MONEY TALKS: A SEMIOTIC EXPLORATION OF MONEY AS COMMUNICATION
University of Oklahoma, USA
Abstract
Money talks. While many have heard and even used this adage in their everyday communications, few have taken the premise of this statement at face value. In this paper I posit that money is itself a form of communication and that the examination of money as communication can broaden our understanding of the human experience. Additionally, this paper attempts to answer one of the central questions posed at the intersection of Semiotics and Marxism by suggesting that money is an appropriate object for study in this endeavor. One basic premise of Marx’s social analysis is that the base determines the superstructure; that material (and economic) relations influence our thoughts and expectations about how society works. As the preferred form of capital, money – the medium through which our material relations are performed – structures our interactions and our perceptions thereof.
To clarify, I am less interested in symbolic work that plays out on the physical vessels of money (e.g., dollar bills) as these aspects have been explored by Shell and Tschachler. All forms of money – the bills, the coinage, the credit card swipes – are sign vehicles which point to abstract form of value – just as the word “hello” carries similar meanings whether it is traveling by vibrations in the air molecules or electrons moving down a copper wire toward one’s telephone. This paper is concerned with the communicative power of money itself, not the physical object that carries or references it.
For this endeavor I present a four-cell typology of money’s communicative processes. First, money speaks through positive movement, as can be seen at the instances of purchase and sale. Second, money speaks through visible inertia, or the times when an expected transfer does not occur. Examples of visible inertia are boycotts, budget cuts, and when someone is written out of a will. Third, money speaks through its presence. The way that money works as a universal legitimizer, conferring a general sense of credibility on the wealthy, while denying it to others despite relative levels of knowledge or expertise, illuminates the communicative power of money’s presence. Fourth, money speaks as a metaphor. Similar to Lakoff and Johnson’s description of orientational metaphors, our cognitive and affective experiences with money inform our understanding of the world in general, including aspects outside of the economic sphere.
In short, this paper represents an exploration into four distinct processes of semiosis whose antecedent is money. Pairing Marxism with the notion that money is communication opens new avenues for understanding the intersection of exchange value and lebenswelt.
1. Money Talks
We have all heard the expression “money talks,” but is this adage an accurate description? Generally speaking, the phrase “money talks” conveys the idea that money motivates people to action, communicating in a way that words alone cannot. Therefore, while money may not be able to hold its own in a conversation, it does function as a form – or perhaps medium – of communication, on a level that is distinct from linguistic interchange.
This paper outlines the justification behind a semiotic analysis of money as a form of communication. Working from this perspective I will elaborate on four distinct areas or realms where money functions as a form of communication. When defining this fourfold typology I will explicate each realm and provide specific examples of how money communicates, as well as outline opportunities for empirical research in each category. Ultimately, my goal is to provide a rough sketch for a research agenda whose purpose is to explore the communicative function of money.
As a preface I must offer one caveat to the content of this presentation. Acknowledging the importance of context, I must disclose as a limitation my own cultural subject position. Specifically, I am American studying communicative culture within the US. As such, the outcome of my research may only be applicable to my own cultural environment. An interesting extension to this research would be a comparative study to map money’s communicative aspects in other cultures, and to determine which aspects are uniquely American.
Before one can justify this course of research, I must first explicitly describe similar lines of inquiry that are conceptually distinct from my research goals. In other words, one may find it helpful to know what I’m not talking about considering the similarities that are present. First, a number of scholars such as Rossi-Landi (1983) and Georgio Borrelli (2013) have endeavored to use Marxist analysis as a way to explore the process of semiosis. While this line of theory is immensely helpful to my own enquiry, my research exists more in the realm of applied semiotics. By the end of this presentation I should be able to provide a number of examples that demonstrate fertile sources for empirical semiotic enquiry.
