Post Entry #5 11/27/12

Throughout the book, White Noise, a major recurring setting is the grocery store. A place to find nourishment through the advertisement overdosed store becomes a central location in this post-modern text. The significance of the super market is that it gives us insight on what exactly "White Noise" is to the author. Whether through the background presence of the people or the sheer amount of advertising, the super market helps the author communicate a key underlining message.

Murray is the first to show the white noise, or white sight, by opening up an idea for Jack. Murray’s flavorless, tasteless packaging gives Jack some realization of how the food advertisement affects him. "It seemed to me that Babette and I, in the mass and variety of our purchases.... in the sense of replenishment we felt, the sense of well-being, the security and contentment these products brought to some snug home in our souls." (20) By never being exposed to another choice before Murray's groceries, Jack now took into account how his groceries made him feel. The advertising constantly being linked into his food, and although sub-consciously processed, were not understood until now. Possibly advertisements had moved to a more sub-conscious appeal, where the observer does not even realize the own advertisement is affecting themselves.

The next supermarket trip shows the readers that the white noise is really there, and has been. Jack, although accompanied by Murray, comes to a conclusion that what around him is unable to be comprehended by people. "The toneless systems, the jangle and skid of carts, the loudspeaker and coffee-making machines, the cries of children. And over it all, or under it all, a dull and unlocatable roar, as of some form of swarming life just outside the range of human apprehension." (36) There are these electronic sounds, and screeches, and people talking, and children crying but no individual sounds were recognized. Not until Jack took into account the surrounding around him. Once he removed himself from his personal life bubble, the white noise around him is separated into the all the parts that make up its whole.

There are noises and then there is white noise. The only difference is that white noise is all of the noises complied together to make something that is only understood as a whole. In our society and in this text, people do not want to, or care, to listen to the makings of the white noise. Things are only truly understood once the white noise is replaced with the pieces that it is made up of. That's my problem with this book. Maybe it should be looked at in pieces instead of as a whole. I wonder if that's what the author wants.