Elementi di semiologia. Con un'appendice di testi inediti in italiano

by Roland Barthes, Gianfranco Marrone (editor)

Elementi di semiologia di Roland Barthes è ormai un classico: per la semiotica, che lo annovera tra i suoi testi fondativi; per la filosofia strutturale, che vi ritrova un manifesto teorico di primo piano; per le scienze umane e sociali, verso le quali si propone come l'ultimo, utopico tentativo di unificazione metodologica; per il pensiero militante, che lo considera un modello di teoria critica della cultura e della società. Scritto nel 1964 e pubblicato per la prima volta in Italia nel 1966, concepito inizialmente come una serie di appunti per studenti, il saggio costituisce un'agile sintesi delle categorie d'analisi e dei problemi teorici della nascente semiologia e, oltre a riassumere i principi della linguistica strutturale, applica ad altri sistemi di comunicazione (il vestiario, l'arredamento, il cibo...) gli schemi usati per l'«idioma» della scuola strutturalista. Nella sua Prefazione alla presente edizione (completata da alcuni frammenti inediti), Gianfranco Marrone ricostruisce in prospettiva storica le vicende legate alla genesi del testo, sottolineandone il ruolo cruciale per le scienze umane del secondo Novecento «non foss'altro perché è ormai impossibile leggerlo, o rileggerlo, senza pensare al dibattito che ha suscitato, e che tuttora continua a suscitare, tra gli studiosi di linguaggio e di significazione».

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction, Theory, Semiotics, Linguistics, Language, Literary Criticism

120 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1964

About the author

Roland Barthes of France applied semiology, the study of signs and symbols, to literary and social criticism.

Ideas of Roland Gérard Barthes, a theorist, philosopher, and linguist, explored a diverse range of fields. He influenced the development of schools of theory, including design, anthropology, and poststructuralism.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roland_...

Reviews

[Alan Scott · Rating 2 out of 5]

There is no reason to inflict this text on yourself. If you are looking for a primer, or at least a solid piercing into the semiological membrane, there are far superior works to be had, such as the wonderful "Semiology: The Basics" by Daniel Chandler or "Structural Poetics" by Culler. This book, it seems to me, was meant as a fast and dirty reference for a class or a seminar of Barthes: it rarely defines its terms, it seems disorganized and is also very dry unlike some of others wonderful work, it just lists methods without any reason why one should be interested. The other two books, in particular "Basics," were written long after "Elements" and thus have a historical perspective on the semiology movement, including theory and practice developed well after "Elements" was written, and "Basics" by Chandler even has a glossary of terms at the back. Bartes may be the man, but this is not the book; however, if you are a Bartes completist, already well initiated into the world of Semiology and Structuralism, then by all means pick this up. Everyone else may want to steer clear.

[Luís · Rating 3 out of 5]

Roland Barthes, here, conducts an investigation of linguistics (metalanguage) from its origin to its conception. A very bold study.

[Andrew]

100 pages and a lot of confusion later, I have to wonder… what was the point? First, I’m not 100 percent sure about Barthes’ program of establishing semiology as a metalinguistics (get back to me later on that, it makes intuitive sense, but I’m not 100 percent sure I’m on board), and I haven’t read a lot of the material he’s referencing, and when I have it’s been a while (15+ years since I’ve read Saussure). And the whole thing is awfully, awfully dense, with the sorts of equations the structuralists loved, but which seem more truthy than truthful. Skip.

[Alexander · Rating 4 out of 5]

This short and dense-ish book is everything it says on the tin. It is Barthes’ introduction to semiology, although the stress should be laid on the fact that this is Barthes’ introduction, which means this isn’t quite the walk in the park that that might otherwise imply. In fact its short length is what, if anything, counts against it, the Elements being one of those books that would have benefited from being longer, and spending more rather than less time on its subject matter. Nonetheless for those like me, who, having soused in the atmosphere of these ideas (Derrida, Deleuze, Foucault) without ever having seen them systematically laid out, the Elements is something like a skeleton-key, unlocking and explicating ideas that only ever seemed scattered and alluded to, rather than directly spelled out.