However, by using the word empirical I do not mean to imply that I will focus solely on the physical manifestation of money. This approach, which often focuses on the interpretation of signs printed on money, (bills, coins, etc.), has already been addressed from a number of perspectives by Mark Shell (1995), Heinz Tchlachler (2007), and Paschalidis (2014). When I say that money speaks, I do not mean to say that it functions as a container for holding other types of signs such as a coin or reserve note might. Rather, here we are concerned with the way that money’s movement sends a message to a receiver. For example, the cashier is obligated to accept your payment whether it is in physical cash, or electronically using credit and debit cards. It is this form of money, this abstract form of (or conveyer of) value that is the focus of this enquiry. Additionally, I do not mean to argue that all forms of money are equivalent, that there is no important distinction between debit cards and cash. On the contrary, if spending money on a debit card feels different from spending cash, then we should seek to explore that distinction. All forms of money - the bills, the coinage, the credit card swipes – are sign vehicles (or perhaps signals) which point to an abstract form of value – just as the word “hello” carries similar meanings whether it is traveling by vibrations in the air molecules or electrons moving down a copper wire toward one’s telephone. This paper is concerned with the communicative power of money as it transmits value, not the physical object that carries or references it.
Semiotics scholarship has also addressed the issue of money, although in ways distinct from the goal of this paper. Working from an economics perspective, Wennerlind (2001) uses semiotics to examine how different economic schools view the nature of money. Umberto Eco (1979) also uses semiotics to define the role of money in Marx’s critique of capitalism. To Eco (1979) Marx’s description of money’s role in society is analogous to the signifier in semiotics literature. Through this research agenda I intend to explore the various signifieds.
According to Marx (1976), the base (our real relations to society and each other) determines the superstructure (our thoughts and ideas about the nature of society). Additionally, many of linguistic and social features that we consider signs (words for Saussure 1986; Myths for Barthes 2012) and ideology (Hegemony for Gramsci 2006, 2011a, 2011b; Interpellation for Althusser 2006) are aspects of the superstructure. Following Marx and Engels (1978) we must assume that aspects of the base must be antecedent to the ideas and processes within the superstructure mentioned above. Or as Schaff (1970) explains, the base indirectly determines the superstructure with humans serving as a mediating factor. Here is where money is important: cash and credit have real buying power, which is relative between individuals. In other words, money is part of the base because it is often the central medium through which we maintain our relationships to each other and to society. Money is also communicative in that it sends a message, instigating a change in the recipient. Therefore, if money is part of the base, that it functions as a form of communication, and the base influences the superstructure, then perhaps studying money as communication may be one way to help explain the nature of the sign found in the superstructure. This research agenda could provide another tool for discussing Marx’s (1978) notion that “the ideas of the ruling class are the ruling ideas,” without having to assume a conspiracy of global economic elites.
To reiterate, for the scope of this presentation one should assume the following perspectives. First, that money is a form of abstract value than can be held in a number of forms. Second, that the abstract value has definite, observable communicative functions. And third, that our social interactions that involve this abstract value have the potential to influence the way that we see the world. Keeping these considerations in mind we will examine a fourfold typology of the ways in which money communicates and explicate ways that these ideas can be explored through research.
2. A four-fold typology of money’s speech
Here I posit a fourfold typology of the realms in which money plays a role in the conveyance of meaning. There are, however, several limitations to the provided typology. The first limitation is my subject position as a member of the culture of the US, as stated earlier. The second limitation is that further theoretical consideration may illuminate the possibility of collapsing multiple categories into one. The categories below are conceptually distinct. However, one cannot deny the possibility of rearticulating the categories in more parsimonious ways.
The first realm in which money communicates is through positive movement, or when money is sent from one entity (e.g., person or business) to another. The second realm is through visible inertia, wherein the fact that money is not moving between entities conveys meaning. The third realm acknowledges that money has a certain presence of force, and can speak without moving. The fourth and final realm is that of metaphor, where our knowledge of money influences meaning-making processes without the need for any money to actually be present. Each of these four realms will be explicated below in three ways. First a brief functional definition of each realm will be provided. Second, examples will be described which highlight how money functions as communication. Third, these examples will be used to propose future research projects which will further line of enquiry. Therefore, each category will represent not only an aspect of money’s communicative function, but also illuminate an area for empirical research.
