Assignment 3 -Decoding advertisements

Choose a current advertisement or campaign and drawing on the work of Barthes and others, analyse it to show how it derives and conveys its meaning to its intended audience. You will need to apply the principles of simple semiotic, structuralist and post-structuralist analysis.

Introduction

For this assignment I have chosen a Conservative Party Election Broadcast from 2015 as it has many elements of an advert- it’s a large company selling a product through a constructed ‘reality’. Also, having won the 2015 election and in the light of recent events such as the referendum, terrorist attacks, a second (optional) election, ‘strong and stable’ government turning to a ‘coalition of chaos’, and most recently the appalling loss of life in the Grenfell tower block fire, has the reality of the offered vision for our voters really come to fruition? Are other interpretations possible which are more accurate and less dishonest?

The Broadcast;

I have taken the broadcast from the internet at https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=conservative+party+election+broadcast+2015

where it is freely available to those who have a computer and knowledge of how to use it. The original broadcast was likely meant to attract a particular demographic of established older adults (young  ones are traditionally less likely to vote and are less valuable as viewers/consumers).  I have included  images and both spoken and written text from the broadcast. After introducing some terminology I’d like to take certain frames, and analyse possible meanings contained within them.

What is reality?

In order to analyse the broadcast it will be important to introduce ideas about what reality actually is.  It may seem simple, but on closer analysis it is not. Ferdinand Saussure (1857-1913) and Charles Peirce (1839-1914) independently laid the foundations of semiotics, the study of signs, which are essential to how we perceive our reality. Peirce proposed that ‘we think only in signs’ (Chandler, 1994), and it is reasonable to assume that meaning is not simply ‘transmitted’ to us but that ‘we actively create it’ (Chandler, 1994).

Linguistics and semiotics

“Semiotics is the study of everything that can be used for communication: words, images, traffic signs, flowers, music, medical symptoms, and much more.”                                                                                                                                                                                                        (Bybee, 2000)

Linguistics is a special case of semiotics. Linguistic meaning is found by decoding words and sentences using the (English) language. Roland Barthes gives a clear analysis of how meaning is built up from a word in Rhetoric of the image (Barthes, 1993 p.33). If we take the word ‘rose’ we can make a simple semiotic analysis (table 1).

Table 1. Semiotic analysis of the word ‘rose’

	Analytical method
	Saussure	Peirce
the physical sound or text	signifier	representamen
mental concept	signified	interpretant
Physical object	Not included	Object/referent
Combination of above	SIGN	SIGN
Number of elements in SIGN	2	3

Peirce’s method differs from Saussure in several ways. The terminology is different and the Sign concept has 3 elements not 2.  Whilst Saussure applied his theory to language, Peirce was interested in how we sense the real world and added a physical object. He also allowed that the mental concept is an interpretation of the signified giving the listener/viewer more input over meaning. His method is more dynamic than Saussure’s signified; the representament-interpretant couple can be iterated successively (one interpretant becomes the representamen for the next) allowing for chains of signifieds, and shifting meanings (Chandler, 1994).

Fig 1. and 2.show images (signifiers) suggesting a reality of a youngster walking into a garden, and a baby in a chair surrounded by toys and photos (the signifieds).  The spoken text begins ‘What do I want for my children? I want them to be happy……etc…’ . The linguistic message is built up through the individual words as in table 1. It suggests voters’ children will be secure and happy when the conservatives deliver shrewd economics.

From a young age children learn to interpret visual images of ‘things’ as a  representation of reality (Barthes, 1993: p. 36), thus the images are also  signifiers at the lowest level of meaning; the denoted message.

Fig. 1 Youtube: John Moore (2015)

Fig. 2 Youtube: John Moore (2015)

Structural analysis

Structural analysis is a study of text as a whole and the kinds of interrelationships/contrasts that the system builds into itself to give it meaning (Bybee, 2000).  It is closely related to semiotics. Meaning is built up within a text through the choice of signifiers chosen from a collection of binary opposites.

This strategy tends to favour one choice over its opposite, illustrating the  paradigmatic  aspect of structuralism. For example male> female, white> black, rich> poor and young>old. Additionally, the syntagmatic aspect says that spatial structure of signifiers is important in conveying meaning and is biased (reading English text from left to right for example) (Pooke and Newall, 2008 p.102). It is now possible to see how several layers of meaning (connoted messages) are constructed in the broadcast using structural analysis and a system of signs as in table 1.

Stuctural analysis of the broadcast

There are many types of media including visual, auditory and tactile. Each has its own characteristics.  Images, especially photographic and moving filmed images, tend to be interpreted as very ‘real’ compared to others. The TV images are meant to signify a voter’s real life. The images are accompanied by written text and voices, which are also interpreted as more real, more personable, and allow a much richer range of signs than, say text alone (Chandler, 1994).

The music and voices used throughout this film are very benign. The music is catchy if a little insipid. It has a simple structure; essentially a repeated tune and harmony for each scene, suggesting (ie. a sign) a pleasant wandering between the scenes and families. Spoken text corresponds to the voter’s requirements from a government, and voices are adult representing different geographical areas, origins, nationality, sex and class, a sign that everyone will benefit from voting conservative. Each spoken statement is followed by a ‘response’ from the Conservative party, which is reinforced by the perfect cadence which lands on it. Dominant-tonic harmony is a strong musical sign of stability and strength. All these aural meanings are connoted messages.

At the connoted level meanings begin to multiply quickly. Fig 1 and 2. Shows that technical ‘filmic’ methods have been used to increase the sense of reality (real>imitation). The French windows are opened, the child walks through, and we (the camera) follows. The whole scene (the whole advert too) is in slow motion which means ‘relaxed, gentle and reassuring’. Meaning is transferred through ‘Conservative Blue’, both in the baby’s toys, and in the strange blue haze in the scene (this seems not to be a reproduction artefact- has a camera filter been used here?).

The (simplified) analysis in Fig. 1and 2 might be summarised; the scene uses signifiers of children, babies, educational toys, photos, a suburban garden, relaxation, a benign regional accented voice, gentle movement and  music. These signify a successful life, economic wealth, stability, the birth and nurturing of children. These in turn signify (either individually or as a repeated chain) the Conservative ideal, and a life you will get if you vote Tory. Each signified transfers meaning through their hidden opposite-childlessness, difficulty, unintelligible harsh voices, poverty, and change. The addition of text to the images helps to keep the number of meanings under control, through both anchorage and relay (Barthes, 1993: p. 37)

In the park

Fig.3 Youtube: John Moore (2015)

Fig. 4   Youtube: John Moore (2015)

Voiced Text: I want him to grow up in a Britain where there are doors open to him, so he can get on, get a good job………’.

In fig. 3 and 4 we see several signified/signifier couples (signs) which transmit the meanings paternal and pastoral care (the son, dog and ducks),  family life and values (leisure time, active paternal engagement), and the importance of a capitalist society for happiness (business and jobs). These hidden biased positions are referred to as discourses.