And ‘spell out’ is just what the Elements does, albeit precisely in mode of a dictionary or a reference book, providing just enough of a gloss to get the rough idea of terms and their interconnections, even if leaving one hungry for more in its wake. Consider the following then, an appetiser to an appetiser: for Barthes, semiology is basically a generalized linguistics. Linguistics applied extra-linguistically, if you will. That is, by ‘extracting’ the analytical concepts of linguistic analysis – in Barthes’ time, the entire vocabulary of concepts revolving around the ‘sign’ (signifier and signified, language and speech, etc) – one can, with some judicious tweaking, use these terms in the analysis of the world at large. From fashion to food, advertising to writing, there is a ‘vestimentary rhetoric’ no less than a ‘alimentary language’, each of which can be analysed by way of linguistic terms.

It’s an ambitious project – one involving the explication not only of complex and highly technical terms from the then-nascent science of linguistics, but also the concrete analysis of all sorts of objects and systems in the world. Exactly how much of this semiological project remains active today remains something of a question, which gives this book the feel of a historical document as much as a technical pamphlet, each an aspect of interest on its own terms. On a personal note, it was an absolute delight to find here, laid out, as if an obvious set of terms de rigueur, what I otherwise thought were mostly idiosyncratic, made-up expressions from Deleuze and Guattari’s A Thousand Plateaus: neologisms like ‘form of content’ and ‘substance of expression’ – as it turns out, perfectly standard terms from (60s French) linguistics. Who knew? (OK, I, kinda, but not to this extent).

[Mohamedridha Alaskari محمد رضا العسكري · Rating 4 out of 5]

ان عناصر سيمياء الدلالة لدى بارت فقد حددها في هذا الكتاب، وهي مستقاة على شكل ثنائيات من اللسانيات البنيوية وهي: اللغة والكلام، والدال والمدلول، والمركب والنظام، والتقرير والإيحاء(الدلالة الذاتية والدلالة الإيحائية).

وهكذا حاول رولان بارت التسلح باللسانيات لمقاربة الظواهر السيميولوجية كأنظمة الموضة والأساطير والإشهار... الخ

ويعني هذا أن رولان بارت عندما يدرس الموضة مثلا يطبق عليها المقاربة اللسانية تفكيكا وتركيبا من خلال استقراء معاني الموضة ودلالات الأزياء وتعيين وحداتها الدالة ومقصدياتها الاجتماعية والنفسية والاقتصادية والثقافية. و الشيء نفسه في قراءته للطبخ والصور الفوتوغرافية والإشهار واللوحات البصرية.

ومن منطلق بارت بوجوب بناء السيمولوجيا فأنه يبدأ بالدال والمدلول ويفككها ويستند في اغلب تفكيكه وبناءه الى الفيلسوف سوسير الذي يعد رائدا في هذا المجال.

[أحمد شاكر · Rating 4 out of 5]

واحد من الكتب العظيمة رغم صغر حجمه..

[Gabrijela · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pet godina studija lingvistike u stotinjak stranica - predivno!

[Kenny Kidd · Rating 4 out of 5]

A weird choice for my last book of 2022 lol.

Got what I wanted/expected, I suppose! I now feel like I kinda know what’s going on when I hear people talking about Semiology, Metalanguage, etc. The section on Syntagms is particularly dense.

[Fadwa · Rating 4 out of 5]

٥ نجوم لمقالة موت المؤلف؟ مية نجمة وألف قبعة.
عبقري لأبعد حد في هذه المقالة مع أنها الأقصر.

