Eater's Notes - Garibaldi, Wedge, Bomber, and Spuckie -- A Sandwich by Any Other Name

Beer Battered Catfish, Salsa, Purple Onions, Lettuce,
Tomato, Spicy Mayonnaise on a hero

I like sandwiches. I have a lecture on Saussure and structuralism that I give every year, and my primary example of the arbitrary nature of the relationship between signifier and signified is the wide variety of names for the type of sandwich served on a long roll found throughout the United States.  Call it a sub, hoagie, grinder, hero, or any one of a dozen other names, I'll call it delicious. Dave Wilton has an excellent article in Verbatim that discusses the variety of names for the "long sandwich."  I also include for the sandwich-lovers out there, a resource that might only be able to exist on the web, a collection of scanned sandwiches, deftly titled Scanwiches.  A sample image from Scanwiches is at left.  In my experience, as much as people enjoy food, they also enjoy looking at pictures of food.

PN Feedburner | PN iTunes | PN Twitter | PN Facebook | PN Video | PN Goodreads