This scene nicely illustrates Peirce’s three different modes of sign.The linguistic message is symbolic (signifier related arbitrarily to the signified), the video image is both iconic (relation based on likeness), and indexical (the relation is direct) (Chandler, 1994). In fact the infant fulfils all three types simultaneously; indexical via the process of filming (a direct connection between the infant and the image-the unique ‘having been there’ character of photography (Barthes, 1993: p 40); iconic as we interpret the image as a real infant, and symbolic because children and babies hold meanings such as trust, prosperity, and happiness. As we move through indexical, iconic, and symbolic, the signifieds become more ‘arbitrary’ and less ‘motivated’ (the connection between signifier and signified is ‘looser’).

Symbolic signs, the infant, ducks and dogs in the park, dad’s protection, and the importance of businesses and jobs in society, are heavily determined by cultural factors (Chandler, 1994). Our Western culture puts a large value on discourses like a good and stable job, a home, children, and possessions.  All these signs and discourses operate via the chosen half of a binary opposition. Arguably other ways of measuring a good and stable life are possible.

Post-structuralist analysis:

Post-structuralism emerged in Paris in the 1960’s as a reaction to Structuralism, through the work of Jacques Derrida, Jean Baudrillard, Michael Foucalt, and Roland Barthes.

Post-structuralism holds that the study of underlying structures is itself culturally conditioned and therefore subject to myriad biases and misinterpretations. To understand an object (e.g., one of the many meanings of a text), it is necessary to study both the object itself, and the systems of knowledge which were coordinated to produce the object.

New World Encyclopaedia (2015)

Post-structuralists rejected the inherent dominance within binary pairs, and allowed a signifier to be emptied and of no fixed meaning New World Encyclopaedia (2015). This deconstructed message represented a different and potentially more accurate view of reality (see my BLOG for a deconstruction of the anthems ‘God save the Queen’ and ‘Jerusalem’ ). To illustrate the process I will investigate the underlying structure and reality by deconstructing the later broadcast scenes which focus on David Cameron, his family and the Tory party (fig 5-8).

Fig. 5 Youtube: John Moore (2015)

Fig. 6  Youtube: John Moore (2015)

Fig. 7  Youtube: John Moore (2015)

Fig. 8 Youtube: John Moore (2015)

Fig 5-7 show the Prime Minister watching his son play football, scoring a goal, and then back at home for the family dinner (the salad bowl resembles a trompe d’oleil Dutch still life-like the shopping basket in Barthes’ analysis of  a Panzani advert (Barthes, 1993: p 35). It is east to see the constructed  meanings of the signs in these images.

Deconstructing the scenes may reveal alternative truths about life which are not part of conservative ‘brand’. In a stable happy family, it is not necessary for son’s to play football whilst dad watches (male> female), and mum stays at home making the dinner. Daughters could play football, mum’s watch, goals do not indicate success,  and the son and dad could be home enjoying more ‘feminine’ pastimes, such as baking or preparing the dinner.

It is also possible that a worthwhile happy family life can be enjoyed by people who do not correspond to the narrow view of normality seen around Cameron’s kitchen table. The family could be mixed race, same sex parented, may be childless, looking after an elderly relative with physical or mental disabilities. This deconstructed analysis questions why some meanings are inherently chosen. A more balanced view will give more space and ‘air time’ to less socially acceptable realities that are possible in the UK. The final scene (fig. 8) shows a union jack, and the take home linguistic message on a conservative blue background. The union flag represents a strong discourse about British history, involving male domination, mercantilism, war, imperialism, colonialism and slavery. A deconstructed view of this image might describe British family life from the point of view of feminism, Queer theory, LGBT society, altruism, pacifism and post-colonialism.

Conclusion

I have shown how this party political broadcast has constructed many meanings in many different ways, in order to create an illusion of reality which might allow an election victory. This version of reality has been contrasted with other versions which are possible in UK society.

These may be more (or less) accurate, honest and real- or they may not be. Some people’s reality will not have corresponded to the vision offered, others’ may have.  Probably no ‘fixed’ reality exists, and the best notion of it is multifactorial- involving words, images, signs, physical objects, and the different points of view of lots of different theoretical ‘isms’. However I think this best shot at reality is likely to include, and possibly highlight, those aspects which are hidden, but still detectable within this broadcast.

Illustrations

Fig.1-Fig. 8.   John Moore (2015) [Youtube webpage]  at https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=conservative+party+election+broadcast+2015 [accessed 29th June 2017]

References

Barthes, R (1999).  ‘Rhetoric of the Image’ in visual culture: a reader. Evans, J and Hall, S (eds.). London. SAGE Publications.   P33-41

Bybee, C, 2000. Semiotics and structuralism [online] at http://journalism.uoregon.edu/~cbybee/j388/semiotics.html [accessed 29th June 2017]

Chandler, D (1994): Semiotics for Beginners [online] at http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/ [accessed 29th June 2017]

Moore, J (2015) conservative party election broadcast 2015 [Youtube webpage] at https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=conservative+party+election+broadcast+2015 [accessed 29th June 2017]

New World Encyclopaedia (2015) Post-structuralism [online] at http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Post-structuralism [accessed 29th June 2017]

Pooke, G and Newall, D (2008) Art History. Abingdon.  Routledge.

 

 

Deconstruction-analysis of two texts

1. God Save the Queen

 

 

2. Jerusalem  by William Blake

 

 

 

 

Project- Deconstruction

Notes on the theory of Deconstruction:

• People: – Jacques Derrida (main founder), Nietschze, Heiddiger, Marx, Althusser , Plato, Saussure,

Eg. Marx’s “Religion is the opium of the masses” is Deconstructionist,  breaking down the discourse of powerful religion to effect the weaker society.

• Institutions- works to expose institutions of Religion, Law, Political class, Males, Whites, Colonialists………
• Era- late 60’s to 1980’s (context -Paris student riots- overcoming government, independence of Algeria over colonial French)

What does it do? It’s a Post structuralist, Post-modern way of reading Texts……. Eg text, images, films…..

Derrida’s essay  “Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of Human Sciences”,

It allows us to deconstruct the text and reveal it’s inherent CONSTRUCTEDNESS.

Western thought and philosophy is not a ‘natural’ but is constructed and cycled through society by institutions forming a Discourse. Since PLATO Western philosophy iss dominated by various ideas, inc.  Religion, enlightenment, Binary opposition, Centredness, Hierarchy, unchanging sign-signifier-signified , voice over writing,

• The binaries are endless – male  v female, young  v old, west v East, Good v Bad, God v devil…………..speech v writing. These dualisms are never equivalent; they are always hierarchically ranked.
• Queer theory, feminism, post-colonialism are related ……..these are attacks on the stsus quo of powerful institutions.