[Muntather ‎ Alsawad · Rating 4 out of 5]

مقالات متنوعة، بعضها مكرر في الكتب الأخرى، لكنّه ثقيل من حيث طريقة معالجة الأفكار المطروحة، ويستحق الكتاب قراءة أكثر من مرة، ولاسيما في القضايا التي تتعلق باللغة والتعامل معها ومع الأدب، والكتاب يطرح الأسئلة ويثوّر أخرى في ذهن المتلقي

[Carrie Callaway]

finally finished! not doing a star rating for this one either because i feel like i didn’t understand enough to really judge it lol

but i like to read things that i don’t fully understand, it’s a nice little workout for my brain and when i inevitably come back to this in however many years it will get easier

plus what i did understand i thought was interesting

[Dominik · Rating 2 out of 5]

może nie trafiłem w czasie, ale kompletnie mija się to z moimi potrzebami. choć lubię, szanuję i cenię lingwistykę. przypuszczam zresztą, że jest tysiąc lepiej napisanych i bardziej zrozumiałych wprowadzeń w semiotykę, która potrafi być mega sexy... ale tutaj nie:( nie wykluczam, że kiedyś tu wrócę, ale już bardziej obudowawszy się w tych de Saussurów i Pierceów

[avah · Rating 3 out of 5]

We need to ban france

[أحمد أبازيد Ahmad Abazeid · Rating 4 out of 5]

منذ زمن لم أستمتع بنصّ عن الكتابة و الأدب كهذا , كتاب صغير يضم مجموعة من الدراسات كتبها رولان بارت , و من ضمنها خطبته في افتتاح مقعد السيميولوجيا في الكولاج دو فرانس , و مقاله عن موت المؤلف .

[staeph · Rating 4 out of 5]

Saggio molto interessante che introduce a concetti di linguistica, trovando il suo fondamento nella scuola strutturalista. Nasce per studenti e devo dire che è scritto in modo molto chiaro e conciso, perciò fa il suo dovere, dato che l'ho letto per un esame universitario.

Molto bello il fatto che ponga determinati concetti non solo in prospettiva di un linguaggio verbale ma anche guardando ad altri ambiti, come la moda o l'alimentazione.

Brillanti anche alcuni scritti in appendice, che consiglio di non saltare per alcune intuizioni assolutamente valide ancora oggi.

[hayatem · Rating 4 out of 5]

الكتاب تجسيد للإشكاليات الأدبية واللغوية بكثافتها، واختلاف مدارسها وأجناسها الفكرية، بما فيها اشتغالات القراءة كمنهجية متعددة و كفعل نامي عن اللغة بوصفها بنية ذهنية.

[زهير قرطيطة · Rating 4 out of 5]

ترجمة موفقة جدا.
عن الأدب وتدريس الأدب والتحليل البنيوي وموت المؤلف وولادة القارئ وبعض الأفكار الأخرى في مقالات وحوار واحد.
يحاول بارط لمس بعض خيوط السيميولوجيا في التحليل النقدي للنصوص.

[Kira L'Dante · Rating 3 out of 5]

Shorty must be a French theorist the way I find her impossible to read.

[Achmad Soefandi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dalam buku ini dijelaskan mengenai pemikiran Rolland Barthes khususnya dalam kajian ilmu Semiologi. Karya lain barthes sendiri dalam kajian semiologi ini sebenarnya tidak hanya dalam buku ini dalam karya lainya mitos. Barthes sendirilah yang mencetuskan kajian ilmu semiologi ini, kajian semiologi sebenarnya masih muda dan ada beberapa anggapan bahwa semiologi tidak bisa menjadi sebuah kajian ilmu pengetahuan.

Semiologi sendiri berasal dari kata semion (tanda) dan logi (pengetahuan). Jadi secara garis besar semiologi merupakan ilmu yang mempelajari tanda. Tanda sendiri sangat berkaitan dengan bahasa. Dalam mencetuskan kajian semiologi sendiri barthes sangat terpengaruh oleh Ferdinand de Saussure. Ferdinand de Saussure adalah tokoh yang biasa dijulki oleh bapak strukturalis. Dalam pemikiran struksurasil sendiri masyarakat berjalan secara teratur dan setiap sistem dalam masyarakat menjamin keteraturan tersebut.

