Of Cigarettes, High Heels, and Other Interesting Things

239 Pages·2018·2.189 MB·English

by  Marcel Danesi

MARCEL DANESI
CIGARETTES,
high heels
&
other
INTERESTING
t hings
AN INTRODUCTION
THIRD
TO SEMIOTICS
EDITION
Of Cigarettes, High Heels, and Other
Interesting Things
Marcel Danesi
Of Cigarettes, High
Heels, and Other
Interesting Things
An Introduction to Semiotics
Third Edition
Marcel Danesi
Victoria College
University of Toronto
Toronto, ON, Canada
ISBN 978-1-349-95347-9 ISBN 978-1-349-95348-6 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95348-6
Library of Congress Control Number: 2018935183
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Preface to the Third Edition
Among species, human beings seem to be a peculiar lot. Why is it, for exam-
ple, that certain members of the species routinely put their survival at risk by
puffing on a small stick of nicotine? Why is it that some females of the species
make locomotion difficult for themselves by donning high-heel footwear? Are
there hidden or unconscious reasons behind such strange behaviors that seem
to be so utterly counter-instinctual, so to speak?
For no manifest biological reason, humanity has always searched, and con-
tinues to search, for a purpose to its life. Is it this search that has led it to
engage in such bizarre behaviors as smoking and wearing high heels? And is it
the reason behind humanity’s invention of myths, art, rituals, languages,
mathematics, science, and all the other truly remarkable things that set it
apart from all other species? Clearly, Homo sapiens appears to be unique in the
fact that many of its behaviors are shaped by forces other than the instincts.
The discipline that endeavors to understand these forces is known as semiotics.
Relatively unknown in comparison to, say, philosophy or psychology, semiot-
ics probes the human condition in its own peculiar way, by unraveling the
meanings of the signs that undergird not only the wearing of high-heel shoes,
but also the construction of words, paintings, sculptures, and the like.
This is not a comprehensive textbook on semiotic theory and practice. My
aim is to present the basic notions of semiotics that help us probe how humans
“produce meanings” and how these constitute small-scale versions of the
larger-scale need to unravel the “meaning of life.” Studying the raison d’être of
the latter has always been—and continues to be—the aim of philosophy, the-
ology, and various other disciplines; studying the raison d’être of the former is
the specific goal of semiotics, which can be defined simply as the “study of
produced meaning.” I have left out many of the technical details of sign theory
v
vi Preface to the Third Edition
and I have not gone into any in-depth discussion of the pivotal contributions
made by theorists, since these belong to a more comprehensive treatment. My
hope is that this book will engender in the reader the same kind of inquisitive
frame of mind with which a semiotician would closely examine people and
cultures and why they search for meaning. Perhaps the greatest mental skill
possessed by Homo sapiens, literally the “knowing animal,” is the ability to
know itself. Semiotics helps sharpen that skill considerably.
The first edition of this book came out in 1999. To my pleasant surprise, it
struck a chord among many readers. One of the reasons may have been that,
in it, I decided to contrive my presentation of semiotics around a seemingly
trivial scene, but one that nonetheless appears to reveal a lot about the human
need for meaning. The scene was a fashionable modern-day restaurant—an
urban courtship setting where wooing rituals are performed in a “sign-based”
manner. The fictional actions in that scene allowed me to tell the semiotic
version of the human condition in concrete terms. A second edition was pub-
lished in 2009. Much has changed in the world since that edition. Therefore,
in this updated third edition I have retained that scene as a framework for
describing semiotic ideas, although even there some radical changes have
taken place such as, for instance, the virtual elimination of smoking from
public venues due to changes in social attitudes towards cigarettes and their
meanings. The world has also become much more digitalized and technologi-
cally sophisticated since then, with the Internet practically replacing all other
media systems for the routine transmission and recording of information.
Such changes have informed the revision of this book.
Similar to the previous editions, however, I have taken nothing for granted.
I have defined in clear language and illustrated with common examples any
concept that is basic to semiotic theory. I have also avoided making constant
references to the technical literature. The works that have informed my com-
mentaries, descriptions, and analyses are found in the endnotes. I have tried
to cast as wide a net as possible, attempting to exemplify within two covers
how semiotics can be used effectively to probe human nature in specific ways.
As in previous editions, I wish to assure the reader that I have made every pos-
sible attempt to emphasize method of analysis, rather than my personal views.
Whether one agrees or disagrees with any or all of my commentaries is, in
fact, beside the real purpose of this book, which is to spur readers to identify
and reflect upon the unconscious meanings that flow through the system of
everyday life in which they take part on a daily basis.
The first edition of this book was the idea of the late Professor Roberta
Kevelson of Penn State University, a leading semiotician. She will be missed
greatly. It was Michael Flamini of St. Martin’s Press who brought it to fruition
Preface to the Third Editio n vii
as editor. The invitation to put together a second edition comes from Farideh
Koohi-Kamali, also of the Press. This edition is made possible by Shaun Vigil,
my editor at Palgrave. I cannot thank them all enough for their support and