Deconstruction involves

1. Technical aspects: voice v writing, graphie (written form) , gram, differance, trace (the originary- but is not original and has no centre),
2. Revealing the inherent biases and positions of a text: re frozen signs/ bias of one of the binary pair
3. Allowing an alternative meaning/reading/discourse……where there is a slippery/shifting sign , and a balancing of the hierarchical relationship eg….toward the weaker….. and a recognition that there are no absolute oppositions….

Derrida’s ‘différance’ is both  semiotic and philosophical. The a represents several features in the application of this theory:

• Différance is the difference that shows there is no origin (Différer =to differ). Something can only differ wrt to something else…..
• Différance  is written: we can see the a that we cant hear it ( voice has no  hierarchy over writing)
• Différer [to defer] is to displace, shift, or elude. It means that signification is not static, but always changing. There is no ‘transcendental signified’.

Bibliography

A.V Club (2010)  Lights! Camera! Deconstruction!: 19 movies that double as movie criticism [online at] http://www.avclub.com/article/lights-camera-deconstruction-19-movies-that-double-47629 [accessed 15th June 2016]

Gnanasekaran, R. (2015) An Introduction to Derrida, Deconstruction and PostStructuralism [online at] http://www.academicresearchjournals.org/IJELC/PDF/2015/July/Gnanasekaran.pdfhttp://www.academicresearchjournals.org/IJELC/PDF/2015/July/Gnanasekaran.pdf
[accessed 15th June 2016]

Stanford university (nd), Jacques Derrida-Deconstruction [online at]https://prelectur.stanford.edu/lecturers/derrida/deconstruction.html [accessed 15th June 2016]

The Bubble (2010), An introduction to deconstruction [online at] http://www.thebubble.org.uk/culture/literature/an-introduction-to-deconstruction/   [accessed 15th June 2016]

 

Author, What author? In your BLOG……..

1. In the light of the two texts on authorship, I made the following observations on two works, by Sherry Levins and Cindy Sherman.

1.Sherry Levine

Fig. 1 Crystal Skull_(2011).

•  Cast-crystal skulls in vitrines are part of Levine’s show at the Whitney Museum of American Art (Fig. 1)
• Sherrie Levine is famous for appropriating others’ work
• See also assignment 2-my annotation of ‘After Walker Evans’
• What of this work?
• Skulls are quite common in art so it’s not immediately obvious if there is an ‘original’ here    eg….Vanitas paintings, mask like primitive African Art, but Damien Hirsts diamond encrusted skulls was a very famous contemporary example of its use (he also uses Vitrines a lot) .

 

• One consequence of ‘the death of the author’ is that one can be more creative about one’s thoughts about a work of art- one is not anxiously thinking ‘I wonder what Dr X said that this painting means…’ or similarly ‘I wonder what the artist really meant ?’…..it really gets you thinking- not regurgitating text from ‘experts’ in a book or on the internet !

• This feels very powerful and empowering. It seems to allow us to reduce the effect of that ‘…Ideological figure by which one marks the manner in which we fear the proliferation of meaning’ (Foucalt, 2003). It’s the same idea as Berger’s complaint about the stuffy detached analysis of two Franz Hal’s paintings which ‘transfers the emotion provoked by the object from the plane of lived experience, to that of disinterested ‘art appreciation’ (Berger, 1972:13).

 

• In relation to Brit pop artist Damien Hirst, the use of a skull and glass vitrine may draw attention to aspects of his art- this skull is less bling, less ‘valuable’ in terms of materials? (and in terms of market value?). Perhaps Levine thinks Damien Hirst’s skull (and perhaps the artist) is overrated, overpriced, and over hyped?

 

2.Cindy Sherman

Fig. 2 Untitled #223. 1990

 

• This looks like a Renaissance picture of Maddona and child (the symbology)
• The background looks Dutch- flowers resemble the Dutch realist’s trompe d’oleil style, which developed alongside the initial development of a well-to-do middle class in Europe.
• Is the idea of Madonna and child an ‘authored original’? No it’s a reworking of Biblical characters. Though much scholarship is invested in deciding what is part of the bible and what is not, the characters in the bible are not controlled and copyrighted like contemporary symbols such as Mcdonalds golden arches. or the coke bottle (though Iconoclasm in various times and by various groups, destroyed religious images thinking them ungodly- ‘Thou shalt not worship a graven image’, )
• The artists painted them at a time when the ideology of authorship was less important, but symbology and reverence to God was more important.
• Hundreds of artists have painted this subject…… Duccio, Sano di Pietro (c 1300) Sassoferrato (17^th C), Marco Basaiti c 1510), Giovanni Bellini, c. 1500
• Could this photograph have a feminist discourse?- we see a false breast, and a removal of overtly sexual organs like breasts?
  • That the idea of an ‘accepted’ image of any woman is damaging to ‘real women’?
  • That the immaculate conception (The virgin Mary) is damaging to ‘real women’ ?
• Her hair garment resembles a Dutch Vermeer sitter , but is the garment Scottish tartan- if so what does it symbolise? Is it irony about the nationality of the Virgin Mary ? perhaps the artist believes that Mary is no more from Nazareth as from the Scottish Highlands? Indeed perhaps she does nt exist at all????
• Is the baby anatomically normal- ? the feet look a little flat and forward- like an animal? The right foot looks like it’s webbed ? What could this mean?? Is this a discourse against ‘perfection’ which could be a feminist/ disabled rights discourse?
• The breasts are not obvious –no flesh is seen- in fact the chest seems rather flat-
• Except a false boob is being sucked by the baby. What does this mean? False boobs are commonly bought by women who are unhappy with their body image ( a feminist symbol?) , they can be used by women who have had breast disease ( a symbol of courage over disability?), and they are FALSE- perhaps the story of Jesus is false and is an IDEOLOGY
• Perhaps the perfect woman is an ideology?
• As usual Sherman puts herself in the image to reinforce that it is a modern appropriation of a text

 

2. If the birth of the reader is at the expense of the author is there still any of Benjamin’s ‘aura’ left?

Benjamin’s text on the original and the reproduction centres around visual images, and the effects of reproduction on the original. In relation to the original alongside a mechanical reproduction ‘the quality of its presence is always depreciated’ what is lost being the aura. Benjamin states that reproduction both  ‘detaches the reproduced object from the domain of tradition’, and reactivates each copy ‘shattering’ tradition (Benjamin, 1999:74).  When we ponder the more general case of loss of authorship- eg in relation to ideas, such as those in written or visual texts, I think it is useful to remember that Benjamin also distinguishes between technical and manual reproductions.