Saussure adalah tokoh yang mengkaji bahasa (Linguistik). Dalam bahasa (Language) menurut Saussuure tersusun dari penanda dan petanda. Penanda adalah bentuk verbal dan petanda adalah konsep dari penanda. Contohnya jika kita menyebut kata kucing penandanya (hewan yang berkaki empat, berbulu, memiliki cakar dan gigi taring) bentuk fisik, sementara petandanya( adalah kucing merupakan hewan peliharaan, hewan karnivora) keonsep pengetahuan tentang kucing. Jika penanda dari kucing dan juga petandanya digabung itulah bahasa atau language.

Dalam buku ini juka dijelaskan bahwa Saussure membagi Language (bahasa) menjadi 2 yaitu: Langue dan parole. Langue bentuk bahasa yang digunakan masyarakat secara umum dan pembentukanya merupakan bentuk dari konsesus, contohnya bahasa jawa sunda dan lain lain. Sementara Parole adalah bentuk bahasa yang diucapkan khas oleh masing masing individu. Dalam mengkaji Language, Saussure lebih menekankan penyelidikanya terhadap langue, karena menurutt Saussure cukup dengan mengkaji Langue kita akan bisa mengerti parole, karena menurut Saussure parole hanya turunan dari langue. Dari pandangan Saussure inilah yang kelak banyak filsuf yang menentangnya antara lain Ludwig wittgentstein, Jaques Derrida dan Barthes sendiri. penolakan Wittgenstein terutama sewaktu dia menghasilkan traktat filsafatnya yang kedua adalah bahasa setiap wilayah tidaklah selalu sama terkantung bentuk social cultural nya, jadi menurutnya tidak bisa mengkaji bahasa hanya dari langue nya saja seperti yang diungkapkan Saussure. Derrida juga menolak pandangan Saussure tersebut menurut fisuf yang terkenal dengan dekonstruksinya tersebut, karena pembagian bahasa seperti yang dilakukan Saussure hanya menyebabkan kita jatu pada logosentris, Logocentris adalah pola pemikiran yang meyakini suatu hal dan berdampak menolak realitas yang sebenarnya.

Dalam karyanya ini barthes menolak dan merevisi pandangan Saussure, dia menggunakan konsep penanda dan petanda. Akan tetapi barthes menariknya lebih luas, dalam merevisi pandangan Saussure barthes juga memanfaatkan keadaan masyarakat dalam mengkajii masalah bahasa, menurut Barthes dalam masyrakat pada saat itu (dan masyarakat modern) penggunaan bahasa tidak hanya menggunakan bahasa bahasa denotative (bahasa sebenarnya) akan tetapi bahasa konotatif sudah mulai digunakan khususnya dalam karya karya sastra pada masa itu. Jika sudah dijelaskan tadi bahwa Language terdiri dari penanda dan petanda yang membentuknya.

Dalam karya barthes ini language tidak hanya berhenti pada penggabungan antara penanda dan petanda, akan tetapi penggabungan penanda dan petanda tadi menjadi tanda, dan selanjutnya masuk pada penanda dan petanda tingkat 2. Maksudnya jika penggabungan penanda dan petanda tadi akan membentuk bahasa denotasi contohnya jika kita mengucapkan bunga maka benar benar bunga yang disebut. Jika dalam penandaan (Penanda dan Petanda = tanda) tingkat 2 sendiri kata mawar bisa menjadi memliki makna yang banyak. Dalam penandaan tingkat 2, tanda (gabungan antara penanda dan petanda) yang berasal dari penandaan tingkat pertama menjadi penanda. Dan untuk mengisi petanda dalam tingkat 2 biasanya berhubungan dengan penandanya. Contoh bunga dalam penandaan tingkat 2: penanda adalah tanda tingkat peratama (bentuk dari bunga beserta konsepnya) sedangkan petandanya tergantung dari kita yang mengisi contohnya (cantik, menarik, elegan dan sebagainya).

