One of the ways in which salt-and-pepper shaker sets humanize the figures they depict who are not in reality human beings is by means of clothing. They have hats on, or scarves, or shoes. I thought it might be interesting to look at some sets in which that happens, in a series of posts beginningContinue reading “Pantlessness”
Category Archives: Sameness and Difference
Polyamory
Recently, my friend Joseph Thomas made a comment on Facebook that relates to my interest in salt and pepper shakers: What I think is wonderful about salt n pepper shakers: although they come as a pair, they so often aren’t bound together, save by their maker’s intent or owner’s whim. Thus, even pairs “meant forContinue reading “Polyamory”
All Nature Is But Art
This is another set of salt-and-pepper shakers that my son Asa made me, this one a few years ago. As you can see from this view of their tops, he made them of modelling clay formed around an already-existing set of plain ceramic shakers. I’ve asked Asa for an explanation of what he intended themContinue reading “All Nature Is But Art”
A Coupla Chicks Sitting Around
After generalizing about there being no same-sex pairs in my salt and pepper shaker collection, and then being surprised to find all the many male pairs I’ve been discussing in my posts over the last week or so, I decided it was about time to see what I could find in the way of femaleContinue reading “A Coupla Chicks Sitting Around”
Ambiguously Gendered: Batting for Which Team?
This shaker set is not necessarily ambiguously gay–more like ambiguously gendered. Its two baseball players (who each look a little like stereotyped angry codgers wearing too much eyeliner), might be either both male or both female or a combination of one male and one female. The shaker on the left wears a pink hat, whichContinue reading “Ambiguously Gendered: Batting for Which Team?”
Bøsse: In Danish, Both ‘Shaker’ and ‘Gay’
Having opened the possible closet of implication hidden in the all-male sets of salt and pepper shakers I’ve been looking at in my last few posts, I’ve found myself wondering if indeed there are any out and openly gay shaker sets in existence. A little bit of Googling led me to this pair: According toContinue reading “Bøsse: In Danish, Both ‘Shaker’ and ‘Gay’”
Adam and Steve After All
This post stands as a warning about never making a generalization. In my last post, commenting on how salt and pepper shakers represent the gender of the characters they represent, I suggested that “once gender has been signified . . . then it is always, as far as I can tell, one shaker of oneContinue reading “Adam and Steve After All”
The News Is a Woman
In the miniverse of salt and pepper shakers, almost everything is either humanized or genderized or both. Most of the apples and bunnies and fire hydrants and yachts have been given some sort of human characteristic–human eyes or mouths or human smiles on non-human mouths. And apparently objects can’t be represented as somehow human withoutContinue reading “The News Is a Woman”
Underlining Gender Differences–Especially When We Kiss
One of the things I find fascinating about shaker sets is how their basic purpose–to contain two different condiments–becomes the basis of an ongoing confirmation, not only of the difference between salt and pepper, but indeed, of their oppositeness. They’re not just different flavors. One is black and one is white. Black is not justContinue reading “Underlining Gender Differences–Especially When We Kiss”
Chinese Cooking Clones
As I suggested in an earlier post, alongside the exotic aliens, the other major branch of Asiatic stereotypes represented in my salt and pepper shaker collection consists of cooks. Here’s a pair: The standard stereotypical slanty eyes, so slanty that seem to be creepily without any whites, and this time accompanied by jolly rounded cheeksContinue reading “Chinese Cooking Clones”
Perry Nodelman 