I believe that appropriation of ideas is analogous to the reproduction of an image as described by Benjamin. To see an exact authored text is like the case of technical reproduction (the text technically and accurately reproduces the author’s ideas). To appropriate the text for oneself (to use it to continue meaning-making) is like Benjamin’s reactivation of the exact copy, which involves a little loss of aura but allows a meaningful and powerful creative process to continue. However, the product of one’s appropriation of the original text (in idea or written as text) is akin to the process of manual reproduction- it’s not identical to the original-it involves a human process….- it may be inferior or indeed superior. If the original is of good quality it’s more likely (on balance ) that the next appropriation will tend towards the mean- and be slightly lower quality. In this way we lose some aura of the original each time it’s appropriated. Meaning therefore evolves with the diminishing of aura, and quality may either increase or decrease (based on either a single appropriation, or an overall collective appropriation).

3. Does any of this explain or validate the unregulated nature of the internet?

The internet basically allows any connected person to see other people’s texts (in the broadest sense). It’s in the nature of man to use these and to appropriate ideas and to republish them online, and the shear amount of ideas is impossible to regulate completely (even though most (all?) of these avenues do require a person to attach an identity to the idea however). It’s the shear size of the population of internet surfers, augmented by the ease and speed of appropriation which explains why the internet of ideas too large to regulate.

As for validation of unregulation, I see two sides. Lack of regulation allows plenty of what an evolutionary biologist would call ‘hybrid vigour’- lots of appropriations between lots of different people. This is generally likely to be good for the production of interesting and good ideas. However not all individuals are making quality contributions, and some are downright socially un acceptable, corrupt, criminal, or unpleasant- there is no ‘survival of the fittest on the internet- everyone survives and all ideas remain).

If we consider that we must take the rough with the smooth on an unregulated internet, then great ideas flow, and some people are hurt which is acceptable to us as a net product. This is my belief. If we consider the negatives outweigh the positives, then we introduce regulation (impossible completely anyway), which stifles free speech and ideas, and reduces both the net good and the net bad !

4. Does this invalidate the interest in the artist’s or creator’s intent at the time of making?

I would tend towards a common sense approach. It seems silly to disregard an author’s intent or circumstances (see also my BLOG entry Epilogue-some worries about structuralism)  . This includes his name- because one way or another quality authors who write, paint etc for a living need to be remunerated- or they will starve and their ideas will stop! But reducing the element of authenticity in authorship will allow ideas to flow more freely. We can appropriate them ourselves and make them what we want (equivalent to Benjamin’s manual reproduction). We will still want to read, and view original works and ideas from truly great minds (technically reproduced for us) – Shakespeare, James Joyce, Rembrandt, and the like.

 

Illustrations

Fig. 1 Levine, S. Crystal Skull (2011) [Cast glass] online at   http://whitney.org/WatchAndListen/764 [accessed 8 June 2017]

Fig. 2 Sherman, C Untitled #223. (1990) [Chromogenic color print] online at https://www.moma.org/interactives/exhibitions/2012/cindysherman/gallery/7/#/9/untitled-223-1990/ [accessed 8 June 2017]

 References

Benjamin, W.(1999) ‘The work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction’ in visual culture: a reader. Evans, J and Hall, S (eds.). London. SAGE Publications.      p. 72-8

Berger, J (1972) ‘Chapter 1’ in Ways of Seeing. Great Britain, Penguin.   p.  7-34

Foucalt, M. (2003) . ‘What is an author’ 1969   In  Harrison,C. and Wood,P. (eds). Art in Theory 1900-2000. Oxford. Blackwell Publications. p. 949-953

 

 

 

 

Project-Myth is a type of speech BLOG questions (ii)

I was a little uncertain how to approach this annotation based on the given quotation. I therefore decided to replace this exercise with  some ideas about structuralism based on the book Ulysees by James Joyce. I am currently listening to this book on audible, and thought that the complex nature of the language would make an interesting analysis  with respect to structuralism, myth, and the several layers of meaning which the text might contain……

i.

 

ii.

Project: Structuralist Analysis

This project consists of annotated images of

1.  Two naturalistic paintings- In what ways do the formal and informal have a similar structure?
2. A formal and an informal photograph- In what ways do the formal and informal have a similar structure?                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     1. Two naturalistic paintings.    (right click on image and open in new tab for zoomed view ).   

2.A formal and an informal photograph (right click on image and open in new tab for zoomed view ).

Illustrations

Fig. 1 Durer, A The Hare  (no date) (watercolour and bodycolour on vellum) [online at ] https://www.bridgemanimages.com/en-GB/ [Accessed 27th May 2017]

Fig. 2 Audubon, J. Snowy Heron or White Egret  (no date) (aquatint and engraving with hand colouring ) [online at] https://www.bridgemanimages./en-GB/ [Accessed 27th May 2017]

Fig. 3 Biography.com  Charles Dickens  (no date) [photograph] [online at]https://www.biography.com/people/charles-dickens-9274087 [Accessed 27th May 2017]

Fig. 4  Mccullin, D Biafra (1967) [B& W photograph] online at  http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/mccullin-biafra-ar01203 [Accessed 27th May 2017]

 

 

Project -Author ? What Author

I made the following notes on 2 key texts

1. The death of the author- Roland Barthes
2. What is an author? – Michael Foucalt

The death of the author- Roland Barthes

Paragraph 1

• Barthes begins with a sentence by Balzac, and says that this sentence sums up the problem… it could be representing Balzac the author, Balzac the man,  a character in the story, ‘universal wisdom’ ….and that all writing has this character…..all the voices- the ideas ‘to which we cannot assign a specific origin.
• Literature is always like this and the first identity lost is the one that writes ……

Paragraph 2

• Barthes says that once something is recounted…. and therefore not directly acted out, then it is separated from reality and can’t act upon reality- except as a symbol… once this happens then this death of the identifying voice occurs.

This seems to imply that authorship/provenance can only apply to acts carried out by persons  in reality, everything else is so similar as to be only symbols.

• In ancient times narratives were told only by special people like shamen, but they were not admired as geniuses…….
• at the end of the medaevil times and with movements like  the Reformation, we began to identify more with ’the human person’-the individual.
• This then developed through phenomena like Capitalism to produce the importance of the author as a person.
• The author still dominates all literature – who he is, what he thinks, what he likes and does……,
• Van Gogh is a good example… his work is inseparable from his madness…….
• ‘the explanation of the work is always sought in the man who has produced it’ ….. the author.

Paragraph 3

• Certain people have begun to question this state of affairs, the first in France was probably Mallarmé, who believes that language speaks, and not the author.
• Mallarmés poetic works supressed his authorship and increased the status of the reader.
• Valery made fun of the author in his writings
• Proust blurred the lines between literature and authorship by allowing his words to be written not by those who experiences, or one who writes, but one who ‘will write’ when it becomes possible……. (this seems to me distance words from author a further step)
• Surrealism allowed language that was not edited by the author’s ‘head’ (in automatic writing…. Or painting)  This is said by Barthes to ‘ secularize’ authorship with respect to language……. to reduce its importance over language……..
• Linguistics also, does not require any knowledge of the writer to function.

