DIJEMSS) has the right to be the first to publish with a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0).
- Authors can submit articles separately, arrange for the non-exclusive distribution of manuscripts that have been published in this journal into other versions (e.g., sent to the author's institutional repository, publication into books, etc.), by acknowledging that the manuscript has been published for the first time in the Dinasti International Journal of Education Management and Social Science (DIJEMSS).
