The CODE-X series catalogs a vast codex of source codes (aka “signs”) extracted from past audits.

The object of study in semiotics is not the signs but rather a general theory of signification; the goal of each “audit” is to build a model demonstrating how meaning is produced and received within a category or cultural territory. Signs on their own, therefore, only become truly revelatory and useful once we’ve sorted them into thematic complexes, and the complexes into codes, and the codes into a meaning map. We call this process “thick description”; the Code-X series is thin description.

“BELLY UP” NORM: Pain knocks you flat on your back — taking you out of the game.

“BELLY UP” FORMS: Examples we’ve seen target men — suggests that pain makes you passive, ineffectual, takes you out of the workforce (and therefore makes you worthless).

From a proprietary 2019 study of the Back to Normal space within the Pain category (US).