 

Paragraph 4

• An author is ‘supposed’ to precede his book on a timeline- Like a father the child
• Barthes believes that the modern writer must exist only alongside the text, and that rather than as a recording of something , the text is’ uttered’ and has no content other than by that utterance.
• Like much of Barthes’ writing, the language is poetic, but becomes rather self-consciously prosaic in parts, and a little repetitive.

Paragraph 5

• Writing is not like God’s text- one theological meaning- it is full of hundreds of ideas and these come from all of culture

Paragraph 6

• When the concept of author is discarded the idea of ‘deciphering’ a text is redundant. This idea of deciphering can be left to critics, for whom it is eminently suitable.
• Here we have thoughts which appear very structuralist, that the text is everything, the context of the text is disregarded (see ‘Some worries about structuralism…’ in my BLOG)
•  The author was also the critic historically, and we need to rid ourselves of both.
• The new writing should not contain a ‘secret’ divine meaning, and is thus counter-theological and revolutionary.

Paragraph 7

• Returning to the original example of a speech in Balzac, Barthes states that no one person utters it- but that it is in the reading that it is located…. In every reader…… reversing the usual hierarchy of importance into Reader-writer.
• Using another example of the double-meanings found in Greek tragedy (upon which the tragedy is often based),  the  meaning of the  text is only truly understood by each reader himself (ie. How they interpret it). This idea is a lot like the idea of grounded theory -building up a meaning through foundation layers -which I mentioned in ‘Some worries about structuralism…’ in my BLOG)
• ‘The unity of a text is not in its origins but in its destination’
• ‘the birth of the reader must be ransomed by the death of the author’.

 

References.

Barthes, R ( no date) The Death of the Author  online at http://www.ubu.com/aspen/aspen5and6/threeEssays.html#barthes [accessed 29^th may 2017]

 

2.  What is an author?

p.1.

• The rise of the author (and the work) came into being at a moment of individualisation in fields like science, literature, and philosophy, and became the fundamental unit..
• The author’s name allows functions such as classification of the text, and grouping with other texts …..    (meta- information?)

 p.2.

• Mentioning the authors name puts the text in a ‘discourse’ which is not for common consumption but expects to be given a certain status
• The concept of the author began when discourses were able to become ‘transgressive’ and therefore authors needed to be punished.
• Not all writings have an author……… a letter , graffiti, a legal document has a writer , but not an author ……
• The ‘author function’ therefore characterises ‘the mode of existence, circulation and functioning of certain  discourses within a society’.
• Characteristics of the author function

1. Authored works can be appropriated
2. Authorship can effect different texts differently eg literature in former times (dates unmentioned) literary stories needed no author to be accepted as true and worthy, in contrast Science in the middle ages needed a name in order to be recognised as ‘true’
3. In the 17-18^th C the  functions in b.  were reversed

• Literary texts were valued according to questions about the author and the writing ….and if a text had no author, scholarship was introduced to find it.
• St Jerome proposed 4 criteria for grouping works by the same author
• These essentially relied on the works being of similar value, style, subject, and in the right era of time.
• Modern literature is analysed along the same lines, and any variations in works by the same author (style, subject etc…..) , are made to appear logical through reference to the author and his life (biography, maturity and development etc….)

p.4

• Definition: valorize

1. to establish and maintain the price of (a commodity) by governmental action.
2. To give or assign a value to, especially a higher value: “The prophets valorized history” (Mircea Eliade).

• Foucalt suggests it’s time to assess discourses via ‘modes of existence’ eg. Valorisation, attribution, appropriation, circulation (but does not clearly elaborate further- don’t some of these imply an interest in exactly the author function?
• There follows a rather difficult long paragraph which I cannot fully understand. The author suggests ‘re-examining the privileges of the subject’  and to grasp ‘its points of insertion, modes of functioning and system of dependencies’
• Nevertheless…..the paragraph ends by suggesting that the subject should be deprived of a role as an original and given a value via its role within a complex discourse
• Although we are used to thinking of the author as one who produces ideas ad infinitum, he is not! And in fact we use this author idea to impede free flow and recomposition of ideas.

p.5

• The author goes further by saying that the author’s function set out in the preceding bullet is exactly the opposite of what we think him to be, and so he is ‘the Ideological figure by which one marks the manner in which we fear the proliferation of meaning’
• The author might like to see a time when the role of the author to control the free flow of ideas and use of texts will disappear, but thinks it’s unrealistic that there will never be a constraint on ideas……
• The Author suited the times of capitalism, industrial revolution etc…. but when society is changing (as it is) , authorship will begin to disappear.
• It will be replaced by another concept to constrain….. but what that it we don’t know, and he doesn’t hypothesise.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         Can I think of any ways that authorship has been diminishing in the last few years (which has seen the great digital revolution) ??

  Digital media have made it easy to sample and reform text (in its broadest sense). This has been used by recording artists (the famous court case of U2 against a small band who sampled them).

More traditionally the work of Sherry Levine, a visual artist, has used direct photographs of other artist’s copyrighted) works to produce their art.

The ability of the controlling powers of publishers to detect ‘illegally’ appropriated art (especially music via You tube, streamed music…)  has become greatly diminished. This has inevitably reduced the value of ‘authorship’.  This also applies to the ability to detect reused works……

However, are there good points to copyright laws??

 

Foucalt clarifies  his vision in the last paragraph, by stating several questions which are more easily digestible than other areas of the text. He suggests that in future he’d like us to be asking the following (non-author) types of questions about discourses:

• What are the modes of existence?
• Where has it been used, how can it circulate, and who can appropriate it for himself?
• What are the places in it where there is room for possible subjects?

References

Foucalt, M. (2003) . ‘What is an author’ 1969   In  Harrison,C. and Wood,P. (eds). Art in Theory 1900-2000. Oxford. Blackwell Publications. p. 949-953

 

Project- Myth is a type of speech BLOG questions (I)…..

 1. Minou Drouet was a child poet in the 1950’s. she was so young that people thought her poems must have been written by an adult. But the Chicago tribune thought these were unmistakably written by a child (Engel, 1957). She describes objects in a very honest and child-like way- and with a completely different take to how adults might see them eg. a tree bereft of leaves ‘..seems like a tree drawn by a clumsy child who is too poor to buy coloured crayons and so drew it just with the brown chalk left over from making maps at school.’ (Drouet quoted in Engel, 1957).  These descriptions are so different to how an adult would interpret the world that they nicely illustrate Barthes’s view that there are no limits or rules as to how human societies should describe objects.

2. Other elements within images that can signify passion, emotions or other objects or events…

I.  

Fig. 1 Condron, T (no date)

This joke hinges partially on the idea that  the man with a pipe, bald head, dirty jacket, and scruffy hair is an academic and will therefore be nerdy and not good at small talk!

ii. Fig. 2 Cameron enjoys the Sun

The Sun newspaper has a reputation for being dominated by its titillating page 3 nude girl, and having no news-worthy value.

 iii.

