In November, I celebrated the completion of my doctorate. After three and a half years of writing and research, this was an opportunity I wanted to share with my academic network, so I posted a photo of myself holding a physical copy of my doctoral dissertation on contemporary.
The title was criticized by those who deliberately misrepresented the nature of the research. “Smells are racist” has become a false refrain. One user commented that this was a study aimed at “why it’s racist and/or classist to not like people exhibiting body odors consistent with poor hygiene.”
My thesis investigates how some authors in the last century have used smell in literature to indicate social hostilities, such as prejudice and exploitation. It also connects this to our actual understanding of the role meaning plays in society.
For example, in The Road to Wigan Pier (1936), George Orwell states that “the real secret of class distinctions in the West” can be summed up in four chilling words: “The lower classes stink.” Orwell continues to discover the damage caused by this type of messaging and how we might combat it.
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It’s good documented this smell has been used to justify expressions of racism, classism and sexism. Since the 1980s, researchers evaluated the moral implications of perceptions and stereotypes related to smell.
My thesis completes this work by evaluating the contributions of a selection of books and films that take the sense of smell seriously. In each of the texts I examined, smell plays a role beyond simple sensory perception.
I include examples from well-known works by George Orwell, Vladimir Nabokov, JM Coetzee, and Toni Morrison, as well as notable recent examples, such as Bong Joon-ho’s film Parasite.
I suggest that smell very often evokes identity in a way that is meant to convey an individual’s value and status. In Parasite, for example, a worker overhears his employer saying that his “smell is beyond the limits,” which the director describe as a moment when “the basic respect you have for another human being is broken.”
Some authors draw on a long history of discrimination based on smell to explore its relevance in contemporary society. For example, during the transatlantic slave trade, black slaves were said to issue a smella misconception that contributed to their dehumanization.
In Toni Morrison’s novel Tar Baby (1981), set in the present, one of the protagonists uses these racist associations by stating “I know you’re an animal because I smell you” to a black female character .
I have found that it is difficult to counter the ideas people have that certain smells are associated with particular identities. This could be due to the strong emotional and bodily reactions produced by smell.
We tend to think of our desire to avoid bad odors as an instinctive protective mechanism, but evidence suggests that we be taught which smells are disgusting, because the disgust response is almost entirely absent in children under two years of age. Smell is therefore shaped by society and influenced by the prejudices that inhabit it.
I also argue for the personal and social functions of reading and critical engagement in literature in which authors are closely interested in smell. The texts I consider in my thesis introduce readers to new ways of understanding their own sense of smell.
For example, in Sam Byers’ 2020 novel, Come join our illness (2021), the characters fully accept bad smells and draw attention to their harmless nature.
I therefore suggest that books and films not only record the political aspects of smell, but can also foster and test new knowledge about our own sense of smell.
The fact that many commentators were initially unconvinced that smell could possibly be a fruitful topic of academic discussion speaks to the widespread devaluation of the sense of smell. Ultimately, smell is one of the primary ways almost all of us interact with the world and deserves more of our attention.