One of the things I found most helpful is Barthes regular itemization and categorization of concepts. The way I read it, Barthes offers an alternative to a sequential and linear kind of thinking that challenges the binarism at the core of Saussure. Barthes discusses the idea of “presence / absence” as a way of relating concepts, and offers the suggestion of either implying or not implying “i) the mental representation of the relata” or “an analogy between the relata”, or an immediate “link between the two relata (the stimulus and its response)” or that the relata “exactly coincide” or one overruns the other, or they imply “an existential connection with the user” (35-36). While the text could give some more concrete examples to help guide readers, it’s an interesting framework for how we classify the connections between things.
The Elements of Semiology relies on two core examples that emerge frequently: references to the Highway Code and, somewhat amusingly, the fashion industry. I say amusingly because it appears almost like a fixation and it also makes me think of the notion of the ‘seam’ that Barthes elaborates on in The Pleasure of the Text.
When discussing the semiological sign, Barthes goes beyond language. His philosophy opens up the world in that way: everything is open to interpretation. The world is composed of signs and signifiers. He gives the example of how the colour of a light tells us to drive forward or not in the Highway Code. Where linguistics and semiology differ is that semiological systems “have a substance of expression whose essence is not to signify” (41)---and yet they do. Barthes refers to “sign-functions” that come to take on meaning and, while they seem arbitrary, “as soon as there is a society, every usage is converted into a sign of itself” (41). A helpful example is the idea of how someone might wear a raincoat for the practical purpose of not getting wet in the rain, but also implies a certain relationship to the situation.
To me, that’s what is so revolutionary about Barthes from a literary standpoint. Interpretation is not just about the words on the page, but their context as well. He also addresses the idea that interpretation is not as simple as this-stands-for-that; signs have a meaning that is separate and distinct that exist on a separate plane. Barthes says that
the signified is neither [the mental representation], nor [the real thing], but rather [the utterable]; being neither an act of consciousness, nor a real thing, it can be defined only within the signifying process, in a quasi-tautological way: it is this ‘something’ which is meant by the person who uses the sign. In this way we are back again to a purely functional definition: the signified is one of the two relata of the sign; the only difference which opposes it to the signified is that the latter is a mediator. (43)
As you can likely tell, the language is quite complex. With a focus on the utterable, Barthes says that objects, images, and gestures “refer back to something which can only be expressed through them” (43) but that the “semiological signified can be taken up by the linguistic signs” (43). Barthes talks about sweater weather in that respect: “a certain sweater means long autumn walks in the woods; in this case, the signified is mediated not only by its vestimentary signifier (the sweater), but also by a fragment of speech” (43). Again: the context in which signs appear matters.
Barthes discusses the idea several times of trying to transfer the meaning of one field into another. For instance, if you think about music, the meaning is essentially felt and then is offered verbalized signifieds (e.g. “anguished, stormy, sombre, tormented, etc.”). They are all signs for a musical signified to something that, essentially, cannot face “verbal dissection and no metaphorical small change” (45). These descriptions are referred to as metalanguages.
There is some pretty challenging discussion of how different metalanguages can interact with one another and what determines whether they are closed or open systems. There’s the notion of syntagms, which are kind of like a collection of signifiers that are associated together in the same place. Conversely, “several lexicons—and consequently several bodies of signifieds—can coexist within the same individual, determine in each one more or less ‘deep’ readings” (47). That overlap, actually, makes me think about The Pleasure of the Text being the seam where things overlap and are about to come apart. Essentially, signification “does not unite unilateral entities, it does not conjoin two terms, for the very good reason that signifier and signified are both at once term and relation” (48). Barthes says that ambiguity is exactly what forms semiological discourse, even in its clumsiness (48).
At its core, Barthes is still addressing the idea of difference. Saussure suggests that all linguistics is a relationship of differences (this-not-that). Barthes does some interesting discussion of the way that oppositions can sometimes be identical and gives some examples of words in French that sound the same despite having different meanings about number or time frame (e.g. finit/finissent, mange/mangent) (79). Semiology, in Barthes’ account, seems to suggest that we can go beyond the binaries of either/or and move towards a more both/and/neither.
(Sort of) as promised, I’m keeping this review short to try to keep my time management and priorities in check (new year, new me). I have two more Barthes texts on my shelf and I will be periodically reading him to try to enrich an understanding of the world.
No comments:
Post a Comment