·        Physis- material existence

·        Anti-physis- natural existence

·        Pseudo-physis- links to ideology

 

Fig. 3 Kotliarov, L (1935)

Here the miner becomes a symbol for  Soviet-Communist increases in productivity.

iv.

 

Fig. 4 Ravilious, E (20^th C)  

This artist painted many pictures of the English countryside which seemed to symbolise the idyllic purity and calm that was being threatened by the Nazis throughout world war 2.

5.

‘The meaning is always there to present the form; the form is always there to outdistance the meaning’

·        Chomsky suggests innate elements to language- eg baby wants milk- mu, ma……

·        Structuralist linguistics says the opposite (meaning causes language)

·        or is meaning the result of language?

Lets take an example which I vaguely remember being discussed by Leonard Bernstein in ‘The Unanswered Question’ TV series.

Language begins after birth and when a baby need s things from its mother to survive- all developments in language might be said to continue to serve as a human proceeds through life and needs to meet the requirements to survive.

When a baby wants attention (eg for warmth or security) the simplest sound he can make is probably one of the vowels- perhaps a prolonged ‘AAAAA’ ! It seems that the meaning comes before the language here- how can a baby decide what he wants to say ? It’s innate sound.  When a baby wants milk he may use a different vowel sound to distinguish the meaning from say AAAA (meaning warmth and security)- say ‘eeee’ (vowel i). Perhaps ‘eee’ become ‘milk’ due to another added sound- say an approximate ‘m’ and ‘k’ before and after the i. This sort of process seems a bit like Darwins theory of natural selection for words…. Words appear to some extent at random but with an underlying systematic process-eg ease of enunciation?? , and are fixed with meaning if they suit the purpose……and the words are ‘maintained as a species’  by recurrent use – other words never develop beyond an initial point.

This sort of process makes most sense to me- meaning before words during development. How do we explain the development of language  in similar ways in similar geographical areas ? Perhaps this is originally one language, then due to movement of different peoples the one language is modified in certain ways and becomes similar but different in different geographic areas.

Of course this is only one possible mechanism, and perhaps many may exist. Certainly adult language is very complex, and there may be some words which come first and are then fixed with a meaning (but I can’t think of any immediately).

Of course there may be an element of ‘we understand to be true that which tells us to be true’ but only to a certain extent. For example if you said to me,

‘my cat is called ‘The Bard of Pocklington’ and he has just completed a round the world yacht race whilst singing Nessum Dorma by Puccini’

I would know that your meaning was in some way ‘false’, but my imagination may make a funny image or story or reality out of the information. It’s about different shades of reality-as Althusser said, ‘the material existence of the ideology in an apparatus and in practices does not have the same modality as the material existence of a paving stone or  a rifle’ (1999).

Illustrations

Fig. 1 Condron, T (no date)‘He’s surprisingly good at small talk’ [cartoon] online at https://www.cartoonstock.com/directory/e/emotional_intelligence.asp  [accessed 19th May 2017]

Fig. 2 Scarfe, G (2009) ‘Cameron enjoys the Sun’  [print] online at

[accessed 19th May 2017]

Fig. 3 Kotliarov, L (1935) ‘Alexei Stakhanov’ [photograph] online at  

[accessed 19th May 2017]

Fig. 4 Ravilious, E (20^th C) ‘Furlongs’ [watercolour] online at

 

References

Althusser, L (1993). ‘Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses’. In visual culture: A reader. Evans, J and Hall,,S (eds), London. SAGE Publications. p317-324

Engel, P (1957) Minou Drouet’s poems [online at] http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1957/11/24/page/179/article/minou-drouets-poems [accessed 18th May 2017].

 

 

Project-Myth is a type of speech.

Text: Myth today- Roland Barthes

 

The author begins by asking the question , what is myth today? He replies that simply put ‘myth is a type of speech’ (Barthes, 1999 b; p.51).  It’s not just any type though, it has a specific form and  is a way of communicating. It follows that myth is not an object (the term mythical objects is, for example,  meaningless); anything can be a myth – it is the language that is key. Barthes now introduces the tree expressed by Minou Drouet, which is both matter and substance, but also contains a social usage (Barthes, 1999 b; p. 51)

Objects can come and go as myths at different epochs in history, because ‘myth is a type of speech chosen by history: it cannot possibly evolve from the nature of things’ (Barthes, 1999 b; p.52). I wonder if this is completely true? Are not some concepts universally important in our human history, and therefore, by their very nature more likely to be mythologised?

For example the myth of an omnipotent god who can supernaturally explain strange phenomena, and has the power to punish bad behaviour thereby keeping society in order. This myth seems to have been continually expressed by human kind, in different cultures independently and simultaneously. Also, the myth of creation (Britannica, 2017), or of the cleansing  of humanity through flood (Britannia, 2017), seems common to many cultures and civilisations.  These myths may be subtly different from Barthes’s definition, but he himself equates myth with ideology (see later), and from ideology one may soon arrive at religion (Althusser, 1999). More generally the Marxist thinker Louis Althusser describes several ‘world outlooks’ such as religious, ethical, legal and political ideologies suggesting that these ‘….. as the ethnologist examines the myths of a ‘primitive society’ are largely imaginary……’ (Althusser, 1999: p.317)

As an introduction to the semiological arguments still to come, Barthes first introduces the equivalence of the signifier and the signified (they are of different class therefore cannot be equal).  Using an example of a bunch of ‘passionfied’ roses, we are led through the analysis which consists of the signifier (roses), the signified (passion), and a third term the sign (the passionfied roses). The sign better reflects how we see the end product, not as consecutives, but as a combination. Barthes distinguishes between these roses  analysed from the point of view of experience (where there is just the sign) and analysis  (where all 3 terms exist).  The distinction of the 3 terms is crucial to the discussion of myth as ‘a semiological schema’ (Barthes, 1999 b: p.52).

Barthes now introduces Saussure’s la langue  as a  particular  example of this schema, one which relates to written language. Here we have signifier (the acoustic (or visual?) image – the sound (or sight?) of a word (like dog for example), the signified (the concept of the object which we understand as a dog) , and the sign ( the combination-hearing or seeing the word dog signals the object dog) (Barthes, 1999 b: p.52).

Another example of a semiological sytem is Freud’s interpretation of the human psyche through dreams. Here we have the manifest behaviour in the dream (the signifier), the latent meaning of the dream (the signified), and the dream as a combination of both, in toto (the sign) (Barthes, 1999 b: p.53). These analyses also have echos of the authors analysis of advertising images, where he discusses linguistic and visual messages, from the point of view of denotation, connotation, and in terms of signifiers, signifieds and signs (Barthes, 1999 a.).

Barthes now moves on to describe myth as a ‘second-order semiological system’ (Barthes, 1999 b: p.53) saying clearly, and almost (ignoring his parentheses) poetically ‘That which is a sign (namely the associated total of a concept and an image) in the first system, becomes a mere signifier in the second’(Barthes, 1999 b: p. 53).

