Barthes and Matt's Excellent Adventure

In the selection The Pleasure of the Text (1973), it appears Barthes is able to acknowledge the unhealthy reading habits of the impatient reader and offer the appropriate form of interaction with text. By implementing a metaphor comparing reading text to the beauty of the human body, Barthes is able to assess the  problems with impatiently reading text and offer his opinion of how to interact with the text to create value.

Barthes argues that the common reader is obsessed with functionality and wants the answers immediately. Thus, he asserts that the reader skips over what he or she deems extraneous and attempts to temporarily dive into the text, expecting the meaning of text to reveal itself in only that segment. Comparing the text to a striptease, the metaphor of the text as a beautiful body shows that this type of reader tears away the clothes feverishly to reveal the body instantaneously rather than enjoy the show. In saying this, I think he is criticizing the progressive speed of society and how that progressive attitude will spread to even the most fundamental aspects of modern life. Reading text in this case, has become more about the specifics rather than the entire work. This calamity leads the reader to simply regurgitate information from the text rather than gain genuine knowledge from what the text is saying. Leading to readers who speak as if they know, when in actuality, they are approximating the meaning of texts and consequently, creating a rift between the text and its meaning.

In addition, Barthes explains merely reading a text and agreeing with its principles is a useless interaction with the text. Barthes denotes this reader as a "voyeur" who simply gains pleasure as a witness rather than a participant. Meaning the reader observes the text but creates no true meaning or interaction from it. On the other hand, questioning and challenging the text creates a direct relationship between the reader and writer. In summation, by reading texts perversely, Barthes believes we can infinitely create, while in contrast, observing texts limits creativity to mere conformity.

BoredCaitlin, Barthes

“...what I enjoy in a narrative is not directly its contents or even its structure, but rather the abrasions I impose on the fine surface: I read on, I skip, I look up, I dip in again.” (Barthes 1973, 109)

Reading this quote from Barthes reminded me of a concept I see often in media and literary criticism known as “death of the author,” or as John Green likes to call it, “books belong to their readers”. Surely the creator of any given text doesn’t intend for a reader to “skip... look up... [and] dip in again,” but to Barthes, the only thing that matters  is what he sees in a text. The creator’s intention is completely irrelevant. This implies that when a text is open and available to the public, it doesn’t belong to its creator anymore, but to its spectators. One could say that a work isn’t really complete until readers impose their analyses. When one analyzes a text, one will always bring their own biases and experiences to their reading. A common reaction I see to unusual interpretations of a work skirts along the lines of, “are we reading/watching/looking at the same thing here?” On the surface it may seem that way, but quite often different readers will impose different interpretations on the same work, and thus not technically be looking at the same thing. For example, many read the song “Let it Go” from the Disney film Frozen as a metaphor for embracing sexuality. However, there may be just as many listeners who read the song, and the character of Elsa, as an allegory for mental illness. They may be different interpretations, but they both work well because “Let it Go” can lend itself to many perspectives, and thus many different readings. In fact, I think this concept is discussed rather well in PBS Idea Channel’s video about Frozen and audiences’ reactions to the film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVscW9LEMp0

EDIT: Well, looks like I wrote this thing without knowing that Barthes was the one who coined the term "death of the author." I feel awkward now...

IMoreno - De Saussure

After a few rereads of the initial paragraphs, I realized that I had forgotten a lot more than I initially thought. Although some of it brought back faint memories, most of it seemed like a foreign language to me.

Within the first pages, De Saussure goes on to explain the connections that several people make depending on their own societal experiences and correlations. Within these communities, a string of words can have a unique meaning when compared to another community. "If words stood for pre-existing concepts, they would all have exact equivalents in meaning from one language to the next; but this is not true" (De Saussure 2012, 8). Without having to even change languages, Saussure goes on to explain how linguistics are tied in to ideas and these ideas can vary greatly.

De Saussure goes on to talk about how despite the differences, the same phonetic sounds can unite people. His look at linguistics and his interpretation of the subject had me rereading over and over again as I tried to grasp the concepts. Hopefully I will be able to revisit the reading when I am better equipped.

De Saussure

When I read the title of the assigned reading, initially I felt like it was going to be self-explanatory. However, from the first paragraph, my prediction proved to be wrong. Although it was a very detailed section on linguistics, it was extremely eye-opening. I have to admit, it was a little difficult to follow due to wordage, yet it was very thought-provoking.

The creation of linguistics is so interesting and something that I don't fully understand. In our everyday lives we use words that hold a meaning to us and the people around us, yet we rarely know the origin or backstory for the words themselves. De Saussure states that "the characteristic role of language with respect to thought is not to create a material phonic means for expressing ideas but to serve as a link between thought and sound, under conditions that of necessity bring about the reciprocal delimitations of units" (2012, 5-6). Instead of viewing language as a way to convey ideas, we should view it as the binding factor. "Linguistics then works in the borderland where the elements of sound and thought combine; their combination produces a form, not a substance" (De Saussure 2012, 6).

He continues to explain that linguistics serves as a link instead of a substance because not every sound represents an idea, and only that idea. There are many ways to convey ideas by using numerous words. De Saussure argues that the notion of value versus significance is completely different in the sense that words may have the same meanings but hold different purposes in different contexts.

The reading took the topic of linguistics and shed some light on a totally different way of thinking. It was a great way to start the semester by delving into a break down of the way we communicate every day.

Kayla Salyer, Berman

Materialism. This is a term that is ingrained in human beings from the moment we are able to understand the meaning. Americans are materialistic. The rich countries are materialistic. Humans are materialistic. We surround ourselves with the things that make up are lives.
Yes, this does not define every individual. Many believe that love, kindness, hope and many other concepts and actions are not based on materialism, and yet this does shape a big part of our lives. People strive for more, both in the materialistic world and the intellectual world. This is what makes modernism possible. Why is it that we strive for things to such an extent? Why are we all not striving for what makes our lives more meaning on an intellectual side?

"All our inventions and progress seem to result in endowing material forces with intellectual life, and stultifying human life into a material force" (Burman 1982, 20). Burman explains that modernism is obtained through both the intellectual and the material aspects of our lives. Without the strive towards stronger better things people would cease grow and thrive.
Despite my wish for people to be only driven by love, kindness, hope, I find that our world would be nothing it is today without materialism. Through science we are able to reach new levels of intelligence which, in turn, forms modernism. I am then forced to acknowledge that materialism, in its original form, is necessary, and helpful for our society. The need for the constant growth in material things is what drives much of our modern world.

As Burman describes it, "It is ironic and contradictory, polyphonic and dialectical, denouncing modern life in the name of values that modernity itself has created, hoping -- often against hope -- that the modernities of tomorrow and the day after tomorrow will heal the wounds that wreck the modern men and women of today" (1982, 20). Dangers cannot stop the flow of life because 'the grass is always greener on the other side'. As far fetched as it may sound, this can be translated to the need for materialism. Human beings need something in their lives to drive them to keep living, whether it is spirituality, science or the simple concept of 'life will get better', we use material things as a way to find meaning in our lives. We use materialism as tool to seeing the future as a better life. We want the faster cars, and the nicer cloths. We want the faster computers, and the thinner phones. This gives us something to work towards, something to push us towards a better future

Although materialism is looked at as somewhat of a bad thing, I would like to put forth the idea that it has shaped much of our modern world. Without the constant need for newer, better, and simply more things, we would have a very different world today.

My boy Barthes

"Text of pleasure: the text that contents, fills , grants euphoria; the text that comes form culture and does not break with it, is linked to a comfortable practice of reading" (Barthes 110, 1973).

"Text of bliss: the text that imposes a state of loss, the text that discomforts (perhaps to the point of a certain boredom), unsettles the reader's historical, cultural, psychological assumptions, the consistency of his tastes, values, memories, brings to a crisis his relation with language" (Barthes 110, 1973).

- At first, reading these 3 and a half pages, I was very confused. To be honest I still am a little confused. I have had to read paragraphs over and over. It is quite funny as I sit here not knowing what most of these words mean but also kind of sad. What I think Barthes is trying to say is that people read to fill themselves with pleasure and not to challenge their minds. To not make their minds uncomfortable. That culture has created a "text of pleasure" that goes with culture and everything that you know. But on the other hand the "text of bliss" challenges those ideals. But reading a  "text of bliss" does not necessarily make it fun. It is not what we want to read but sometimes is what we need to read.

I have grappled with this concept for a while now, reading and re-reading. I hope I do know sound wrong, but the concept of "the text of pleasure" is a hard one to grasp beneath what I am saying.

"Thus, what I enjoy in a narrative is not directly its content or even its structure but rather the abrasions I impose upon the fine surface: I read on, I skip, I look up, I dip in again. Which has nothing to do with the deep laceration the text of bliss inflicts upon language itself, and not upon the simple temporality of its reading" (Barthes 109, 19873).

Brooke Bumgarner - De Saussure

There have been countless times when I have asked others, and myself, where do our words come from? More specifically, why are all the words we use significant for what they are in reference to, or in essence, the word that defines said thing? Sure, there were words that “made sense”, words such as anthropology (anthro meaning human, logy meaning study of, therefore the study of humans) for these words use suffixes with origins, but still I wondered, how were the suffixes then decided?

As De Saussure points out, “Psychologically our thought – apart from its expression in words – is only a shapeless and indistinct mass” (De Saussure 2012, 5). With such thinking, I always wondered about the significance of each word. I always wondered about the word toilet. I wondered why it was that that object in the bathroom was titled a toilet. To me, a word like dishwasher made sense, for just as the name implies, it washed dishes. But toilet… why? I couldn’t understand how such a shapeless idea, or thought, had gained its name.

Reading further, the idea of how a sound becomes a sign started to make sense to me. De Saussure wrote, “Each linguistic term is a member, an articulus in which an idea is fixed in a sound and a sound becomes the sign of an idea… Linguistics then work in the borderland where the elements of sound and thought combine; their combination produces a form, not a substance” (De Saussure 2012, 6). So then, it wasn’t really the word that defined the thing. It was the phonetic sound paired with the idea that created the sign representing the word. Still then, he notes, “Not only are the two domains that are linked by the linguistic fact shapeless and confused, but the choice of a given slice of sound to name a given idea is completely arbitrary” (De Saussure 2012, 6).  And so with his use of the word arbitrary, I began to make some connections. Language is said to be arbitrary because each word we use for each object or concept we refer to, does not necessarily have an exact rhyme or reason to it, that’s why in different languages, different signs are used to represent different things. For example, in Spanish, el baño, is the bathroom, however, it is also the word they use for the toilet. Yet in Italian the word toilet is toilette. And for us, it is simply a toilet.

This further helps me to understand the differentiation between value and significance. For as De Saussure explains, value is only relevant when there are relationships and differences that create significance for the word (De Saussure 2012, 9).  Therefore, a toilet would not be a toilet if it were not in a bathroom, for in a bathroom a toilet may be situated next to the sink, where one would wash and maintain cleanliness and would find a toilette (or cloth). The significance of the word toilet, is not the word itself, but rather what is done in the bathroom, on the toilet, to stay healthy and clean. The value of a toilet is not determined by what we call it, but by why we use it, and why it is needed (its significance) and thus has a word signifying it.