2.1. Positive movement
The realm of positive movement is the standard setting in which we see money used. This realm involves movement in that it relies on money moving from one entity to another to fulfill its communicative function. The act of payment is the clearest example of the realm of positive movement. A customer transfers something to a vendor. Whatever is sent – be it in the form of cash or a credit card swipe – functions as money, and it sends some form of message, which when decoded, tells the vendor that goods and services have been properly paid for. Additionally, this positive movement of money cannot be replicated through linguistic means; money says something that my words cannot articulate or convey.
This category is interesting in that it treats money as an autonomous communicative medium. Any number of rational individuals can verify the amount of money rendered, meaning that it is objectively measurable. In this category money is both ontologically positivistic (it exists in a way that is empirically verifiable to all agents involved) and symbolic (arbitrary in Saussure’s sense 1986). The paper notes which are rendered for payment (if using cash) as a physical object has no real use value. The cash is then symbolic in that it “stands in” for something else, some form of pure, abstract, or intersubjective value.
The positive movement of money can also carry very specific meanings when it occurs in certain defined contexts. For example, in the realms of investment and betting behaviors, the movement of money can be read as a statement of confidence; that the sender believes that the investment will pay off. The betting practices during a game of poker, where players move money into a pot that can be won, are especially illuminating for their communicative potential. In poker, seeing, calling, or raising – matching an opponents bet – demonstrates an amount of confidence in ones cards. Additionally, a player with a bad hand can raise the bet with the hope of scaring other players away from the hand. This strategy is called bluffing and it effectively uses the movement of money to lie about the nature of ones cards. Here, bluffing is important, because, as Umberto Eco (1976: 7) suggests, signs are anything than can be interpreted, which means anything that can be used to lie. Since bluffing involves communicatively using money to lie, then it passes Eco’s (1976) criteria for semiotic investigation.
Another example of the positive movement of money – although a culturally specific one – is the practice of tipping in the US. Generally a large tip is seen as a “thank you” for good service while a small tip communicates displeasure or annoyance. However, the interpretation of the tip by the server may be more complex than this simple dichotomy. Lynn’s (2013) publicly available data sets show nuance in servers’ speech on tipping, indicating that the decoding processes that servers apply to tips are actually quite complex. However, most of the scholarly research on tipping has been conducted from the marketing and management perspectives, and represent attempts to map tipping as a consumer behavior. Therefore, mapping the communicative nature of money’s positive movement may be best served through an ethnography of tipped employees which will explore the phenomenological nature of being tipped. Examining how these employees react to tips and talk about tips to other employees may be useful in exploring the interpretation of tips. Additionally, the inverse study – interviewing the tip-leavers – may also be illuminating in a comparative manner. To what extent do interpretations of a tip’s meaning coincide or diverge between the tipper and the tipped server?
2.2. Visible Inertia
Sometimes the fact that money is not moving can send a message, we label this communicative function visible inertia. Returning to the example of tipping, the practice of “stiffing” a server – leaving no tip at all – can send a powerful message. This is a prime example of visible inertia, where the positive movement of money is expected, and its lack of movement is both obvious and meaningful. Two additional examples of negative movement are boycotts and writing someone out of a will. In the realm of visible inertia, money is, in some ways, secondary to the process of meaning construction. When writing someone out of a will, the visible inertia of the money acts more like punctuation, adding an exclamation point to a statement of disapproval.
