"HE'sEvtnvrHrNcYou'nnNor..." Bsncsn . 229 "He's Everything You're Not . ."1 A SemiologicalAnalYsis of Cheers Arthur AsaBetger T Is it symbolicthat DianeChnmbers, one of theoriginal leads in thesit- com Cheer,s,has blond hair? why doesCarla the waitresshaae a temperand by the nameNorm? These kid aroundso frankly aboutsex? what is signit'ied Bergersets out to answ-erin his are justa 7ew"o7 tne questions that Arthur Asa semiologicalaialysis of oneof themost popular situation comedies of all time. Takingiis criticil poiition the structuralistsFerdinand Saussure and "reads'"from llmbirto Eco,Berger the text o/Cheers throughthe l-ens of sem.iotics' For Berger,this riading is a processof decodinga text and of interpretingthe signsyitems it contaiis.He'defines a sign as a unit madeup of a soundimage oid ,"rorrrpt---or, in the terminologyof thestructuralists, of a signifierand a signified." 'Brrg* is carefulto point out that thesign is not na1nal; in otherwords, blondhair means sometiting to us not becnusethere is a naturalconnection be- "meaning," tweenblond hair and itssi-catted but becauseof thecultural and it with. Therules establishinga re- historicalaalues that we haae inaested for " lationshipbetween the signifier and thesignified, then, are called codes,"and thesecodes tells us whal signsmean. When this type of semioticstudy is ap' subtexts,or concealedmeanings, 'comepliedto a situationcomedy, some interesting to tight. For exampli,the bnr itselfmay signtfu more- than iusj^a building thecharacters can buy atcohoi. lts geographical location (Bostod and in which "classier" its interior decoratingsuggrti that it is than a collegeor zootking classbar. For Berger,"botii1tnese signiJiers giae the Cheers bar a meaningbe- yond itsdictionary definition. Nof only doeiBeiger proaide a criticalapparatus-semiotics-withwhich "read" to Cireers,but hi alsoproaides a modelfor readingand interpreting "texts"you comeacross in yourdaily liaes. For example, you mighteasily ap- numberof signifuing sys.tems in com- 'm"ercialsply thesisame critical methods to the,ost on teleaisionand in theadaertisements in magazines,Iooking at signs' ,'binary codes,and oppositions"in thoseeaeryday pop-cultural artifucts to de- "texts" terminethe meanings those impart. semioloSy (or semiotics or structuralism) The basic question that "texl"- asks of a television program or film or advertisement--or any is this:How do p"opt",itta"rstand what's going on?How do peoplede- rive meaning frbm a text? How do they know how to interpret facial ex- pressions,bJdy movements,clothes the characterswear, kinds of shots' ih" ,."n"ry, correctly?How is meaning generatedand conveyed? a 230 Terrvrsror.r A hint comes from ]onathan Culler, who writes in Structuralist Poetics: Thenotion that linguisticsmight be usefulin studyingother cultural phenomena is based on two fundamental insights: first, that social and cultural phenomena are not simply material objects or events but ob- jects and events with meaning, and hence signs; and second, that they do not have essences but are defined by a network of relations.l Meaning, Culler tells us, stems from considering phenomena as signs and from looking at the relationships among these signs. These two notions are at the heart of the semiologicalenterprise. In this semi- "Cheers,"2 ological analysis of the pilot episode of we will be consider- ing the text as a collection or system of signs.We will define signs in the Saussureanmanner as a combination of a sound and an image (signi- fier) and a concept or understanding (signified). The problem of meaning arises from the fact that the relation be- tween the signifier and the signified is arbitrary and conventional, so signs can mean anything. And, as Umberto Eco points out, they can lie. A signifier (suchas a gesture)can mean different things to different peo- ple, depending upon their socialclass, cultural level, location, and other factors.since the relation between signifier and signified is arbitrary, we must discover the codesthat explain the signs,that help us interpret the signifiers. In additioru we must look for important relationships (other than that of signifier and signified) found in texts that help us under- stand cultural phenomena. Here again Saussureis useful. He writes inhis Coursein GeneralLin- "[C]oncepts guistics, arepurely differential and defined not by their pos- itive content but negatively by their relations with the other terms of the system.Their most precisecharacteristic is in being what the others are not."3 Nothing means anything in itself, and everything (as far as con- ceptsare concerned)is dependent on relationships.The most important relationship is that of polar orbinary opposition; binary oppositions are the fundamental way in which the human mind finds meaning. This no- tion has been adapted by Claude L6vi-straussainto a meansof looking at texts such as myths and Greek tragedies-and, by extension here, "Cheers." In essencewe searchfor the hidden set of oppositions that in- I JonathanCuller, structuralist Poetics:structuralism, Linguistics and thestudu of Literature (lthaca,NY: Comell Un.iversityPress, 1975),4. 