Introduction to Semiotics of Cultures, 2010

Ronald Barthes – Modern Myths

Vesa Matteo Piludu

University of Helsinki

The first part of Mythologies

Is fragmentary, kaleidoscopic

The articles seems to be disconnected

But there is a recurrent topic: all the myths are presented by media as natural and obvious fact, without historical and social background

Even are all myths of the ‘50, some element of them could be easily found in contemporary popular cultures

For the most part written every month for Les Lettres Nouvelles between 1954-56

The theoretic part, analyzed in the first lecture, Myth Today was written in 1972

The myths of French society are part of a process in which the middle class or bourgeois ideology falsely impart universal standing to symbols that have an historical status

Best cultural criticism: no criticism at all!

The Middle class hit lights well balanced rhetoric: it is always better be moderate

Culture, as a noble universal thing, should be opposed to ideologies (reactionary or communist)

Culture is falsely presented as something created ex-nihilo, outside the social choices

It should be good for all, light, pure Opposed to heavy, dark ideologies

The culture is supposed be good for all, something neutral, free from judgment

The best literature is presented as eternal

Eternal or social artist?

The best artists or literates are heroes admired without critic, good only for National pride

In Italy Dante is considered the eternal poet, it is mythologized and depurated from his historical and political environments

But Dante is far to be a neutral moderate: he put an relevant number of popes, priests and politics into the Inferno (hell)

Critics of novels and drama

When the critics doesn’t understand a word of the book they add two arguments:

Criticism is unnecessary because the subject is ineffable

If they are too stupid to understand the book, this is unsuitable for the common folk (even more imbecile)

So where is the problem? The clarity of the author Ideas seems dangerous if they are not controlled by common sense Culture should be nothing but a sweet rhetorical function, ready to be

understood by all If critics fear the analysis, why they become a critic?

Problem: it’s impossible to understand philosophy using the common sense

But luckily the philosophers are able to understand the critics’ disappointment and common sense

Verne as a national myth

Verne is a myth of French literature, general synonym for

adventures travels modernity technology

Verne as the mythographer of closed spaces

For Barthes Verne’s literature is something else: A self-sufficient cosmology of closed spaces

The travels of Verne are mostly exploration if closures, the delight of the finite: something similar to a children’s tent

The Mysterious Island, the travel to the centre of the World

Verne, as man-child, re-invented a microcosms, it fills it and it close it: the writer seems to be obsessed by plentitude and appropriation, accumulation of object

He tends to be encyclopedic as a Dutch painter and says: the world is finite, numerable, suitable for inventories and catalogues

Nautilus as a nice house

Is a progressive bourgeois: the world is like a nutshell, an object in his hand

The ship is not a model for departure but closure: a nice finite space with many objects, a home, a house, like the nautilus, the most lovely of caves

Inside the human habits Outside the vagueness of waters

The Nautilus could be considered the opposite of Rimbaud’s Drunken boat, clearly a symbol of exploration

Nemo in the Nautilus

Outside the Nautilus

Writers in holiday

Article on Le Figaro Bossuet going down to Congo

In vacation the writer add vocation to leisure Common holidays are for working people

The writer is different from the common mortals: even in vacation, he doesn’t stop producing:

He is writing memories, correcting proofs or preparing in absolute secret his next book

It’s natural that the writer is writing all the time and in all the situations

He is prey of an inner god who speaks all the time: his muse doesn’t know the word vacation

Angiographies of genius, of different beings

Women novellist

According to Elle

Women novelists produce essentially to things: children and novels

Jacqueline Lenoir (two daughter, one novel), Marina Gray (one son, one novel), Nicole Dutreil (two sons, four novels)

It seems that the little bohemia allowed (be a writer), is logically connected to the previous tribute to nature

Discurse: Women novelists are obviously brave, symbols of self-confidence,

they write like men: a model Even so, don’t forget they are women too

Women are considered mostly as homogenous being

The mystic brain of Einstein

The genius’ brain had a magical dimension, that had been studied with seismographers

Einstein death: “the most powerful brain has stopped thinking”

The formula E=mc2 is of an unexpected simplicity, suitable for modern myth

It has been considered a kid of magic formula of the word

The magician that failed

Also Einstein is a common mortal, suitable to failure

He died without having been able to verify the equation in which the secret of the world was enclosed

The craziness of genius

The Riddle of Einstein’s Brain

????

