Even the swastika has no fixed cultural meaning

Evidence

No sooner has a form been objectified than it seems in some measure constricting or inappropriate to the vital processes which called it into being. From this tension arise the dynamics of culture history, a result of “the deep contradiction between life’s eternal flux and the objective validity and authenticity of the forms through which it proceeds.” — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 83 (#exemplifies, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Cultural symbols carry no fixed meaning; meaning shifts with the social field — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 1012; Ideological elements like racism and nationalism have no necessary class belonging; Cultural meanings are unstable and shift with the social field (+4 more)

Related

• Cultural symbols carry no fixed meaning; meaning shifts with the social field (similarity 0.89)
• Culture is a constant battlefield with no permanent victories (similarity 0.88)
• Culture as constitutive of practice retains contingency and is never finally determined (similarity 0.84)
• Cultures represent themselves as fixed but are always changed by history (similarity 0.84)
• No cultural symbol, even the swastika, carries fixed intrinsic meaning. (similarity 0.84)
• Cultural forms ossify and drift apart from the life that created them (similarity 0.83)
• Each cultural form is inevitably replaced by its successor (similarity 0.81)
• No cultural form permanently expresses any class until struggle gives it that accent (similarity 0.81)
• Objectified cultural forms always lag behind the life that created them (similarity 0.81)
• Cultural struggle shifts positions, never staying over the same meaning (similarity 0.80)
• Cultural value is historically mobile as forms move between elite and popular (similarity 0.80)
• Culture operates as signifying practice rather than a fixed way of life (similarity 0.80)
• Cultural meanings are unstable and shift with the social field (similarity 0.79)
• Tradition is about how elements are articulated, not about persistence of old forms (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Objectified cultural forms always lag behind the life that created them #exemplifies (0.85) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 83
• Cultural meanings are unstable and shift with the social field #exemplifies (0.80)
• Traditions are mutable and contested rather than fixed and class-bound #exemplifies (0.65)
• Culture is a constant battlefield with no permanent victories #expands (0.55)
• Racism has no universal structure but only historically specific forms #expands (0.50)