[Jimena · Rating 4 out of 5]

Aquí puedes encontrar de forma, simple y clara, los elementos que componen la semiología de Barthes.
El autor lo contrasta con los estudios de Saussure y otros investigadores relevantes para la materia.

[Phillip · Rating 4 out of 5]

Barthes is like the master of figuring out what physical artifacts and actions mean. This is the second book of his I've read (the other, Camera Lucida, was about photography). Basically, as the name implies, Elements of Semiology is a summary of the major innovations of semiology, which is the study of sign systems. Much of the basis of semiology comes from Saussure's Course in General Linguistics (which I've read in part), but then there were a few other theorists who took Saussure's work in different directions and challenged some of his precepts. Barthes gives us a solid analysis of Saussure's original principles, the conversations/evolutions of those concepts, and then evaluates the contemporary state of semiological theories from his own point of view.

As far as the writing goes, for critical theory Barthes is remarkably readable, which is always a boon for those of us trying to make our way into a theoretical discourse. There were some sections where he got bogged down a bit in the terminology (many of the words in semiotics are somewhat similar and it is easy to misread--signifier and signified are the big two concepts and they are only one letter apart), but I think these sections are more a result of the material than Barthes' style.

[Gerardo · Rating 5 out of 5]

E' un testo molto agile, utilissimo per chi ha bisogno di reperire velocemente informazioni sul mondo della semiologia.

In più, è il testimone di un'epoca in cui gli studi semiologici stavano formandosi: tant'è che si noterà subito come Barthes cerchi di adattare studi linguistici al mondo dei segni in generale (non solo linguistici, ma anche oggetti, immagini, suoni).

Per quanto piccolo, il testo è molto denso e va letto con particolare attenzione. Non privo di tecnicismi, bisogna comprenderne per bene il significato prima di poter continuare con la lettura.

L'importanza di questo testo sta nel fornire al lettore la consapevolezza che non esistono elementi neutri all'interno della società umana, ma che tutto nasconde al suo interno un'ideologia. La semiologia, quindi, permette di estrapolare questa 'partigianeria' dagli oggetti per poter capire meglio il mondo (e per potersene difendere).

[ebrar]

semiyoloji dersi almış bir tasarım öğrencisi olarak kitabın bir noktada görsel öğelere değinerek ilerlemesini beklemiştim. tamamen dil ve kelime yapılarıyla ilerlediği ve özellikle fransızca örneklerden gidildiği için bazı şeyleri kafamda oturtmakta zorlandım.
kitabın başında zaten o dönem semiyoloji üzerine çalışmaların olmadığına değiniliyor, bunun yanında ben kendimce beklentiye de girdim. bu yüzden pek aradığımı bulamadım ve bağlantı kurması zor oldu benim için.

[Leonart Maruli · Rating 3 out of 5]

Aduh, saya sulit sekali mengikuti logika Barthes di dalam traktatnya ini. Filsuf favorit saya masih Karl Popper dan Bertrand Russell karena tulisannya lebih mudah "terbaca".

[Jake · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was my introduction to Roland Barthes, and it was surprisingly accessible. As the title of this work suggests, Elements of Semiology presents some of the core Saussurean ideas that collectively make up semiology – the hermeneutic science of signs, symbols, and visual systems.

What I find particularly fascinating about semiology is the quasi-Platonic impulse guiding it. There is this underlying assumption that the world is textual and, as a text, its contents can be read to produce a plurality of meanings. We suddenly find ourselves actively immersed in systems of language with – and without – speech. It leads Barthes and other semiologists to treat the everyday as worthy of interpretation. Banal objects like clothing, furniture, or movies become imbued with meaning in Barthes’ writing.

