Of the senses, the most privileged in the field of philosophy have been sight and hearing. The others have been relegated, possibly due to the good-evil duality. Perhaps, the taste for gluttony, the touch for the sexual; the smell so fetid. Although, we all know that there are bad sounds and bad visual things that we see.
Smell, apparently, was a sense offensive to the intelligence of philosophers and did not occupy space in their intellectual reflections. This was a practical instrument for medical use to locate the morbid principle of diseases and to identify the stench of fevers.
Cristina Larrea points out that Corbin was interested in demonstrating that the disqualification of smell as perception and the deodorization process are part of the worldview of the ruling classes, of what we call the Western world.
The hierarchy of sight relegated smell to the bottom rung and assimilated it to animality (hunting, sex, nutrition). Instead, he turned vision into the quintessential civilized sense. Which embodies the aesthetic ideal, for example, in painting and is the basis of the scientific method of direct observation.
In this sense, the perceptual hierarchy is a historical construction within the process of civilization. Such a process restricts smell as if this were something animal, and the same happens with the tendency to sniff food or other things. Possibly your grandmothers were upset if you, as children, smelled the plate of food.
However, the contradictions that smell contains are part of the paradoxes of individual and social processes. When I was visiting my mother’s house, walking through the patio several times brushing against some bush or grass, I don’t know which it was and I don’t think I wanted to know either, it emitted a smell that reminded me of a moment from my childhood in a house with many years ago: The house in Sacramento, whom I don’t remember, but I know that it was in his house where that smell was.
The interest in smell and the olfactory is recent. Cristina Larrea indicates that «Alain Corbin (1987) is the first historian to be interested in dissecting olfactory metaphors and unraveling the interwoven theme of the history of olfactory perception» . According to the author, the interest began towards the end of the 18th century due to health and health interests. This coincides with the classical period of madness that Foucault analyzes in the «History of Madness».
However, to talk about smells is to talk about the history of sensibilities and the anthropology of the senses. In the «Iliad» the poet recites about the smells of sacrifices that are pleasing to the gods. Or we remember that film “El Perfume”, the homonymous title of the text by Patrick Süskind. Or from the movie “The smell of green papaya”, a Vietnamese film directed by Anh Hung Tran. Or closer to us, the conversation between Plinio Apuleyo Mendoza and García Márquez, when the latter defines the tropics as “the smell of a rotten guava” in the book “El olor de la guava”.
The relevance given to smells is a cultural fact. To realize this, it is necessary to look at the olfactory metaphors used in everyday language and, more broadly, in literature. Perhaps the most famous and well-known reference in relation to smell is Proust’s Madeleine, which transports him back in time.
The recognition of smell, and therefore of smells, in the construction of identity, allows establishing interrelationships through sensory order and contrasting cultural models. In the literature the rejection of the Jews in Europe appears reflected because they smelled of garlic; or groups of shepherds and fishermen in Ethiopia are differentiated by their smell; In a film about a Greek family, in the United States, the female character at one point says «it’s just that we are very noisy and we smell of garlic and goat cheese.»
An element, not conscious in many cases, is the difference or the reminiscence of the smells of other places; these olfactory memories make us develop the sharpness of our senses. García Márquez says, in “The smell of the guava”, that when he traveled to Angola he felt like he was on the Colombian coast, because the smells were similar.
The smell memory is very strong, because it transports us in an instant in space-time. We have all lived that experience of memories that emerge with certain smells.
The smell of the other can become a category of discrimination, exclusion or inclusion. Be it the personal smell, the smell of the food prepared by that family from other places. Many times, we say that «it smells like misery», or that if it smells good, we transpose a moral value to the olfactory. And so we make many other value judgments through smells about a person, a family, or a place.
From these judgments we build and transmit our personal and social categories until we build the «olfactory codes» by which we abide. We internalize such olfactory codes until they shape our classificatory thinking.
Currently youtubers and influencers help many cases, because they travel to various countries and leave us perceptible testimonies of what they see, hear, feel, taste and smell. In Japan, says a youtuber, it is not well seen to use a lot of body perfume because it can interfere with food at mealtime. So in Japan, it is not good to wear perfume if you go to a restaurant or are invited to eat at a house.
From the classificatory categories we elaborate an olfactory symbolism. Which is expressed through identity and difference. We use smells to categorize others. It is a way of expressing, in everyday life, the concepts of otherness and identity.
Oloroso symbolism regulates and expresses our cultural identity in opposition to that of others. Therefore, it can become an element that builds or breaks down social barriers.
