Page 182 - Cultural Studies A Practical Introduction

166 Bodies and Things

their manufacture is invested with great meaning. It is far from the ordinary
everyday event it appears to be to an outsider for whom the whittling of

wood may not be that significant an activity. In the more developed parts
of the world, cars have long had both a practical and a symbolic meaning
for many people. In recent years, hybrid cars came to signify “ cool ” and a
sense of connection with environmental concerns because the cars use less
gas and are less polluting. In the 1960s, on the other hand, the Pontiac GTO
was cool to us high school boys, precisely because it had a large V - 8 engine
that burned enormous amounts of gas in order to go faster. And fast was
cooler than environmental awareness back then.
Buildings and monuments are things in our world that are often invested
with meaning. The Vatican, for example, is a building with great meaning
for many people, even though it is unremarkable from an architectural
point of view and is even built incorrectly. For many years, the Brooklyn
Bridge was quite meaningful in the lives of New Yorkers because it was the
first such bridge in America. A poem was even composed about it. Since

9/11, itself a meaningful thing or event in the lives of many people, the

twin towers of the World Trade Center have become significant in ways

they were not before, and indeed, it is their significance as icons of US
foreign policy arrogance and economic power in the eyes of Islamic radicals
that led to their being the target of a terrorist attack.
In your everyday lives, objects or things are charged with meaning you
may take for granted. “ Hoodies ” once were associated with athletes (at least
when I was growing up), but now they signify a particular kind of hip
subcultural allegiance. Gold jewelry in Black youth culture also has meaning
that it lacks in, say, comparable White youth cultures, which might be more
consumed with other kinds of accessories such Abercrombie and Fitch
clothing. “ Hotrod ” cars mean more to kids who grow up in “ country ”
culture, where NASCAR is a leading form of entertainment, than they do
to urban kids who might find more meaning in tattoos or body jewelry.

Similar meanings attach to such lifestyle consumables as vacations and
houses, toys and clothes, drugs and computers. Mac or Windows? We ’ re
all familiar by now with the cultural difference lodged in these two things,
a difference between the hip, artistic, and cool - looking Mac products and
the mass market Windows with all of its unhip glitches. To a certain extent,

we are what we own. Things define or express our cultural identities as
much as words or actions.
We are also what we eat, of course. When we eat food, we literally take
in things from the world and make them part of ourselves. What those