Meaning in Bodies & Bodily Adornment

null, Marilynn Johnson (CUNY Graduate Center)

Bodies and the things we adorn them with have meaning. In this talk I will argue that such communication is best understood as a branch of philosophy of language and in particular, within a Gricean theory of meaning. This argument begins with discussion of a previous study of meaning in bodily adornment undertaken by Roland Barthes working in the Saussurean, semiotic tradition. I argue that Barthes’ attempt fails for the same reason many theories of linguistic meaning failed: they treat meaning as the result of a system of codes – an assumption that leads to theories that can never fully explain communication. I take Barthes’ attempt as an indication that dress should be treated instead as a fundamentally Gricean, intentional process, with meaning first delineated into Grice’s categories of natural and non-natural meaning, as well as a new category I will introduce: ‘imitation of natural meaning.’ I present specific cases to show how these categories apply to meaning in dress. In the course of this argument I will also defend Gricean intentionalism from a number of objections.

Please email Jamie Perez-Galvan ([email protected]) to request the meeting passcode.