Semiotics: Roland Barthes

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Semiotics Roland Barthes

• and Advertisements

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Outline

• Major principles in semiotic readings
• Sign systems fashion as an example
• Semiotic reading (1) denotation and connation
• Semiotic reading (2) first and second-order
  signification. (literal language and
  meta-language)

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Major principles

• All the cultural products and activities read as
  process or results of signification. No meaning
  is inherent or natural.
• 2. There are more than one relations between
  signifiers and signified. (iconic resemblance,
  indexical cause, symbolic arbitrary).
• 3. There are more than one level of meanings. ?
  denotation and connotation.

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What kinds of signs are they?

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Sign System difference and the two axes.

• All social practices as sign-systems and thus
  are open to cultural interpretation (or
  de-mystification).
• e.g. meaning of Jacket defined by its context.
• e.g. the langue of clothes (selection
  combination)

System a. blouse, shirt, T-shirt
b. skirt, trousers
sentence blouse skirt high heeled shoes X snickers 2. blouse jeans snickers ?X not for concert sentence blouse skirt high heeled shoes X snickers 2. blouse jeans snickers ?X not for concert
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Fashion and Myth

• . . . Mist gold, pure gold, and black gold are
  all flashing in full glamour since most
  collections are heavily weighted toward evening
  cloths with an ostentatious dressing chic.
• If gold is too much for you, dont worry, for
  here comes the backup that makes you in style as
  well, the color of camel! As usual, camel has
  always been playing its role of warming up the
  winter, but never has it ever been so elegantly
  carried out by the blazing gold like this year.
  (Sophie Ko)

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Examples of languages used in fashion

• Leather, of course, is something that cant be
  left out in each winter.
• Fur, for sure, is a must, especially for
  collars,
• As for trousers, they really do need to be
  slim-fitting and skinny-legged to be chic this
  season!

(Sophie Ko)
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Semiotic reading (1) Denotation and Connotation

• e.g. Panzani pasta
• 1. Denotation the real objects in the scene
• The signifiers these same objects
  photographed.
• 2. half-opened bag ? spilling out onto the
  table ? freshness, the domestic
• 3. Italianness (red green white)
• 4. a total culinary service
• 5. Arrangement like still life painting

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Semiotic reading (2) Different levels of
signification primary signification secondary
signification
sign (full)--denotation
a signifier signified

• primary signification
• Secondary signification
  

Sign (empty)/ Form content sign
--connotation
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Semiotic reading (2) Different levels of
signification primary signification secondary
signification
sign (full)--denotation
Signifier signified (home)

• primary signification
• Secondary signification
  

Sign (empty)/ Form content sign
--connotation Homepage, country cottage, etc.
Barthes examples rose, black pebble.
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Myth
colonialism
militariness
Signifier signified Young negro, in uniform,
saluting, With eyes uplifted, fixed on the
tricolor
sign (full)denotation (Black solider saluting
a French flag) Patriotism/submission

• primary signification
• Secondary signification
  

Sign (empty)/ Form content sign
--connotation France as a Great empire,
loved by all her sons.
Barthes examples rose, black pebble.
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Myth distortion, naturalizing

• regression from meaning to form, from the
  linguistic sign to the mythical signifier. ...the
  form does not suppress the meaning, it only
  impoverishes it, it puts it at a distance...
• myth hides nothing its function is to distort,
  not to make disappear
• Target Myth has an imperative, buttonholing
  character ...it is I whom it has come to seek.
  ...
• For this interpellant speech is at the same time
  a frozen speech at the moment of reaching me, it
  suspends itself, turns away and assumes the look
  of a generality it stiffens, it makes itself
  looks natural and innocent

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Three positions in reading a myth or an ad

• 1. producer of advertisement -- focus on an empty
  signifier, let the concept fill the form of the
  myth without ambiguity use a simple system of
  equation, where the signification becomes literal
  again the Negro who salutes French imperiality
• 2. reader of advertisement an inextricable whole
  made of meaning and form, amazed at its
  greatness, absorb its messages willingly.

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Three positions in reading a myth or an ad

• 3. Critic clearly distinguishes the meaning and
  the form, and consequently the distortion which
  the one imposes on the other, I undo the
  signification of the myth, the saluting Negro
  becomes the alibi of French imperiality.

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elements of an ad.

• 1. the slogan (or copy)
• 2. the visual image--with the slogan, it implies
  a story
• 3. supplementary --color, design where the
  product, the words are placed
• colour,
• size and position,
• texture
• celebrity endorsement

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Ads languages -- from Ways of Seeing

• The romantic use of nature (leaves, trees, water)
  to create a place where innocence can be found.
• The posed taken up to denote stereotypes of
  women serene mothers (madonna), free wheeling
  secretary (actress, king's mistress), perfect
  hostess (spectator-owner's wife), sex-object
  (Venus, nymph surprised), etc.
• The special sexual emphasis given to women's
  legs.

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Ads languages -- from Ways of Seeing (2)

• The materials particularly used to indicate
  luxury engraved metal, furs, polished leather,
  etc.
• The physical stance of men conveying wealth and
  virility.
• The equation of drinking and success.
• The man as knight (horseman) become motorist.

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Examples for analysis identity

• 1. ??????????????????????Style, GD 85.
• Signs book stacks, darkness, fire, silver.
• 2. ??????????
• Signs office space, meeting, short-haired men
  and women
• ?????????????
• Signs play sign, cartoon sign, swinging the hair
  left and right.

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Examples for analysis identity (2)

• 3. ???????????
• Sign ????ballet skating red vs. white ice
• 4. ?????????????????Samsung, ??????
• Signs castle, well-ornamented stairway,
  pallace-like mansion, evening gown.
• 5. ???????????????

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Key words for Structualist and Semiotic
approaches

• I. Following language as a model
• II. Disclosing the deep/basic structure of a
  text, which is a (combination or selection)
  system of meaning composed of basic elements such
  as

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• -- binaries, or semiotic rectangles,
• -- roles/actant and functions, or narrateme,
• -- story and discourse,
• -- narrator- narratee,
• -- metaphor and metonymy,
• -- grammatical parts of speech, or lexemes,
• -- signs or signification on different levels
  (signifier and signified).

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Questions

• Reductive? Disregarding meaning, textual
  complexities, or the authors intention?
• De-centering, dehumanizing?
• Do we really think in terms of binaries?

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Connections

• How is our social existence modeled after
  language as a system of relations?
• From work to text (textuality)
• From identity to system of relations
• From myth to ideology
• Myth -- the complex system of images and beliefs
  which a society constructs in order to sustain
  and authenticate its sense of being.
• From structuralism/semiotics to
  postmodernism/poststructuralism

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Assignments for next week

• 1. First paper at least four pages.
• 2. Summary Quiz 1
• 3. M Butterfly Act I
• 4. Textbook pp. 75 Daffodils poems