Roland Barthes was a semiotician who built upon Saussure's theories of semiotics. He believed that cultural influences shape the meanings of media texts over time. Barthes also explored how myths are created through social values and systems. In his work Mythologies, he analyzed how visual symbols and images in works of art can become elevated to the status of modern myths. Barthes viewed any text as having a potentially infinite number of meanings that could be derived depending on the perspective and interpretations of the reader.

1. ROLAND BARTHES
F L E U R F E E N E Y

2. INTRO
• Built on Saussure’s theories of semiotics but then combined that with denotation and
connotation.
• Barthes said that cultural hegemony is very influential in the meaning of media texts,
and so the meaning of different texts changes with time, culture and the nature of the
zeitgeist.
• This means meanings are not fixed and can change over time or according to different
people.
• Barthes also spoke about codes and conventions – which I can utilize for my
documentary.

3. MYTHOLOGIES
• Barthes published the book Mythologies in 1957.
• It is about how social value systems create modern myths and iconography (the visual
images and symbols used in a work of art or the study or interpretation of these).
• He studies the semiology of myth creation, updating Ferdinand de Saussure’s system
of sign analysis and making it more complex by saying that signs are also elevated to
that level of myth.

4. Barthes says a text is…
‘a galaxy of signifiers, not a structure of signifieds; it has no
beginning; it is reversible; we gain access to it by several
entrances, none of which can be authoritatively declared to
be the main one; the codes it mobilizes extend as far as the
eye can read, they are indeterminable...the systems of
meaning can take over this absolutely plural text, but their
number is never closed, based as it is on the infinity of
language...’ (S/Z - 1974 translation)

5. WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?
• A text is like a tangled ball of threads which needs unravelling.
• Once we start to unpick a text, we encounter an absolute plurality of potential
meanings.
• We can start by looking at a narrative from one viewpoint, considering one previous
experience, and create one meaning for that text.
• You can also unravel the narrative in a different way, from a different perspective or
angle, or using a different experience and create a whole new meaning. This can
continue an infinite number of times.
• texts may be ´open´ (i.e. unravelled in a lot of different ways) or ´closed´ (there is only
one obvious thread to pull on).
• There are different ways I can anchor my preferred meaning in my text, so that I can
mediate that meaning with an audience.

6. NARRATIVE
• There can be an infinite number of narratives, which, equally, can be be in many
different forms.
• Ideas about narrative exist in all cultures. Making it international, trans-historical and
trans-cultural.
• These cultural norms aid in conveying the intended meaning.