Nibbing on Einstein’s brain

Einstein Brain Station (!)

Jet - pilot

Jet – pilot as a new race: half robot with a new skin Dietetic prescriptions New technical race

Aviators vs. Jet - pilot

First aviators: hagiography, age of miracles and excess

Jet-age: monastic, continence, temperance

Uniform and mask Submission to collective ends Inhuman condition and

religious call

Electoral photography

The nature of the election is elitist and paternalist

Electoral photos try desperately to create a personal link between the politicians and the electorate

The politic exalted himself as a perfect model of a social type, that is somewhat similar to the elector

In a certain sense the elector is persuaded to elect a double of himself

Electoral photography

Mystical connection between thought, will, reflections, actions: the inner dream

Hit lighted social status, respectability

Spider-Obama

The Savage Dragon

Myths and elections: “Rome is a jungle … Vote for Tarzan!”

The wrestling and performance of pain

Is not a sport, a demonstration of excellence, as boxing or judo Judo in particular eludes any theatrical element, has a esoteric

meaning and even the defeat is eluded rapidly

Is a staged event Is a show of excess, like the one in Ancient theatres A spectacle, a performance of suffering and passion

The public is completely disinterested if the contest is rigged or not, they are interested in the quality of the performance

In wrestling there should be an immediate reading of passions: all the gestures are excessive, especially in defeat

Wrestlers and theatre

The wrestlers are presented as types, as mask of the antiquity or Commedia dell’Arte

Orsano was the effeminate teddy boy Reinières the image of passivity Mauzard arrogant as a cock

Thauyin was the very representation of ugliness, baseness: dead flesh

All his action were represented by viscosity The body is a symbol of the moral values: treachery, cruelty and

cowardice

The types represent an Human comedy of passion were all is clear, intelligible, an immediate pantomime

The suffering man is similar to a tragic mask

Wrestling and justice

The pleasure in wrestling is seeing a barbarian concept of justice working perfectly: eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth

In wrestling the villain is about to win, doing all the kind of tricks and breaking all the rules: he is the very image of transgression

The public is revolted against him and in favor of the contestant At the end the contestant win and the public enjoys to see how the

villa is defeated

For this reason, a fair fight is an exception, in wrestling the orgy of evil works better to create interest in the public

The public loves the baroque confusion

French and American wrestling

In France wrestling is more connected with the barabarian concept of justice

In America there are more complicate symbols connected to politics and ethnic issues: the wrestling seems a mythological fight between good and evil

The Villain

Is an unstable, socially unpredictable

He accept the rules when they are useful to him, but takes refuge behind the rules when he consider that they are favorable to him

It breaks all the possible laws when is useful to do so

The wrestling villain isn’t only cruel, he is inconsistent: he offend not only moral, but logic

For the public what is intolerable is not the rule-breaking, that is normal, but the fact that the villain remain unpunished, as it generally happens in real life

The wrestling should be exactly what the public expect: pure signification of an ideal brutal justice

The villains are somewhat similar to many Italian politics, but unfortunately these are never brutally punished by machos on a public stage

Papa Shango vs. Ultimate Warrior 1992

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrQnoplcmz0&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6nU3tU87ew&feature=related

Spider Man – Green Goblin

Asterix

Bud Spencer & Terence Hill

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9jHnSNYMxU

Striptease

Few erotism

Baroque exoticism: Chinese woman with an opium pipe Venetian decor with gondola

Fours, adornments more important than naked skin: ritualized objects are acting as a luxurious shell

The woman is presented as a mineral

The alibi of art makes ritual gestures that are a kind of exorcism of sex

Moulin Rouge even worse: contest and prizes Striptease became a sport, a career, even a National institution

The Lost Continent: postcard ethnography

False ethnographic film

4 Italian explorers in Malay archipelago

All is easy, innocent as a tourist boat trip

Postcard world based on the glamour of the images

Formal exotism without historical background

The Far East is somewhat similar to west: the Buddhists monks are presented was quasi-Christian

