Pudibondi e spudorati. Riflessioni semiotiche sul linguaggio del corpo (s)vestito

Abstract

In this paper I firstly propose a brief survey of the first developments of the studies on the (un)clothed body meant as a language, then I dwell on the way in which such perspective may be used to reformulate classical theories about the (in)visibility of the body, and afterwards I characterize the fundamental semiotic mechanism of the language of the (un)clothed body as the projection of a semi-symbolic system of abstract valences, filled with different values oppositions depending on the historical periods and socio-cultural contexts. I continue by exploring, through a specific semiotic square, the system of values of modesty/immodesty, by offering insights into the processes of naturalization that characterize the arbitrariness of the language of the (un)clothed body, and by concluding with remarks on the distortions that globalization brings about in the perception of and attribution of meaning to the clothes of the Other.