No subject is 'beneath' philosophical examination here. Semiologically speaking, elements of contemporary popular culture could be as intellectually relevant as anything in the Western tradition. Indeed, the techniques of semiology could equally be deployed to analyze anything from Oprah Winfrey to MTV, or from Socrates to Kant. A wonderful idea that is also surprisingly pragmatic for a French postmodern thinker.

Now, there is an unresolved elitist tension in the text. Semiologists seem to hold the hermeneutic keys to unlock this plurality of meaning. Barthes writes: “We might say that society, which holds the plane of connotation, speaks the signifiers of the system considered, while the semiologist speaks its signifieds […]”. The problem is that, through processes of naturalization, language and sign systems become “concealed” from us over time. What Barthes means by that is something akin to what Heidegger says about Dasein. He continues: “[…] [the semiologist] therefore seems to have the objective function of decipherer (his language is an operation) in relation to the world which naturalizes or conceals the signs of the first system under the signifiers of the second; but his objectivity is made provisional by the very history which renews meta-languages." Is everyone capable of becoming a semiologist, or is this something reserved exclusively for the intellectual class? If only the latter, does this collapse into a state of affairs in which philosopher kings hold a monopoly over interpretation? Unfortunately, Barthes doesn't elaborate on this point in this short work. Maybe he does elsewhere?

So it would appear that signs contain many different meanings, but some meanings are preferred over others. In turn, the resultant normalization of preferred readings are then circulated, repeated, and taken for granted. For example, this is why arrows have come to broadly symbolize objects of direction over anything else. Barthes would say that the directional interpretation of an arrow is just one reading of the symbol. Even more to the point, this singular reading of the arrow is quite divorced from the complex historical, cultural and anthropological origins of the bow-and-arrow as a technological artifact of ancient hunter-gatherer societies. Barthes doesn’t talk about hegemony in this text, but it would have been interesting to see how he understood hegemony in relation to linguistic preferentiality.

Semiology is a really attractive and useful way of thinking about the world. For that reason, I will keep literary criticism as one analytical tool among many others in my historian’s toolbox.

[Stephen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Semiotics and semiology are the study of signs and symbols, understood as anything (images, movements, gestures, sounds, objects, rituals, conventions, colours, marks) which communicate a meaning other than the sign or symbol itself. The communication may be intentional (as in speaking, writing or drawing) or unintentional (as in blushing, the fruity-smelling breath of diabetics, or leaving fingerprints). It can be interesting to watch scholars debate whether semiotics is part of semiology or semiology is part of semiotics; scholars are like that. Linguist Ferdinand de Saussure, in his book "Course in General Linguistics" (1916) imagined that there was (or could be) a science of signs of which linguistics was only a part. In "Elements of Semiology" (1964), French semiotician Roland Gérard Barthes (1915-1980) opined the opposite: that semiology was a branch of linguistics. Barthes' text was first published as an article in a French scholarly journal; and was only later translated into English and published as this book. This is the sort of stuff which is of interest to anthropologists, sociologists, literary critics and psychoneurologists. And I found it pretty interesting, too. I have not read much of this sort of writing since completing a masters degree in human communication theory some fifty years ago. Barthes wrote sixteen other books; I'm not going to read those. The bibliography to this book is almost entirely in French; I'm not going to read those books, either. But it was great mental fun to expand the concept of signs beyond Arabic numbers and the English alphabet and red circles with lines through them. Barthes uses examples such as wine-drinking customs in French society, restaurant menus, fashion in clothing, models of automobiles, African drums, styles of furniture, the films of Charlie Chaplin, and Classical Greek architecture. He insists that signs can communicate through sight, sound, touch, smell and taste. The Italian semiotician and novelist, Umberto Eco published an academic book "A Theory of Semiotics (1975). He then wrote the novel "The Name of the Rose" (published in Italian in 1980 and in English translation in 1983). That novel is all about signs and the process of signification. It is built on a semiotic foundation and examines, continually, the difficulty of interpreting signs. I loved Eco's novel; it is interesting to revisit my recollection of it through the lens Barthes affords.

[Mohamed Karaly · Rating 4 out of 5]

يضم هذا الكتاب الصغير الرائع مقتطفات صغيرة من إنتاج رولان بارت، فهو يشمل درس افتتاحى لكرسى السيميولوجيا فى كوليج دى فرانس، وحوار بين رولان بارت و م. نادو، إلى جانب ثالثة مقالات أخرى، أهمها مقالة عظيمة تقوم فكرتها على تمييز بين ما يسمى بالأثر الأدبى وما يسمى بالنص، وهذا العنصران لا يوجدان بشكل مستقل وواضح، والأغلب أنهما إحالاتان مجردتان من نزاع أطراف متشابكة ومتنازعة فى أى كتابة. يصف بارت "الأثر" بكل ما يخص خلفيتنا المعرفية التقليدية عن الأدب : فهو الكتابة التى تتمركز حول معنى محدد يُوصّله كاتب متعالى على قارىء، وتقوم فكرة "الأثر" على حاجز واضح بين مؤلف وقارىء. فى مقابل هذا،هناك ما يسمى ب"النص"، وهذا النص كما فهمته هو شىء غير موجود إلا كبذرة لإمكانيات مفتوحة، ولم أشعر به إلا كالكتابة المفتوحة الشاملة التى يتوهم الذهن إنه يكوّنها أثناء النوم وعندما يستيقظ يجد إنها تبددت من دماغه، فالنص فى مقابل الأثر هو "فضاء لغوى" ، هو نوع من الشفافية المحايدة المتمثلة فى بنية مفتوحة من قواعد اللغة ونُظمها بأكملها، كل اللغات، دون أن تستأثر لغة على أخرى بسلطة من "المؤلف" ، وهو ينبوع مفتوح لتعدد المعانى يشارك فيه القارىء. إن النص يوتوبيا اجتماعية وبكلمات بارت : "هو ذلك الفضاء الاجتماعى الذى لا يدع أى لغة بمعزل عنه وخارجه، ولا أى فاعل فى عملية التعبير فى مكان الحاكم والأستاذ والمحلل والمعترف والمنقب". وأيضا : "إن النص بما هو مستوى الدال وانتظامه، فهو ينتمى، على طريقته، ليوتوبيا اجتماعية. إنه إن لم يكن يحقق، قبل التاريخ، شفافية العلاقات الاجتماعية، فعلى الأقل شفافية العلاقات اللغوية، إنه الفضاء الذى لا تتغلب فيه لغة على أخرى، والذى تروج فيه اللغات وتدور". ١
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ومن خلال هذه المقتطفات يظهر تأكيد بارت على ضرورة تحليل صوت السلطة الخفى فى الأدب، سواء إنتاجه أو تدريسه، والفكرة المجردة الحلمية الممثلة فيما يسمى بالنص، فى مقابل الأثر، تظهر كيوتوبيا، لغوية فى المقام الأول، ثم اجتماعية، تختفى فيها السلطة، فالنص هو فضاء محايد ومفتوح، هو نقل شفاف ل" بنية اللغة"، البنية الذهنية الممثلة فى اللغة، والتى تسمح بفضاء مفتوح من اللعب، ويتوازى هذا مع فكرة المقالة الأخيرة عن "موت المؤلف" ، انتفاء سلطة المؤلف وتلاشى ذاته، تلاشى سلطة معارفه وتاريخه واعترافاته، فالكتابة الحقة، كتابة النصوص، تجعل ذات المؤلف تتلاشى، لا تتأكد، تتلاشى أمام بنية أسبق تتخلل الكيان الشفاف للكاتب، الذى يصبح بذلك مجرد "ناسخ" لا"مؤلف". ٢

[A. B. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Difficult and obscure. Not sure I understood much besides the main themes.

The theses Barthes is arguing for and some of the important terms are:
(1) That instead of linguistic being a branch of semiology, semiology is a branch of linguistics
(2) Introduces Saussure's Langue-Parole distinction and opines that we need a third level -- matter as opposed to language and usage. This would be the level which allows us to account for the existence of languages without execution.
(3) Signifier-Signified relation is arbitrary as per Saussure, but sometimes a sign-function develops that dialectically the signifier signifies the signified and the signified signifies the signifier.
(4) Syntagm vs System (Associations) are the two axes of language. Syntagm is the meaning of multiple words together which cannot be dissociated from each other e.g. human language. System (Associations) is when terms are united or associated with each other e.g. education with upbringing.
(5) Denotation-Connotation. We need to distinguish the expression, plane of content, and the relation between the two. A connotation examines how one system can act as a signifier of this first relation, specifically how it represents the expression within the first system. A metalanguage is a system whose plane of content is itself constituted by a signifying system; a semiotics which treats of a semiotics.
(6) Synchrony-Diachrony. The aim of semiological research is to reconstitute the functioning of the systems of signification by building a simulacrum of the objects under observation. This is synchronic.

[Emannuel K. · Rating 2 out of 5]

Barthes é um dos meus teóricos preferidos, mas linguística não é bem meu forte, e é o elemento central desse livro. Ele começa com alguns conceitos bem básicos, do tipo que aprendemos nas aulas de português, depois desenvolve algumas questões interessantes a partir disso, passa por um capítulo inteiro no qual eu não entendi praticamente nada e conclui trazendo de volta para questões interessantes. Acho que, para quem gostaria de ter um contato mais sistematizado com a metodologia de Barthes, o apêndice de Mitologias é um lugar muito mais interessante de se começar. Nesse volume também fazem falta os lampejos de genialidade próprios ao crítico, já que ele se concentra aqui em resumir conceitos desenvolvidos por outras pessoas. Ao mesmo tempo, a imagem de uma ciência da semiologia continua difusa. Esperava que esse livro apresentasse alguns mecanismos próprios, que pudessem ir além do feijão com arroz estrutural, mas não foi o caso. O fato de ser essa a edição lusitana também não ajuda. A tradução é truncada, e parece fazer uma transposição dos exemplos do autora para a língua portuguesa que não são dos melhores (sem deixar os originais em notas de rodapé e nem mesmo uma "nota da tradução" que justifique essas medidas). Me prova não só que realmente não curto linguística como também que a obra de Barthes foi ficando mais interessante conforme foi se tornando menos programático (ou seja, mais "pós-").

[Nizar · Rating 4 out of 5]

كتاب يقرأ ويقرأ ويقرأ.

عندما يكتب رولان بارت، فإن الكون كاملًا يتكاتف لينتج فكرًا عظيمًا، ينقله لنا عبر بارت. هذا الكتاب، صعب، على الرغم من سلاسته وصغر حجمه، إلا أنه يحتاج منك التزامًا وجدية. بارت يقرأ بجدية والتزام.

يطرح بارت هنا العديد من الأفكار، عن تطور مفهوم الأدب، وما علاقة اللغة بالنص؟ وما ارتباط القارئ بالكاتب؟ وما هو دور الناقد؟.
وليزداد الجمال جمالًا، كتب مقدمة هذا الكتاب المعلم كيليطو بترجمة عبد السلام بنعبد العالي. ألم أقل لكم بأن الكون يتكاتف مع بارت؟

في حديثه عن أزمة الرواية، يقول بارت رأيه -والذي وبنظري، لا يزال قائمًا-: "لا تكون الأزمة حيث تقل الموضوعات والكتب. بل إن فترات الأزمة تعرف على العكس من ذلك تزايدًا في الموضوعات والكتب. وفيما يخص الرواية فإن الإنتاج ظل على الأقل يعرف نفس الوتيرة. كلا، الأزمة تكون عندما يكون الكاتب مضطرًا إما للاجترار أو للانقطاع عن الكتابة، أي عندما يجد نفسه أمام اختيارين حاسمين: إما أن يكرر ويجتر أو ينسحب".