Similarly, Boycotting a business happens for a reason that is not simply that the protestors don’t want to spend money at the target business or industry. Boycotts usually occur to persuade a company to take a specific action or to end a specific practice. Here, again, money acts as the exclamation point to the protestors’ attempted persuasive appeals. Additionally, the practice of boycotting is predicated on an understanding of profit-driven capitalist enterprise. As useful as getting ones message out into the public sphere may be, knowing that businesses are centrally concerned with increasing profit affords protestors another communicative avenue that if successful will more persuasively make their point. Therefore, boycotts represent another social practice ripe for investigating the communicative nature of money. However, studying boycotts may prove to be a difficult endeavor, and simply interviewing participants runs the risk of having stakeholders stick to their institutionally approved statements. A more useful method may be that of ethnography, to be present during and observe the meetings of the protestors who boycott and in the executive boardroom of the target company to see how each group makes sense of the boycott.
The interesting aspect of this realm of visible inertia is that it may be the one in which it is easiest to view how money influences affective states. Writing someone out of a will is a serious statement of disapproval, and likely ends in an emotional response from the slighted individual. Perhaps it is in this realm of money’s speech that we can begin to understand the emotional effect that money can have on individuals.
2.3. Force of presence
Money does not have to move in order to communicate. During the housing bubble crisis (circa 2009) one would occasionally see news stories about people whose houses were illegally foreclosed upon, and who then fought back, sued their bank or mortgage lender, and won (cf., Lush 2011). These homeowners occasionally mentioned the difficulty in finding a lawyer willing to sue banks. The idea was that the banks had so much money that their legal defense would be impenetrable. Here, money simply sitting in the bank’s coffers is enough to communicate a message to a possible opponent; the potential for money to be put into work against a claimant was enough to often deter litigation. This realm of money’s speech is concerned with the way that by simply knowing where money sits, the money is able to communicate something about its owner (generally their relative power).
This is not to say that only large amounts of money communicate in this way, the inverse is also true. Consider the image present in cartoons and sitcoms of a person pulling his or her pockets inside out to demonstrate their emptiness. In this image it is the lack of money that communicates a meaning in reference to the depicted person. The image works on implicature. We do not simply understand that their pockets are empty; we understand that they have no money, and the aesthetics of the pose through which they communicate this idea implies a disarmed or weak connotation. The presence of no money broadcasts a meaning.
There is an obvious and strong connection between money and power. Therefore, we should also consider the signs that people acquire that indicate their relative amount of wealth, to examine how these signs also confer upon them a type of power. Consider the way wealth is indicated by the clothing system, expensive clothes are seen to look nicer. Additionally, the idea of looking expensive becomes interwoven with aesthetic beauty. We can see this relationship in expressions such as by saying that someone “looks like a million bucks,” or that “he had nothing but a five dollar suit.” This relationship between the expense of a suit and its visual quality can also be seen in clothing advertisements that offer a “$1000 suit for $300.” Such advertisements work, not by demonstrating the visual quality of the suit itself, but by focusing on the importance of it’s perceived cost. Looking sharp is simply a byproduct of looking expensive. Therefore, connotations of money are interwoven with how people evaluate the quality of clothes.
So if a suit looks expensive, what then? Having the illusion of money is very important, at least in the US. The more expensive the suit, the more credibility an audience will confer on a speaker. In the academic setting its easy to see that in large lecture halls undergraduates will pay more heed to the sharply dressed professor than the one who teaches in a suit she or he has had for 20 years. The indicators of money confer with them a certain amount of legitimization, obscuring the need for directly applicable and contextually specific credentials.
How can we examine the extent of this phenomenon? Cultural studies and critical media studies may help us in this specific endeavor. Examining the way that money and legitimization are confounded into one another in popular media is one possible avenue for research. Another approach may be to utilize the methodology of audience reception studies, exposing research participants to samples of media and having them describe – in their own words – the characters present in terms of the character’s authority and financial well-being to document the nature of the correlation between the two notions.
2.4. Metaphor
The final realm in which money speaks is through metaphor. This realm encompasses the many instances where our knowledge of and experience with money informs our understanding of noneconomic matters. One need not have access to money in order to cite money’s explanatory power.
