I was reading the New York Times Book Review and came across a book review of Bananas: How The United Fruit Company Shaped The World. Here's a quote: "The company was, Peter Chapman writes in “Bananas,” his breezy but insightful history of the company, “more powerful than many nation states ... a law unto itself and accustomed to regarding the republics as its private fiefdom.” United Fruit essentially invented not only “the concept and reality of the banana republic,” but also, as Chapman shows, the concept and reality of the modern banana."
Here's Wikipedia's definition of BR: "Banana republic is a pejorative term for a small, often Latin American, Caribbean or African country that is politically unstable, dependent on limited agriculture, and ruled by a small, self-elected, wealthy and corrupt clique.[citation needed] In most cases they have kept the government structures that were modeled after the colonial Spanish ruling clique, with a small, largely leisure class on the top and a large, poorly educated and poorly paid working class of peons. The term was coined by O. Henry, an American humorist and short story writer, in reference to Honduras. "Republic" in his time was often a euphemism for a dictatorship, while "banana" implied an easy reliance on basic agriculture and backwardness in the development of modern industrial technology. Frequently the subject of mockery and humour, and usually presided over by a dictatorial military junta that exaggerates its own power..."
In this context, isn't it odd that the retail store chain we know so well is called Banana Republic? The name suggests that the people who shop at the store are a "wealthy and corrupt clique" (See the Wikipedia definition above). I know I'm being unnecessarily serious, and that maybe Banana Republic is just a cool name, but somehow I feel the reasons the retailers chose that name for their store requires some playful investigation.
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