Barthes lists the wide range of  materials which can be used as mythical speech which include language, paintings, photos, and rituals. All these materials are reduced to ‘mere language’ or  ‘a mere signifier’  for the purpose of myth (Barthes, 1999 b: p. 53), but to my confusion at least, also suggests that ‘myth wants to see in them only a sum of signs….’ (Barthes, 1999 b: p. 53).  Surely myth wants to see in these materials a signifier only ?- one that he can put to his own use ? Perhaps this confusion exists and is acceptable because of the inherent latency and abstraction surrounding the possible messages myth communicates.

Barthes proceeds to the two semiological systems at work in the form of myth’s communication. The first system is the language-object (the message which seems most visible?) and the second the meta-language (in which the first language is put to another use) (Barthes, 1999 b : p. 53).

His first illuminating example of mythical speech is well explained and quite easy to follow. In it he takes the sentence ‘quia ego nominor leo’ from a latin grammar. This is analysed first with reference to the language- object; the meaning being simple – ‘my name is lion’ (Barthes, 1999 b : p. 54); though one page later he conjures up the possible richness of this simple message – ‘I am a lion, I live in a certain country, I have just been hunting, they would have me share my prey with a heifer,…….’ (Barthes, 1999 b : p. 54).  According to Barthes the more intelligible mythical semiological system  interprets the text as a sentence which proves a universal grammatical rule (Barthes, 1999 b: p. 53).

One question sprung to mind over the latin grammar example. The first is whether the system of communication is also influenced by the fact that the sentence is initially said to be in a latin grammar. Does this make it more likely to be an example of a grammar rule? I think this must be so, but it is not certain, as it does not have to be an illustrative sentence; it could be a few words of the author’s introduction for example. The question here is what are the factors which determine the order of the precedence here? Barthes does not discuss any examples where the mythical is overcome by the simple interpretation.

A second example of the language of myth is given; a picture on the cover of Paris Match magazine, of a negro boy saluting (Barthes, 1999 b: p. 54). Barthes’ analysis is interesting and powerful once again, but again I wonder- would all French citizens interpret the image the same way?  Might it be more simply interpreted as This black boy is saluting a superior ? Who determines the amount of semiological coding within an image or sentence ? is it the author or the viewer, or both? Is this the way the magazine wanted it to be interpreted?

This argument about analysis feels like the argument set up in Hebidge’s essay ‘The bottom line on planet one: squaring up to the face’ (Hebidge, 1999), where John Berger’s (planet one) rigorous analysis of the symbolism of consecutive images in a magazine, is compared to a way of (planet 2) viewing which allows a ‘nutty conjunction’ and a ‘symbolic fissure’ to exist between (and I think therefore within) images without traditional  analysis (Hebidge, 1999: p. 113). This post-structuralist/post-modern view acknowledges the ‘withering signified’ (Hebidge, 1999: p. 110), and a flattening of the depth of analysis and traditional historic readings and  conventions (ironically Barthes asserts that to the contrary, in some way  ‘myth is constituted by the loss of the historical quality of things’ (Barthes, 1999 b: p.58). But isn’t the tyranny of Barthes’s layered interpretation (the first system is latent but present nonetheless) a little like ‘the old bourgoise obligation to ‘speak for’ truth and liberty or to ‘represent the repressed , The Third World, the ‘downtrodden masses’ or the marginaux’ ( Hebidge, 1999: p. 109)- in this case the young negro boy in the picture…..? .

Returning from this digression, Barthes now modifies the terms of  the two staged mythical analysis from the Sausserian triad of signifier/signified and sign,  adding the new terms signification and form, preventing the ambiguity  possible if identical terms  in the two systems were allowed to carry different meanings . His final set of terms becomes signifier, signified, and meaning in the first-order system, and form, signified and signification in the second (Barthes, 1999 b: p. 54).

This paragraph on terminology is rather difficult to follow, and the explanation of why certain terms needs to change and not others seems a little unclear and arbitrary. Why for example if we are allowed to keep the term Signified for the (equivalent but not identical) concept in both systems, are we not allowed to keep the term Sign too, as this is also equivalent but not identical in both systems ?

Barthes continues flesh out his analysis stating that the difference between the meaning and the form (he calls them both signifiers in passing) is that the first is full of meaning (..of history, memory, ideas, facts…), and the second has been emptied of its former meaning, and is now at the disposal of myth. He also usefully differentiates the quality of a linguistic signifier and an image signifier, the former being a mental form only, and the latter having ‘a sensory reality’ (Barthes, 1999 b: p. 55).

The form of myth does not completely remove the meaning held behind it. It is simply ‘put at a distance’ (Barthes, 1999 b: p. 56). It is both there but also hidden (under the power of myth). Barthes states that the signified is absorbed by the concept of the myth, which has a whole new history and richness at its disposal. Returning to the example of the dictionary extract for example, we have glimpses of the elements of time, history, pedagogy, and personal habits (Barthes, 1999 b: p. 56). Myth is now compared to an alibi. The meaning of the phrase is somewhere undecided……‘I am not where you think I am, I am where you think I am not’ (Barthes, 1999 b: p. 57), but unlike the alibi which is judged true or false, myth is a value ; it is not correct or incorrect, and is ‘perpetual’.

Now the myth is likened to looking at the landscape through a car window, and interpolating glances at the window itself-back and forth we glance. Myth is described as ‘giving a historical intention a natural justification’ (Barthes, 1999 b: p. 57) a process indistinguishable from Bourgoise ideology. Here, surprisingly Barthes admits to the Bourgoise aspects of myth, but we are unsure of his feelings towards it.

His next sentence may help to clarify- myth is the best instrument to operate the inversion which ‘defines our society’ -that from ‘anti-physis into pseudo-physis’ (Barthes, 1999 b: p. 57). My reading of this inversion is from an ‘anti-natural’ society, one that works against the powers of nature (Robinson, 2011), into a pseudo-natural society-one that uses ideologies to  function. This still doesn’t tell me what Barthes really thinks of myth though.

In the final page of the essay I was hoping to find the answer to how Barthes really feels about myth. He continues, that the world supplies an ‘historical reality’ to myth, and he completes his ‘definition of myth in a bourgoise society: myth is depoliticised speech  (Barthes, 1999 b: p. 57) where political describes real human relations, social structures, and power, and the prefix de is very active (it’s not that political is not there- its actively hidden or abstracted). Barthes also suggests that myth purifies, and that myth ‘passes from history to nature’ (Barthes, 1999 b : p. 57), and allows a flatter world  where ‘…things appear to mean something by themselves…..’ (Barthes, 1999 b: p. 57).

Does myth then flatten not complicate, in contrast my earlier argument? At the end of the text I’m still not sure- it depends how you look at it! Is myth good or bad? Again it depends upon how you look at it.

