Semiotics

Semiotics: noun.  a general philosophical theory of signs and symbols that deals especially with their function in both artificially constructed and natural languages and comprises syntactics, semantics, and pragmatics 


Stereotypes can cut both ways. It is natural for humans when observing something to describe it and relate it to something they know.  But in relating, in categorizing, in stereotyping, people can show their ugliness and darkness.  Yet there are many people who deliberately chose to be stereotyped.  For example:

What would most people think about this man?  He's wearing a jacket and tie buisnessman and has an exspensive watch.  Most people would say he's a buisnessman, someone who holds authority and wants people to know that he can buy that watch and those cloathes.

Bikers right?  But how did you know that at first glance?  Was it the pins, hats, jacket, or beards?

Yet semiotics goes further than what people are wearing.  Body language plays a large role in what other people perceive, what signs they portray.  From the crossed arms, furrowed brow, and stuck out bottom lip you can tell that this girl is very upset with you.  This is a universal gesture, children do not need to be taught to pout, but many other gestures we use are learned and only apply to our culture such as the fist bump:

Here's another curiosity:

What does this mean?  If you're from the United States, you may not. This is the running man, an international sign for an exit.  Knowing this, it makes sense, and every aspect of the design was well thought out and debated.  Yet it never caught on here; for some reason the idea of our sign is so ingrained in our culture that we simply assume that anyone will recognize it, even though people live here who can't speak or read English.  It is because of semiotics that his isn't going away anytime soon: