Pizza Signs

It has been approximately three years since I have enrolled in an English Literature course, and I sometimes find myself making up little assignment prompts in order to better understand language and meaning. As I was walking past Danny's Pizza II on the way home from the corner grocery today, the doughy smells coming out of the place were intoxicating as usual. I asked Alisha whether she thought the smell of pizza could be considered a symbol, which seems absurd until we agree on one key point:

the smell of pizza is not pizza-in-itself

Now lets throw some definitions up on the board (courtesy of cedarseed.com):

Sign: Signs are events or things that direct attention or are indicative of other events or things.

Symbol: A symbol represents something in a completely arbitrary relationship. The connection between signifier and signified depends entirely on the observer, or more exactly, what the observer was taught.

These are fairly close in meaning, but I'm sure as hell nobody taught me to love the smell of pizza. So it's official: pizza smell is a sign, which points to pizza. Please feel free to comment with supporting/debunking evidence.




Just so you don't think I'm taking credit for anything.