The Starbucks logo

[AHunter3]

Can anyone explain why this highly successful upscale coffee vendor went with "Thalidomide Lady Indicates Her Hairdo"?

[Nametag]

It’s a siren. Starbuck is a character from Moby Dick. There’s a bit about Starbuck’s siren here: http://www.endicott-studio.com/jMA03Summer/theMermaid.html

[Cinnamon_Girl]

@Nametag

It’s a siren. Starbuck is a character from Moby Dick. There’s a bit about Starbuck’s siren here: http://www.endicott-studio.com/jMA03Summer/theMermaid.html

Thank you, nametag, for the fascinating link.

[AHunter3]

<impressed> me </impressed>

I wasn’t really anticipating that there was a story behind it. Fascinating!

[DocCathode]

Nametag

I have many problems with that link.

It’s as if Disney set out systematically to obliterate the traditional mermaid mythos.

Except that, other than adding comic sidekicks and a happy ending, Disney was just adapting the work of Hans Christian Andersen. Disney didn’t create a hideous sea witch, Andersen did. Disney didn’t create the plot of a mermaid who sacrifices her voice to gain the love of a human, Andersen did. Why is the author pissed at Disney instead of Andersen?(Directly under the Disney silhouette of Ariel is a picture of the Little Mermaid statue erected in memory of Andersen)

3. The word “mermaid” is usually read as “sea maid,” but it is more properly glossed as “sea maiden” or “virgin of the sea.” This is because of the many connections between the mermaid and the ancient Goddess, whose origin and power are associated with the sea. But if one happens to know French, the first syllable, “mer,” takes on another significance, which is not merely an accident of etymology: mer is “sea,” and it sounds much like mêre or “mother.” Without going into the Indo-European origins for words that sound like “mare” or the prefix “mer” (ranging from the mother horse to the “mer” in “merry”), let it suffice to say that one of the underlying deep meanings of “mermaid” is “virgin mother,” directly linking the term and the figure it names with the Virgin Mary.

BLLSHT! Mermaid no more implies virginity than does chambermaid or barmaid. Mer refers to the sea. Maritime. Marine. Mariner. The article also gives a German word for mermaid “havfrau”. Frau most certainly does not mean virgin. It means either an adult woman, or wife. I’d also like to point out (I’m Jewish, so correct me if I’m wrong) Mary is an Anglicized form of the Hebrew Miriam.

Regardless of where we begin our interpretation of the mermaid, or which analytic path we take, we are brought back, again and again, to the ancient Great Goddess, the archetype behind the figure of Mary, who in Christian culture is usually split into the virginal Madonna and the holy prostitute.

I very rarely do this, but I feel this warrants a :rolleyes:

The male counterpart to the mermaid, the triton, lacks the mermaid’s mystery and seductiveness; he is actually a sort of aquatic satyr (a kind of male nymphomaniac)

Except that there are plenty of tales of male selkies and the like being mysterious and seducing women.

The truth one learns from the mermaid/siren is that patriarchy, especially the Judeo-Christian variety, is a relative latecomer in human history.

What do you mean by latecomer? OTTOMH the pantheons of the Sumerians and Babylonians were headed by male deities. The Sumerian god Dagon is even pictured on the page. He’s the guy with the classic curled beard and a fish tail.

The original logo made quite explicit that Starbucks was using the lure of female sexuality to draw the customer to their coffee, but now you can see that the coffee is linked to the double lure of ultimate wisdom and the pleasures of the flesh.

I’ll give you that the logos were designed with sex in mind. But unless a customer is a student of mythology or folklore, they’re not going to associate a siren or mermaid with ultimaet wisdom.

“Moby’s Coffee,” referring to Moby Dick, the great white whale in Herman Melville’s classic novel (which is read as a Christian allegory, the whale representing Christ).

I disagree rather strongly. Read Melville’s Billy Budd. Having read Moby a few times (great book), I say the whale is the opposite of a Christ symbol. Rather than a god who so loved the world he gave his one begotten son, the whale is a god who doesn’t care about the suffering of his creatures.

My more sinister reading—a more interesting one that connects the siren logo back to Mary—is to trace the name further back to the story of the Essex, the whaling ship on which Melville’s Pequod was based.

In other words, to do research the folks at Starbucks likely never did, and then claim they intended a meaning that they weren’t even aware of.

Finally, the article claims that the vessica piscis or Jesus-fish, is an attempt to claim the yoni symbol of earlier religions. The only other place I’ve read this claim was in a Church Of Subgenius tract produced as a joke.

For the record I do read Joseph Campbell. I love books on mythology and folklore. With the spread of Christianity Freya/Frau Hulda went from goddess to appearing in stories as a fairy godmother or witch. But many of Fenkl’s claims are reading meanings and associations that aren’t there. More, a lot of the article strikes me as Godess revisionism.

[Gyrate]

I was going to post a link to the Onion story “Starbucks To Begin Sinister ‘Phase Two’ Of Operation” featuring the new “Illuminatus” version of the mermaid logo but alas, the SDMB isn’t the only website requested pay for play these days. “Onion Premium” indeed.

[Manduck]

In the original version of the logo, it was more obvious what it depicted. You can see both logos here: http://deadprogrammer.livejournal.com/2003/06/28/ (scroll down). They changed to “thalidomide lady” because the original looked too naughty.

[screech-owl]

Folks, she’s actually a melusine. A little more contemporary than her medieval ancestors, but still recognizable. She is the main charge of a city coat-of-arms (still looking up which one at the moment, but wanted to get this up for information). I think it’s somewhere in Germany or Bavaria, IIRC.

[Dragonblink]

When I worked for Starbucks, I was told that the store was actually named for the owner’s boat, which in turn was named for the Starbuck in Moby Dick. That article misses the middleman.

[AmbushBug]

@Manduck

They changed to “thalidomide lady” because the original looked too naughty.

I confirm that this is the case - I was a coffee addict in the Seattle area when it happened circa 1994. The guy who ran the deli (with authorized Starbucks offered) next to my place of employment told me all about why he had to put up new signage.

[AskNott]

Aside from the logo change already noted, Starbucks stores in Saudi Arabia reportedly have logos without the damsel at all. She was much too immodest for Muslim eyes.

Perhaps Paul In Saudi can drop by and either confirm this or call me a bonehead. :smack:

[leafrog]

I don’t know if this has anything to do with anything, but:
The company I work for provides the corporate day-care center for Starbucks’ headquarters in Seattle.

The name of the daycare center?

the mermaids lagoon

(no capitals, no apostrophe) :dubious: