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The word of the week is SYMBOL (by Massimo Sebastiani)

2021-09-06T06:48:47.712Z


© Ansa These have been months in which the expression 'symbolic photo' has often been used . It was used for the Europeans, for the Olympics, for Afghanistan. The image of the embrace between Vialli and Mancini, brothers of the goal in the Sampdoria of the 90s and then together again to build the miracle of the national team that won the European championship; that of the other brothers, of Italian athle


These have been months in which the expression

'symbolic photo'

has often been used

.

It was used for the Europeans, for the Olympics, for Afghanistan.

The image of the embrace between Vialli and Mancini, brothers of the goal in the Sampdoria of the 90s and then together again to build the miracle of the national team that won the European championship;

that of the other brothers, of Italian athletics, to celebrate unexpected successes in Tokyo wrapped in the tricolor flag;

and finally that of the child rescued in the hands of a soldier beyond the barbed wire at the Kabul airport.

Listen to "Word of the week: symbol (by Massimo Sebastiani)" on Spreaker.

What is a symbol? Is it a powerful thing that can even change the world? This is what the protagonist of 'V for revenge', the 2005 film by James Mc Teigue based on a famous graphic novel and which has as its protagonist a mysterious character with his face always covered by the mask of Guy Fawkes, the exponent more famous than the powder conspiracy that attempted to blow up the House of Lords in London in 1605. A mask - we have already talked about it here - made famous by the Anonymous organization and by many protests around the world that have adopted it, such as for example Occupy Wall Street. Or is it something of little relevance, even if perhaps important for a single person,like when we say that it is only a symbolic thing? The etymology of the term this time is interesting and helps us to understand the singular journey made by the word.

The origin is Greek (from this origin derives the Latin symbolum) and is the verb sunballo, formed by sun, together, and dance, jet, with the meaning of 'putting together'. But put together what? Two different parts which, insofar as they refer to each other, as they rejoin, have a certain meaning. In ancient Greece it was two halves of an object that was broken to then be reassembled and thus be a sign of recognition. The term symbolon in ancient Greek was the identification card or even the hospitalitatis card used by two families or even two cities as the seal of a signed pact: it was precisely the matching of the two parts to be proof of the agreement reached (and agreement is in fact a further meaning of the term). Hence also the problem, if we can say so, of the term symbol,which in many cases can be confused with sign. Because at the base there seems to be the same function of 'staying in place ...' that is, meaning something else.

We are helped by one of our travel companions now habitual in this exploration of words, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel: the difference lies in the fact that between the sign and what it represents, says Hegel in the 'Encyclopedia of Philosophical Sciences', there is it is indifference and conventionality: the sign can also recall the thing it must indicate (for example in the figure of a road sign) but fundamentally it is something different from the content it expresses. The strength of the symbol, on the other hand, depends on the fact that it has features and content that are in analogy with what it wants to symbolize. This is how they acquire extraordinary power: we think of the symbol of a party, which is often the subject of contention, of the flag to indicate a nation, a people (it is flaunted or, in the collective and hostile fury, it is burned),or precisely to that Afghan child mentioned at the beginning to indicate the future and freedom of a people. This is why someone even spoke of 'symbolic violence' which is something deeper, more visceral, one could say, than the whole family of verbal references, now so much used, as 'emblematic' or 'iconic'.

Even when we use expressions such as status symbols or sex symbols: which in fact remain stubbornly attached to the object and thing they refer to unless they lose strength and only become, at best, signs of the times.

Source: ansa

All life articles on 2021-09-06

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