Could Montgomery Ward's 131 different designs of pocket
knife be said to be the result of the discovery of new ways of cutting?
--Forty (quoted in Petroski 1992:25)
Children
would not sit still until they got their hands on Silly Putty. Then they sat
only long enough to press it against their favorite comics and peel away the
impressions. --John Lacy (1995)
Sign.
1. A usually brief communication crafted into the design of a
plant, animal, or consumer
product. 2. A meaningful mark, line, shape,
pattern, brand, label, seal, banner, badge, decoration, symbol, gloss, color,
aroma, spice, cadence, tone, edging, spangle, or applique added to a product to
transmit information (rather than, e.g., to provide
functionality, durability, or strength).
Usage: Through messaging features--e.g., the hem,
lapels, and shoulder pads of a business
suit--consumer products "speak" to us as gestures. Messaging features evolve through a process
of product selection, which gives voice to seemingly innate human preferences
for products that not only function well but also "express
themselves."
Silly Putty. An intriguing case in
point is a chemical concoction of boric acid and silicone oil called Silly
Putty. Invented in 1943 by a General Electric employee trying to develop a
synthetic rubber, the substance had no practical use and seemed doomed to
extinction. But the compound survived--marketed in shiny, plastic Easter-egg
shells--as its messaging features (e.g., the innocent pink hue,
lively bounce, doughy feel, and colorful case) gave
the product something meaningful to "say" to children. That is, it had the
right nonverbal stuff as a toy, and after mention in the New Yorker's
"Talk of the Town" (see MEDIA), a Silly Putty craze ensued, and endured for
half a century as a child's plaything and later as a symbol of 1950s innocence
and youthful optimism. (N.B.: In 1968, Silly Putty was carried
into space by the Apollo 8 astronauts to alleviate boredom and to anchor down
tools [Lacy 1995].)
Biology. Millions of years before the advent of products, however,
messaging features were already prominent in biology. Peculiar features of the
orangutan's face, e.g., are its cheek
flanges--very visual, fleshy flaps on the right and left sides of a
mature male's face. Though without practical function, cheek flanges visually
"enlarge" an orangutan's face to signal dominance, rank, and seniority (much as
the graying "silverback" saddle cue bespeaks dominance in male gorillas).
(N.B.: In Borneo, a male orang's cheek flanges appear at ca.
eight, and reach full size by ca. 15 years of age [information complied by Susan
E. Wong, CNS].)
Botany. In plants, messaging features are called
secondary
products. In the tobacco plant, e.g., nicotine is a secondary product.
Automobile tail fins. Exotic tail fins decorated American automobiles in the 1950s. The conspicuous fins added nothing to automotive safety, durability, efficiency, or speed, but were popular nonetheless, suggesting, in tandem with tail lights, that 1950s-era cars were jet propelled. The most outlandish tail fins were worn by the 1959 Cadillac.
Refrigerator
magnets. Our preference for products that express themselves is clearly
revealed in the burgeoning magnetic artifacts that adorn our refrigerators: ". .
. beginning in the mid-'60s, magnets in thousands of shapes (from faux Oreos to
mini-Mickey Mice) mysteriously appeared like alien beings, and the refrigerator
was transformed. It became a kind of family album, a rotating exhibition of the
crayonist's art, a recipe repository, and anything else we might want. What it
can never be again is an inexpressive cooler of Tuesday's meatloaf" (Edwards and
Nelson 1993:B5).
See also, BRANCH SUBSTITUTE, MESSAGE.
Copyright
1998 - 2013 (David B. Givens/Center for Nonverbal Studies)
"On the Road from Spokane to Seattle" [simple nonverbal lines can be far more meaningful than words] (August 2009; Interstate 90, Washington State, USA) by David B. Givens (copyright 2009)