The prevalence of communication that falls into this realm can be seen in the sheer number of economic metaphors used in everyday speech, at least in the US. Consider some examples. When someone choses between two difficult options, others may ask “was it worth it?” implying that despite the complexity of the situation, the two options should be able to be boiled down into exchange value for the purpose of comparison. We say that we invest time and effort into relationships and expect a return on those investments. We have all heard that “time is money” and that we should “spend our time wisely.” There was even a recent trend (circa 2005–2012) where, in certain social groups the word “money” replaced “cool” in everyday speech. It was not uncommon to hear someone say “That’s money!” in response to something that they found interesting or worthy of merit. Consider the implicature inherent in the use of the word “successful” in American English. When a person describes another as “successful” in absence of a specific context, they do not mean that the other effectively reaches their goals; the statement means that they make a sufficient amount of money.
The list can go on but I would rather focus on one specific instance of the economic metaphor that I’ve seen on a handful of occasions, maybe four times in the past six years or so in television fiction. The example is this: Character A asks Character B a very important question. Character B does not know the answer and so responds to Character A by stating “Hey, man, that question is above my pay grade.” The fact that this phrase only occurs a handful of times does not diminish the importance of the fact that audiences can decode it fairly easily. The phrase references practices in the government and the military that ensure that people in more important positions get paid more money than those in lower positions. When first hearing this expression I knew nothing of the specific “pay grades” but that did not diminish the fact that I knew exactly what Character B meant the moment the phrase was uttered. What character B is doing is using money as a metaphor for understanding his relationship to a specific knowledge set. In other words, with a high degree of success, economic metaphors are used to express and explain noneconomic ideas. Therefore we must ask about how prevalent this and similar processes are. To what extent is our understanding of non-economic issues colored by our personal experience with the economic sphere?
The relationship cited in the pay grade example – that salary positively correlates with knowledge – is important. If knowledge of economic relations orders our understanding of the rest of the world then such a process would support the Marxist conceit that the base determines the superstructure. Money, abstract though it may be, is real. We use money to buy goods, to pay our taxes, to invest in businesses, etc. In other words, our use of money is one aspect of the base. To say that the base determines the superstructure implies that our actual use of money determines how we see order in our world. This perspective on money’s communicative function bears a close resemblance to Lakoff and Johnson’s (1980) description of the orientational metaphor.
Lakoff and Johnson (1980) cite another ubiquitous metaphor when they describe the orientational metaphor. The orientational metaphor relies on the physical orientation of up/down to explain non-physical ideas such as good/bad, conscious/unconscious, etc. What are the implications of assuming that economic interchange determines our mental processes; that we use our knowledge of economics to make sense of non-economic data in a universal fashion, similar to how we universally apply the orientational metaphor? The proposed research here would be to create an archive of financial metaphors, how they are used, and a thick description of how each one inspires meaning in the audience. Such a study could act as a map for the various ways that through linguistic communication we utilize economic knowledge to explain and understand non-economic issues. In other words we need to better understand the ways that money speaks through influencing our evaluative mental and cognitive processes.
3. Further considerations
This research agenda represents the first steps of a long journey. It is through these and other inquiries into the communicative nature of money that we can begin to better understand money’s speech. The questions raised above are important as first steps not only because they ask what money is saying, but they also suggest a self-reflexive effort to determine how to better listen to money on its own terms. My ability to understand television programming in the US is predicated on my proficiency in knowing the English language. Similarly, if we want to understand the communicative nature of money, we must first learn money’s language, and map the relationship between signifier and signified over the medium of exchange value. To fully understand money’s role in society we will need more than simply economic theory. Economics may help us understand how money works but it does not address how money communicates, what it says, how it makes us feel. Therefore, we must create a semiotics of money in order to better understand not only our relationship to the economy, but how our economic participation mediates our relationships with each other.
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