Finally, Larrea points out that the «neutral smell» has been included in the category of positive and negative olfactory characteristics. In the first, the «neutral smell» means cleanliness and purity; the second, on the contrary, expresses a lack of humanity.
What I wanted to express is that smell and with it the perception of odors occupies an unconscious, but highly relevant, place in our us. Because the smell allows us to build interpersonal relationships of inclusion or exclusion.
From what has been said up to here. I made the following request to several people:
«Please, write me something brief if you can’t write it to me, send me a voice message, about your experience in relation to the sensations felt by the smells of the country where you live now and from which you left.»
This part entitled:
SMELLS OF EVERYDAY EVERYDAY
What are the different narrations of the friends who responded to me. They are transcribed exactly as they were sent to me. Here I present them:
A. P. (Silvi Marina, Italy)
Hi teacher. Wow, it takes me a little off guard, I’ve never thought about that. Well, more or less I could describe it, in the area where I am is called Silvi Marina, therefore you can imagine that you feel the smell of the sea every day, in the morning you feel the smell of the thousands of coffee establishments that they are found in every corner and the freshly baked cornettos, in the afternoons the smell of the sea is felt a little more and at these moments, as it is winter, the extremely cold breeze that makes you freeze to tears, oh and it is also the season of rain, therefore the smell of wet earth is felt. Otherwise you don’t feel the smell of smok from the buses like in Caracas, you feel cleaner air.
I only remember that from Caracas, the amount of smok that went to the top of the buildings. And the freshly baked canilla bread from the bakeries
L.R. (Argentina)
What I left I don’t even remember the truth and those of now well of all the one that annoys me the most the one with the garbage when the Chinese throw fish in the container and the one I like the most the one with the pastry shops when they are baking… By the way, I just remembered that in Valle Arriba when they played golf the aroma reached the house and typical of me going and eating one and if I didn’t care I lost because when I went there weren’t any.
F.T. (Canada)
The first thing that came to my mind was the smell of coffee and the sea that I don’t have in Canada, they remind me of my home, my country. Not having that smell in this country, which is characteristic of my country. It’s not just the smell of the coffee, it’s the smell of the process of making coffee at home, of everyone going through the coffee pot and drinking the coffee or going through the shops and feeling the smell of the coffee, going through the sales of empanadas or whatever, it’s the smell of Venezuelan coffee.
What does it mean to start the day, to be with the family? What is waking up, wanting to conquer the world, those things that were overrated at the beginning of the day and you don’t feel them here. It’s like starting the day that doesn’t exist in Canada. I don’t know if that makes sense.
The other smell is the smell in the air, it is the smell of the sea; Although I was in Caracas, I did spend a lot of time near the sea, while I was growing up in Valencia and Puerto Cabello. Very close to the sea and I like the sea very much; and here in Canada there is no sea or at least not here in Toronto.
Here the air that one breathes gives the feeling of purity, freedom, fullness. The smell in Caracas, in general, not only the sea but the general smell of the air is busy. There is something in the smell that smells of Caracas. I don’t know, it smells like Caracas, the city has that smell. What gives me the feeling of Caracas is the run, run; the bustle, get on the train because if you don’t you’re going to lose it. Things like that.
And in a certain way escape from that place by going to another closed place. The smell in Canada gives me the feeling of freedom, of grandeur, of wanting to be outside all the time. The smell of Caracas gives me the feeling that I should take refuge, that one way or another there is something. And the smell of Canada, it gives you that feeling of leaving. That smell of concrete from Caracas, in general, of concrete, of paint.
K.C. (Spain)
The truth is that I am not happy here.
Z.A. (Argentina)
Argentina smells better, because Maracaibo always smelled like garbage when I came here. The city where I am now, for example, is a valley surrounded by mountains. It always smells good, the streets are immaculate. But I don’t like to speak ill of what I love.
Or I’m talking about the Imperial coffee in the morning (the coffee here is terrible) or the smell of fried slices mixed with the smell of beans, or the smell of my apartment, or the smell of fried empanadas when I passed by the corner from Pipo’s. I forgot, the smell of tasty and juicy mango.
M.I.C. (Ecuador)
You know that what you ask is very curious to me. Nobody had done it before and I have always thought that this city smells of marijuana and women’s perfume. Hahaha very seriously hahaha.
And in Venezuela I smelled smoke from cars, trucks, motorcycles.
Not if it’s the answer you expect but curiously I always think about these smells and I ask myself if someone will notice the same.
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