Quotes About Categorization

I don't like labels. I don't understand the need for them. When you define yourself a certain way, people have expectations.

We, as a people, we have a strong need to categorize everything. We put labels on everything and it's a totally understandable need because we are animals and we need to understand order and where to fit in.

The will to label will always prevail over what's being labeled, usually at the expense of either truth or understanding.

That's one of the problems with this country: they put you in a box. You're a Republican, you're a Democrat, you're conservative, you're liberal. And that's really unfair.

I am an actor. It's very unfair when people categorise and term me as a television actor or film actor.

The narrow-minded find it convenient to create stereotypes, and then try to fit everybody, everything and every situation into those stereotypes.

Most people in the U.K. discovered me playing a standard on Parkinson. In America, it was on VH1 singing an original called 'All At Sea,' which is a contemporary pop song. So the people that know me there tend to think of me in the singer/songwriter category.

Typically, booksellers like to put things into neat little categories.

That was how we categorised ourselves in the dressing room - you were either a nerd or a Julio. Julios have got to look perfect - the hair has got to be perfect, they've got to have the right gear on, it's all about their appearance. The nerds weren't bothered about how they looked.

It's normal when there's a new show on the air to say this is the new 'Game of Thrones' or this is the new 'Vikings,' because we need to put things in boxes.

Just figure out what you think jazz is, and then if it fits into that category, it's jazz, and if it doesn't, it isn't. It's no big deal.

about organizing books in his home library, and putting a book in the Arts and Lit non-fiction section) I personally find that for domestic purposes, the Trivial Pursuit system works better than Dewey.

I personally find that for domestic purposes, the Trivial Pursuit system works better than Dewey.

There's not much you can decipher in their faces, really. There's not much that sets them apart from single people; try dividing people you walk past into one of life's four categories - happily coupled, unhappily coupled, single, and desperate - and you'll find you won't be able to do it. Or rather, you could do it, but you would have no confidence in your choices. This seems incredible to me. The most important thing in life, and you can't tell whether people have it or not.

Better to believe that sane people were sane and crazy people were crazy and you could put the two types of people on opposite sides of a wall and keep them separate, clean and tidy. Without that, where did the lunatics go? Where had they gone? Were they among us? Were they us?

At any rate, where books are concerned, it is notoriously difficult to fix labels of merit in such a way that they do not come off.

Standard Industrial Classification (SIC)

So I separated all my books into stacks: best friends, old friends, classic friends, new friends, and casual acquaintances.

I'd like to meet the man who decided that people do or don't look Jewish. What the hell does that mean anyway? Is it the American penchant for pinning things down, catergorizing, for pigeonholing people? Whatever it is, it's wrong.

Now, when Marilyn says this—If she were a white girl—it proves what James has feared all along. That inside, all along, she'd labeled everything. White and not white. That this thing makes all the difference in the world.

You understand that Mauve and turquois are not food items, but that they're colors.

and you're welcome to whatever you put a name to." Thus entreated, the two gentlemen (Mr. Weevle especially) put names to so many things that in course of time they find it difficult to put a name to anything quite distinctly,

To name is to dominate, to categorize, to subjugate and, quite literally, to objectify

There's nothing worse than a label to cement people's loyalties.