There is a lot of  embellishment and revisiting of  concepts in this text, some of which seems a little wordy and repetitive. Perhaps though the subtlety of the different examples, and the almost but not quite saying the same thing feel to this text reflects the nature of these ideas, some of which are described as ‘impenetrably dense’ (Haveland, 2009: p.55). This whole essay explores what on the surface looks a relatively straightforward concept (mythical speech as a second order semiological system).  However, the argument is subtle and different parts of it regularly assume shades of meaning which are very close, but may not identical to one another. The author views things from here (for example the first-order system), and now there (for example the second-order system), uses numerous examples, often restating areas of the argument using different (but similar) words. This might sometimes be in the pursuit of subtly different meanings, but often borders on hyperbole for effect  (see p 58 where myth has emptied, turned (reality) inside out, emptied (again)… removed…. a haemorrhage, a flowing out …., an evaporation, …..an absence .. all to describe in some way that myth has hidden the meaning of the first-order sentence.)

At the end of the text I’m still unsure of the author’s feelings about myth- his judgements about its use. Perhaps he remains neutral. The piece asks as many questions as it answers, and perhaps further readings will elucidate these uncertainties.

 

References

Althusser, L (1993). ‘Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses’. In visual culture: A reader. Evans, J and Hall,,S (eds), London. SAGE Publications.   p317-324

Barthes, R (1999 a.).  ‘Rhetoric of the Image’ in visual culture: a reader. Evans, J and Hall, S (eds.). London. SAGE Publications.   P33-41

Barthes, R (1993 b).  ‘Myth Today’ in visual culture: a reader. Evans, J and Hall, S (eds.). London. SAGE Publications.   p 51-58

Britannica, 2017  creation myth [online at] https://www.britannica.com/topic/creation-myth [accessed 18^th May 2017]

Britannica, 2017  flood-myth [online at] https://www.britannica.com/topic/flood-myth  [accessed 18^th May 2017]

Hebidge, D (1999 b) ‘The bottom line on planet one: squaring up to the face’ in  visual culture: a reader. Evans, J and Hall, S (eds.). London. SAGE Publications.      p. 99-124

Robinson, A (2011) Roland Barthes’s Mythologies: Naturalisation, Politics and everyday life [online at] https://ceasefiremagazine.co.uk/in-theory-barthes-3/ [accessed 18^th May 2017]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Project- Rhetoric of the image…..BLOG questions…

Make brief notes on two or three advertising images you find in your everyday life.

 

Fig. 1 Martin Miller’s Gin (2017)

This is a glossy advert for Martin Miller’s Gin, and contains a lot of information

The linguistic messages include

• The concept of Spirit, Romance and Adventure
• It is the most awarded Gin in the world, so it’s good quality
• It’s distilled in England and blended in Iceland
• The brand name is Martin Miller’s
• The text helps to anchor our interpretation of the images (Barthes, 1999: p. 37) – especially how we view the couple, as this could have many stories behind it. The one we are led to understand relates to the qualities of the Gin.

Amongst the denoted messages are

• A glamorous man and woman in evening dress (photo)-The man eyes up the woman, who looks at either the Gin or us or both
• A bottle of gin (photo)
• The flags of Iceland and England ( computer graphic)
• Gold medals received by the Brand (computer graphic).
• A map of both countries printed on the bottle and the route of a ship voyaging between England and Iceland (graphic).

To understand these denoted messages (messages without a code) the viewer needs to know that an image represents a real-life concept.  We learn this early, at around 4 years old(Barthes, 1999: p 36).

The connoted message

The symbolic messages are numerous and include

• The Brand name Martin Miller’s Gin contains both Alliteration (the repeated ‘M’ consonant) and Assonance (the repeated ‘I’ vowel) which helps us to remember and say the Brand name.
• Martin Miller denotes a man, and is probably alluding to a sailor.
• The deep navy blue in the label is symbolizing the British Navy (and perhaps in a subsidiary role, the Navy/Blue of the Icelandic flag)
• The silver in the label and its cleanliness may symbolize English (or UK) manufacturing (eg manufactured metals) and the British Industrial Revolution , where we led the world in the 17-1800’s. It may also symbolize the cool, sharp, freshness of Iceland.
• The connotation of the British Navy also symbolizes Britain’s dominance of the world, led by its Navy, in the centuries of c. 1500-1850 (including both British Trading, British success in War, and of course  British Imperialism)
• The lines in the picture are clean and straight
• the bottle has clean straight lines and looks like a ship (viewed from above)
• The colourless glass gives a sense of the pure transparent clean water which surrounds the sea and which can be navigated by your adventurous self

The overall message is that drinking this Brand of gin makes you

• sophisticated and attractive
• attractive to the opposite sex
• Patriotic and a lover of the UK (or Iceland?)
• Someone who is brave and adventurous
• Someone who is powerful and world famous
• Someone who is hard working and industrious
• Someone who likes a quality product

Fig. 2  Whitecapltd (2017)

This advert has some similarity to the previous one. It is requesting a sponsor for a round the world yacht race, and recalls the Romantic notion of English Empire and world domination.

The linguistic message includes:

• This is a job advertisement for a vacant situation- a  ‘British Maritime Hero’.
• The successful candidate will be outstanding and courageous and will restore Britain’s naval reputation
• There is a need for a British Sponsor to ensure a British winner
• The last British winner was in 1969, and the French have won ever since!!!
• Duty calls you, the viewer
• England has expectation of the viewer
• The last two words are quoted directly from Admiral Nelson at  the battle of TRAFALGAR that ‘England expects every man will do his duty’ (Aboutnelson, nd)
• It’s time Britain ruled the waves again

The denoted message

• We have a portrait of Admiral Nelson
• Playfully juxtaposed into a ‘modern’ job advert
• There is a symbol of a globe, representing the world.

The connoted message

The sponsor will be

• like Nelson- brave, skilful, and saviour of the British Empire
• will restore Britain’s reputation in the world (Nelson was iconic in saving the day for Britain (against Napolean at the battle of Trafalgar)
• will feel a patriotism and sense of duty
• will help establish a great British Empire again (including all that Imperialism, colonialism, slavery and murder???)

This is certainly an advert with its tongue in its cheek, but uses strong symbolism relating to the Great British Empire. It is designed to appeal to the nationalistic feelings of any potential sponsor.

 

Illustrations

Fig. 1 Martin Miller’s Gin (2017) Romance and Adventure [advertisement] in Good Housekeeping June 2017 p. 186.

Fig. 2 Whitecapltd (2017) Vendee Globe 2020 ‘Admiral Nelson’ job advert [advertisement] in ‘The i’ Wed 3rd May 2017 p.51

References

Aboutnelson (2017) Admiral Lord Nelson and his Navy [online] at http://aboutnelson.co.uk/england%20expcts.htm  %5Baccessed 6 May 2017]

Barthes, R (1999).  ‘Rhetoric of the Image’ in visual culture: a reader. Evans, J and Hall, S (eds.). London. SAGE Publications.   P33-41