Roland Barthes

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Roland Barthes

• Myth Today (1957)

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The Life of Roland Barthes

• Barthes born in Cherbough,Manche on Nov.12,1915
• 1916- After fathers death, Barthes and
  mother,Henriette move to Bayonne where he spends
  childhood
• 1924- Move to Paris and attends Lycee Montaigne
  until 1930.
• 1927- Henriette gives birth to illegitimate
  child, Barthes half-brother, Michel Salzado and
  is denied financial help from her parents. She
  becomes bookbinder to support her family.
• Barthes studies at the Sorbonne classical
  literature,Greek tragedy,grammar and philology,
  and receives degrees in classical literature
  (1939) grammar and philology (1943)

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• 1934- Contracts tuberculosis and spends app. 3
  years in sanatoriums. His illness prevented him
  from completing doctoral research so be began to
  read and soon began his writing career.
• 1939-52 Teaches at lycées in Biarritz(1939),Bayo
  nne (1939-40),Paris (1942-46),French Institute in
  Romania (1948-49), University of Alexandria,
  Egypt (1949-50), and Direction Generales des
  Affaires Culturelles (1950-52)
• 1960-76 Director of studies at Ecole Pratique
  des Hautes Etudes
• 1967-68 Taught at Johns Hopkins University
• 1976-80 Chair of literary semiology at College
  de France

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The Works of Roland Barthes

• Le Degré Zéro De L'Ecriture (Writing Degree Zero-
  1953) published as series of articles in Albert
  Camus journal, Combat. Establishes Barthe as
  leading critics of Modernist literature in
  France. Introduces concept écriture or scription
  as distinguished from style, language, and
  writing
• Michelet Par Lui-Même (1954), biography of Jules
  Michelet who was a 19th century historian and
  focused on how existential reality is given to
  historical moments and related to historians
  writing
• MYTHOLOGIES (1957) uses semiological concepts in
  analysis of myths and signs in contemporary
  culture. Analyzed newspapers, films, shows,
  exhibitions being connected to ideological
  abuse.Myth Today is the last essay from this
  collection

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• SUR RACINE (1963) was most controversial work due
  to nonscholarly appreciation of Racine.
• ELÉMENTS DE SÉMIOLOGIE (1964) deals with his
  views on the science of signs based on
  Ferdinand de Saussures concept of language and
  analysis of myth and ritual
• S/Z (1970) applied structural linguistics which
  analyzed Balzacs short story Sarrasine

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Key Concepts in Myth Today

• Myth a type of speech
• - Everything can be a myth if communicated
  through discourse
• - No such thing as an eternal myth human
  history determines reality through speech and
  that is constantly changing
• - Myth not defined by its object or material
  because meaning is arbitrary

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• Myth Part of Semiology
• - Semiology is a science of forms that studies
  signification separately from its content
• - Tri-dimensional pattern of Myth
• -signifier
• -signified
• -sign
• - Myth is a second-order semiological system
• - comprised of semiological chain that existed
  before it
• - the sign in the first-order becomes the
  signifier in the
• second
• - form (signifier)
• - concept (signified)
• - signification (relationship between
  signifier signified)
• - First-order semiological system
• - meaning (signifier)
• - concept (signified)
• - sign

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Myth Made Up of Two Semiological Systems

• Language-object ( linguistic system)
• - the language is what myth constructs own
  system from
• Metalanguage
• - Myth is a second language that refers to the
  first language