enthusiasm. I am also deeply grateful to Victoria College of the University of
Toronto for granting me the privilege of teaching semiotics for many years.
This has allowed me to learn a great deal about human nature from the enthu-
siastic students I have taught. I have learned more from them than they have
from me. Finally, a heartfelt thanks goes out to my family, Lucy, Alexander,
Sarah, Danila, Chris, and Charlotte, for all the patience they have had with
me over the years. I would like to dedicate this book to my late father, Danilo.
He was a simple and kind soul who inspired generosity and benevolence in all
those around him.
Toronto, ON, Canada Marcel Danesi
Contents
1 Cigarettes and High Heels: The Universe of Signs 1
2 What Does It Mean?: How Humans Represent the World 25
3 Makeup: Why Do We Put It On? 49
4 Tell Me About Yourself: What Is Language? 71
5 Kisses Sweeter Than Wine: Metaphor and the Making
of Meaning 99
6 Now, You Tell Me About Yourself: Why Do We Tell Stories? 121
7 At Arm’s Length: The Meanings of Spaces 145
8 What a Beautiful Ring!: The Meaning of Clothes and Objects 165
9 Art Is Indistinguishable from Life: The Artistic Nature
of the Human Species 187
10 There’s More to Perfume than Smell: Advertising,
Pop Culture, and Meme Culture 205
Index 223
ix
1
Cigarettes and High Heels:
The Universe of Signs
A cigarette is the perfect type of a perfect pleasure. It is exquisite, and it leaves one
unsatisfied. What more can one want?
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
It’s eight o’clock on a Saturday night. Two cool-looking people, both in their
late twenties, are sitting across from each other at an elegantly set table in a
trendy restaurant, located in the downtown area of a North American city. For
convenience, let’s call them Cheryl and Ted. Other couples are seated at tables
in other parts of the eatery. The lights are turned down low. The atmosphere is
unmistakably romantic, sustained by the soft, mellifluous sounds of a three-
piece jazz band playing in the background. Cheryl and Ted are sipping drinks,
making small talk, looking coyly into each other’s eyes. At a certain point, they
decide to step outside for a few moments and engage in a shared activity—
smoking cigarettes in a secluded area outside the restaurant, set aside for smok-
ers. Smoking is a tradition that this particular restaurant has decided to preserve,
despite great opposition to it from city legislators, not to mention society. The
scene overall is distinctly reminiscent of a classic Hollywood romantic movie.
What Cheryl and Ted do not know is that nearby is a semiotician, whom
we shall call Martha, quietly and unobtrusively capturing their actions and
conversations on a smartphone both inside and outside the restaurant. Martha
is our research assistant, assigned to record our couple’s words, facial expres-
sions, body language, and other behaviors on her mobile device, so that we
can dissect them semiotically. Her device transmits the images and sounds
simultaneously to a remote monitoring computer to which we have access.
© The Author(s) 2018 1
M. Danesi, Of Cigarettes, High Heels, and Other Interesting Things,
https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95348-6_1
2 M. Danesi
Let’s start by first examining the smoking gestures that our two subjects
made. As the video starts, we see Cheryl taking her cigarette out of its package
in a slow, deliberate manner, inserting it coquettishly into the middle of her
mouth, then bringing the flame of a match towards it in a leisurely, drawn-out
fashion. Next to Cheryl, we see Ted also taking his cigarette from its package,
but, in contrast, he employs a terse movement, inserting it into the side of his
mouth, and then lighting it with a swift hand action. As the two puff away, we
see Cheryl keeping the cigarette between her index and third fingers, periodi-
cally flicking the ashes into an outside ashtray provided by the restaurant for
smokers, inserting and removing the cigarette from her mouth, always with
graceful, circular, slightly swooping motions of the hand. Occasionally, she
tosses her long, flowing hair back, away from her face. Ted is leaning against
a nearby wall, keeping his head taut, looking straight, holding his cigarette
between the thumb and middle finger, guiding it to the side of his mouth
with sharp, pointed movements. Cheryl draws in smoke slowly, retaining it in
her mouth for a relatively longer period than Ted, exhaling the smoke in an
upwards direction with her head tilted slightly to the side, and, finally, extin-
guishing her cigarette in the ashtray. Ted inhales smoke abruptly, keeping the
cigarette in his mouth for a relatively shorter period of time, blowing the
smoke in a downward direction (with his head slightly aslant), and then extin-
guishing the cigarette by pressing down on the butt with his thumb, almost as
if he were effacing or destroying evidence.
Cigarettes and Courtship
Welcome to the world of the semiotician who is, above all else, a “people-
watcher,” observing how individuals and groups behave in everyday situa-
tions, always asking: What does this or that mean? Meaning is the sum and
substance of what semioticians study, no matter in what form it comes, small
or large, so to speak. So, let’s start our excursion into the fascinating world of
semiotics by unraveling what the various gestures and movements recorded by
Martha might mean. But before starting, it might be useful to check whether
there is some historically based link between smoking, sex, and romance.
Tobacco is native to the Western Hemisphere and was part of rituals of the
Maya and other Native peoples, believing that it had medicinal and powerful
mystical properties. As Jason Hughes has aptly put it, “Tobacco was used to
appease the spiritual hunger, thereby gaining favors and good fortune.”1 The
Arawak society of the Caribbean, as observed by none other than Christopher
Columbus in 1492, smoked tobacco with a tube they called a tobago, from