On Fragile Semiotics
A defensive strategy for our symbols might insulate progressive campaigns from co-opting by the right.
Semiotics, n.: the study of signs and symbols and their use or interpretation; from the Greek sēmeiotikos ‘of signs’, from sēmeioun ‘interpret as a sign’.
I had the good fortune last year to work with a company that provides DEI-related assessments, workshops, and strategic planning for organizations that want to create a more inclusive workplace. In my opinion, DEI awareness is a crucial cornerstone in developing some collective, societal resilience against the capitalist forces that cheerfully kill or disable anyone who fails to produce, according to the mercenary rubric of profit-at-any-cost. This new job came along right at the moment in my life where I was learning how to thrive professionally with my atypical neurotype. I learned a lot about the proven benefits of diversity in workplaces, including neurodiversity — along with the barriers that currently exist to making accessible, diverse workplaces the desired, celebrated standard.
Naturally, because I’m incapable of taking off my stratcoms hat, I’ve started mentally sketching what a national campaign to bring that standard into reality might look like. Almost immediately, I find myself up against an enormous obstacle: any words we choose to advance this flag will be seized, co-opted, and subsequently corrupted by the enemies of change. I may be terribly cynical, but I come by that cynicism honestly, from close-up campaign experience. It’s a simple truth that language changes, often very rapidly — often because it’s being manipulated for someone’s specific agenda.
In college, I took a workshop on semiotics, where I learned how labels can shift or change meaning entirely over time. In the years since, I’ve seen how semiotic shifts can be (and regularly are) weaponized against progressive causes. Our country’s political history is riddled with massive, seismic semiotic shifts. Think about this: from the founding of our nation until somewhere around FDR’s presidency, it was the Republican party that fought against slavery, and later against the ongoing oppression of generations that followed enslaved people. The Democratic party was founded by Andrew Jackson, who needs no other description than Donald Trump’s favorite president. In the early twentieth century, the parties underwent what political scientists call a realignment: they switched the codes assigned to their symbols. There’s an important lesson in there about our present and our future. Definitions are mutable, and can be engineered to suit a purpose.
I should note that modified semiotics aren’t always deployed for sinister purposes. Words that are harmful and offensive can be scrubbed from our collective use with a targeted campaign of education. I’m sure you can think of some examples without me needing to write them here. Another phenomenon to note is the word ‘queer,’ which has changed its semiotics a few times, in fascinating ways. ‘Gay’ used to mean nothing more than ‘cheerful.’ Then, for years, it was a delicate word you only whispered behind someone’s back, or an insult hurled in middle school hallways. Nowadays, the semiotics of being gay in public have shifted from ‘shameful and scandalous,’ or at the very least ‘pushing boundaries,’ to ‘somewhat uncommon, but not disqualifying for federal office,’ as Secretary Buttigieg and many other gay leaders have shown. (At least, those are the semiotics in civilized circles.)
Much has been written by smarter people than me about the language and images of Black struggle being stolen and re-coded in support of white supremacy. During his life, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was an avowed socialist and a radical pro-worker agitator. After his death, white supremacy co-opted his image and remade him into an advocate for cooperation, compromise, and nonviolence. It’s true MLK didn’t want to arm Black militias, which might have provoked even greater violence from a foaming-at-the-mouth white majority. But neither did he want to quiet or diminish the protests of Black citizens fighting for full equality under the law. His writings and speeches are easy to find online. Even a cursory glance will show you he’s been largely mischaracterized in mainstream discourse. Our government gave him a federal holiday while sanitizing his image and teachings. There is no surer way to cripple a movement than to conscript its leaders posthumously into the ranks of those they sought to overthrow.
I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Council-er or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
April 16th, 1963
MLK was assassinated only fifty-four years ago. That was after my parents were born. My grandparents were in their late twenties. How quickly a person’s legacy can be redefined! A more recent example is the frightfully swift transition from “Black Lives Matter,” to “All Lives Matter,” to, in a stunning coup for the evil message maestros, “Blue Lives Matter” — stealing the language of an oppressed minority to demand honor and respect for their murderers. The same forces are having a heyday with ‘woke,’ which was a word coined in the Black community to mean, essentially, ‘aware of our oppressors’ aims, and cognizant of our oppressors methods’ — including how they are wont change the meaning of words and symbols, weakening the language of revolt.
Anyway. All of this was on my mind as I was thinking about a national campaign to improve workplace diversity and inclusion. I wondered about the longevity of terms like ‘accessible,’ an innocuous-sounding term currently coded as a virtuous (but not a necessary) trait in a building or work environment. How long before that word becomes a right-wing buzzword? Is there a way to circumvent the co-opting of our chosen terminology? How do we stop our movement being stymied when opponents of change decide to hijack our language? How do we protect our true meaning from perversion?
Then I had a simple thought: what if we described what we mean in literal terms?
“You must understand, young Hobbit, it takes a long time to say anything in Old Entish. And we never say anything unless it is worth taking a long time to say.”
The Lord of the Rings, The Two Towers
J.R.R. Tolkien
[Emphasis mine.]
We could decide to say what we mean, even if it takes longer. A place is not just ‘accessible,’ but instead, it is ‘easy to reach on foot or by wheelchair, with wide, even walkways and safety rails at all inclines and entrances.’ A workplace is ‘structured around its workforce, so that every employee may perform their work in the environment that best suits their capabilities and needs.’ An event ‘will be performed in a way that can be enjoyed for hearing, deaf, sighted, and blind audiences alike.’ We need a strategy for talking about our desired vision of the future that is proof against semiotic sabotage. ‘Accessible’ is a term that could be taken hostage, but the meaning we put behind it is harder to corrupt. To defend our terms and symbols, we should make it a point to define them in detail at every opportunity. We should say what we mean, and by extension, make the opponents of progress say what they really mean — out loud.
(NOTE: An earlier version of this article appeared on a Substack called The Woodwork, which is no longer active.)
