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.

“PARADIGM SHIFT” NORM: Reimagining milk and how we produce it.

“PARADIGM SHIFT” FORMS: Rebellious, impatient with the status quo: “MOO IS MOOT” (Not Milk) “Transcend the herd” (Milkadamia) “Stirring it up for 35 years!” (Stonyfield) “Making better food and food better” (Horizon) “NotCo” (Not Milk) “Having women in farming is an instrumental part of changing the farming landscape. We want to see things change!” (Organic Valley) Reinvention: “We are a group of people with a common goal: to reinvent the food industry” (Not Milk). Surrealist —challenging us at the visual level to stop assuming that everyday life can’t change radically: Surreal juxtaposition of food, works of art, a woman’s arm. Bizarro world tonality — a teenage kid waits up late at night to confront father sneaking into house with illicit goods (dairy milk)

From a 2022 study of the MAKING PROGRESS territory — associating milk with improved, science-driven farming/production techniques — within the Dairy & Non-Dairy Milk category.