Structuralism & poststructuralism

Ferdinand de Saussure

(1857 - 1913) Swiss linguist. Founder of semiotics & structuralism. In his study of language he drew attention to the structures underpinning speech & writing & noted that signified (concept) & signifier (word or sound) are part of a complex system of meaning. The meaning of language is in its function as a system.

Roland Barthes

(1915-1980) Famously declared "the death of the author". The meaning of a text depends not on the author's intentions but on the meanings the reader creates. Texts are thus unstable, shifting, & open to question.

Jacques Derrida

(1930 - 2004) An important deconstructionist who attacked reason & certainty of meaning. Meaning is not inherent in signs but produced by the relationships between them. Structures of meaning include & implicate any observers: "There is nothing outside the text". Everything is a cultural/linguistic/historical construct so fixed meanings are only fixed within a particular cultural context.

Binary opposition

A pair of theoretical opposites that form part of the deep structure of cultural products & practices.

Codes

A set of rules that enables a group of people to develop a shared understanding of the meanings of signs & symbols.

Signifier

A sign that conveys meaning.

Ideology

A system of ideas / order of signification characteristic of a group or culture.

Cultural conventions

A system that enables human actions to signify meaning & thus become signs.

Structural analysis

After Claude Levi-Strauss, this will examine the tensions between binary opposites in cultural products/practices & the way in which these oppositions interact, develop & resolve e.g. culture:nature, good:evil.

Absence

An emphasis on the missing elements in the deconstruction of a text i.e. the possible components that have been left out.

Polysemy

The ability of a sign, symbol, or text to have more than one meaning or to be subject to many possible interpretations or to be read in a number of different ways.

Surface structure

The actual manifestation of language in speech or writing. What people say, how they communicate, & the language they use. A subject for close structural analysis.

Deconstruction

The analytical technique of poststructuralism. It involves an exploration of a text in order to uncover its assumptions & emphasises the "freeplay" of signifiers in which they refer to multiple, shifting signifieds or "floating" signifiers with no fixed meaning

Poststructuralism

The belief that language is not a transparent medium that connects one directly with a "truth" or "reality".The parts of the structure, or code, derive their meaning from their contrast with one another rather than from any connection with an outside world. It will treat a sign system or text as fragmented, incomplete & without a centre or a stable, underlying meaning. It evolved as a critique of the binary opposites of structuralism.

Discourse

The code of language used to express personal thought.

Signified

The concept indicated by the signifier.

Cultural relativism

The idea that all one's perceptions are filtered through one's culture so that they differ accordingly. There are no truths, only particular cultural perspectives & interpretations according to one's inherited assumptions about the world.

Structuralism

The idea that the study of a phenomenon requires a study of it as a system of structures. Understanding this system & the elements of which it is composed is considered more important than a study of the individual elements themselves.

Foregrounding

The moving of something apparently marginal or trivial in text from the background to centre stage. Draws attention to what has been taken for granted in the production of a text & highlights what has been privileged & unconsidered assumptions regarding what is of importance.

Decoding

The process by which a receiver assigns meaning to the message.

Signification

The process by which a signifier & that which is signified are bound together to produce a sign.

Meaning

The product of a system of representation which is itself meaningless i.e the association of the sound & what it represents as the outcome of collective learning & social practice.

Phoneme

The smallest possible unit in a sound system that can indicate contrasts in meaning e.g. 'cat' has 3: /c/, /a/, /t/ with no meaning of their own.

Semiotics

The study of the social production of meaning from sign systems.

Deep structure

The system underpinning a language. The underlying rules applied, usually unconsciously, by native speakers in communicating with one another. Uncovered by a close analysis of surface structures.

Symbols

Things that stand for or represent something else.

Sign

A building block of meaning e.g. a word, a gesture, an object. A fundamental unit of meaning linking a signifier to that which is signified.

Universals

Deep structural features arguably common to all human cultures; a contrasting position to cultural relativism