2 "Cheers" The first episodeof aired on September30, 1982,on NBC and was 30 minutes in length.The cast was shelleyLong as DianeChambers, Ted Danson as sam Malone,Rhea perl- man as Carla Tortelli, John Retzenberg as Cliff, George Wendt as Norm, and Nicholas Colosanteas Coach. 3 Ferdinandde Sarssure, Course in GeneralLinguisflcs (New york: McGraw-Hill, 1966),1.77. a ' Claude L6vi-Strauss, Structural Anthropology\Gafien City, Ny: Doubleday, 1967). Brncnn . "IIE's EvtnvrrrINc You'nr Nor. ' "' 231' form a text and thus generatemeaning. This meaning is not necessarily recognized by peoplE but is there nevertheless,and can be elicited by the semiologist. Signs "Cheers," The title of the series, tells us something. It suggestshap- piness, good spirits (in this case literally as well as figuratively)' and "Cheers" io-pur"rlotrrhii. is a toast we make when drinking with oth- "rr, ,o there is in elementof conviviality and sociability involved. In this series,which takesplace in a bar named Cheers,we thus find ourselves with expectations ibout what might transpire' We expect something pleasant . and we are not disappointed' Boston The bar itself is a sign system.It is not drab or shabby,like a work- ing-classbar, nor is it a i'ancy,trendy bar. It seemsto be a neighborhood middle-class people. The bar and the row of bai tnat caters mainly to "barness." liquor bottles are primary signifiers of what might be called ena tne bar is in Boston, which gives it a certain flavor and gives us certain understandings becauseof the way Boston is perceived.Boston has an identity due, In part, to its being on the east coast and closely identified wit:h English culture, the revolutionary period,--and Har- vard University. BJstonians are perceived as somewhat effete and a bit snobbish-though this is reserved for upper-class, aristocratic (Protestant)types and certainly not for the Irish working-class types one iinds there. The fact that this ieries takes place in Boston, I would sug- gest,prepares us for all kinds of characters-eccentrics, snobs,weirdos' con artists. Blondness one of the most important signs in the text is the color of Diane hair. she's a blond, and blondnessis a sign of considerable Chambers,s "gentlemen richness and meaning. America is a country where prefer blonds,,,and blond iair coloring is the most popular color sold. But what doesblondness signifY? For some women 6lond hair color is a means of escaping (or at- tempting to escape)their ethnic identity, or, in some cases,their age' It is used to cover gray hair. But there are other aspectsthat aremuch more a 232 Tunvrsror.,r important. Someof theseare pointed out by CharlesWinick in his book TheNew People: [F]or a substantial number of women, the attraction of blondeness is less an opportunity to have more fun than the communication of a withdrawal of emotion, a lack of passion. One reason for Marilvn Monrr.re's enormous popularity was that she was less a tempestuols temptress than, a non-threatening child. The innocence conveyed by blonde hair is also suggested by the 70 percent of baby dolls whose hair is blonde. D. H. Lawrence pointed out that blonde women in American nov- els are often cool and unobtainable, while the dark woman represenrs passion. Fictional blondes also tend to be vindictive and frigid.s This innocence of the blond is appealing to men because blonds, not being experienced, could not be very judgmental about men's sexual performances-if, that is, things ever get to that stage. Thus, when Sum- "ch7ld," ner calls Diane a there is more significance to the term than we might imagine. The book that Diane attempts to read and her numerous allusions 11 to and quotations from great literary figures are signs of her (and Sum- "proper" ner's) status as intellectuals. And the lack of a response (awe, respect) by Sam and his friends is an indication of their status as nonin- tellectuals. They are more interested in the Boston Patriots than in lohn Donne, in linebackers than in literature. Names Let us move on to something a bit more speculative-an examina- t2 tion of the names of the characters to see whether we can find anything of interest and significance. Another name for Diane (Diana) in mythol- ogy is Artemis, a virgin huntress associated with the moon. Thus she is well named, for her basic role in the series is that of an object of sexual " desire, a chlld" / woman who becomes embroiled in a battle of the sexes with the hero, sam Malone. (I will not comment on the fact that her last name, Chambers, suggests a room-especially a bedroom, my dictio- nary tells me.) Sam's name does not tell us much, though we might make some- "alone" thing of the fact that we can find an in Malone and it is his sta- tus as a male with no ties that facilitates the battle with Diane.