Gender differences in graffiti: A semiotic perspective

Abstract

Male and female restroom graffiti analyzed from a semiotic point of view as texts, structures of meaning, illuminate basic societal processes. We learn that there are fundamental gender differences in patterns of communication in same-sex encounters, and we see revealed in such humble data as toilet graffiti a silent political discourse about the distribution of power in American society. These understandings, however, are only achieved if we move beyond a positivist perspective to the underlying level of meaning and if we construct an interpretation that takes account of both the male and the female data, simultaneously. © 1980 Pergamon Press, Ltd.