Semiotics of of Wedding - Comm 403

In my last blog I discussed the implications of semiotics of particularly advertisements. However, semiotics does not always have to be applied to texts such as pictures, movies, or advertisements. Events, places, and ideas can also have hidden connotations that can be revealed using semiotics. In my case, I would like to reveal the semiotics of weddings, a very important rite of passage in most people’s lives.

A wedding has many underlying meanings. However, we’ll start with the denotation of weddings. However, I will not denotate an entire wedding, but particular events and ideas that have particular underlying meanings.

A wedding is an event that the bride and groom most likely plan and organize. A bride is expected to wear a rather large white wedding dress while the groom is expected to wear a suit. In the middle of the ceremony, the bride and groom usually partake in the “Unity Sand” (sometimes it is the “Unity Candle” which is an older version of the Unity Sand. At this event, the bride and groom go to a table that holds three items: One rather large empty glass and two smaller glasses with different colored sands in each glass. The bride and groom grab their own color and pour their sand into the larger glass together.

Now, with theses few events and ideas in mind, we can start to connotate these few particular events in a wedding.

First of all, the wedding as a whole can easily to connotated. A wedding is only understood under social standards. We as a society created it. It is only important because we make it important. (like money) Religion in particular makes weddings important. Therefore, a wedding is not just viewed as an event that lasts an entire day, but a rite of passage that marks the beginning of a journey for the couple getting married.

Next, the attire that the couple is expected to wear at the wedding. There is not much to be said about the groom’s attire, but the bride’s attire is very important. Everyone tends to pay more attention to the brides dress than anything else in the wedding. (Watch the show Four Weddings. They have a whole rating category for just the dress alone rather than many characteristics of a contestants wedding) Moreover, the dress is white to show purity. The bride is expected, according to most religions, to be pure prior to her wedding. This white represents the purity that brides are supposed to have prior to marrying.

Lastly, the connotation of the Unity Sand. The two mixing sands that are poured into the large empty glass are mixed together forever; for, you cannot ever separate those two colors once mixed into the large glass. This represents the couple transitioning into one person under god, rather than two separate people represented by the individual colors.