All the folkloric rituals are presented as natural, they “illustrate” the nature (season, death, storm or whatever), never history

Fishing is not presented in its reality, but is presented the romantic essence of be a fisherman

Edward Curtis’ staged natives

The Lost Continent: postcard ethnography

Fishing is not presented in its reality, but is presented the romantic essence of be a fisherman

Beautiful sunset, eternal natural condition

Peril on the sea and women weeping at home

The madonnas of Curtis

Curtis Natives

Amazon indios

Indios and boxers

The Blue Guide’s world: human commedia?

In classic tourist guide book’s all is picturesque: landscapes, humans, monuments

Man seems to exist only as types: Basque sailor, Catalan tradesman, Cantabrian sentimental highlander, Italian romantic lover man, Brazilian sensual, Parisian sophisticate

All the “national” characters are clear prototypes of a classical ballet or Commedia dell’arte

Only in trains or metro: there is a very “mixed” people

Any analytical description is futile

Many of the monument preserved:

Present a country selecting only national characters and monuments suppress the social reality of the land

Art is presented as the fundamental value of cultures, eliminating the rest

Arts is represented as an economic good, that could be “accumulated”: ´Spain is full of art, rich of sculpture … the museums are full of treasures of art

The country seems in competition to demonstrate to have more art or more relevant, ancient art

The contents of the art, or the meaning of paintings, seems to be less interesting of the great amount of it

Abbé Pierre

Presented bearded: a clear symbol of monastic evangelical life, missionaries, poverty, apostleship or hermits

The secular, urban clergy is represented shaved, more temporal

Padre pio – Sant’Antonio Abate

Soap-powders and detergents

In the first Word Detergent Congress There was Omo euphoria The detergents haven’t harmful effect on skin and they could save

miners from silicosis

Chlorinated fluids are presented as aggressive: they beats, pushes

They are like liquid saviors but blind, liquid fire in war: they burn, kill the dirt

Powders are selective: are separating agents of liberation The dirt isn’t killed, is forced out, as in an exorcism They aren’t soldiers, are police

The dirt, in any case, is the enemy

Omo myths: dept and foamy

Commercial and social vanity: comparison between two objects and one is whither than the other

In Omo myths, the consumer is helping the police, he is the accomplice of a liberation

Omo is cleaning in dept all what is obscure But are the clothes so deep as seas or oceans

Mythology of foam the foam is absolutely useless It’s only luxury, a symbol of abundant proliferation, a vigorous germ,

an airy substance Bubbles connected with air and spirituality

The mythology cover the real abrasive function of the detergent under the cover of a mystical substance that govern the molecular order of materials … transforming all in bubbles

Commercials

Retro Tide commercial http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AVfhSWoI1g&feature=related

Tide Detergent Commercial - VINTAGE - 1950s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSB7HTFECdk&feature=related

OMO Commercial - Dirt Is Good http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5MX2Fq2VZW4

Ajax washing powder - Australian TV commercial http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhOOhqXyleg&feature=related

Tide Laundry Detergent Ad from 1990 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TiOUFkz1jcU&feature=related

Mr. Clean Commercial http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0YPsuZYZIY&feature=related

Plastic

Names of Greek shepherds (Polystirene, Polyvinil)

Alchemical power: transmutation and infinite powers of transformation

It seems that is possible to plasticize the entire world

Plastic

Plastic is the material of the imitations that have only the pretention and the appearance of the original material

Plastic is reproducing cheaply something more luxurious, but have no noble mineral origin (wood, metal, glass)

Plastic is not hard, not deep, but have resistance

Disgraced material: opaque, creamy when it fall, make no sound Colors are chemical, of aggressive quality

Finnish Wood Design: Tapio Wirkkala

Finnish Glass Design: Tapio Wirkkala

Finnish Plastic Design: Yki Nummi (1925-1984)

Finnish Glass Design: Alvar Aalto

Citroen

Cars as modern gothic cathedrals Supreme creation of an era Conceived by unknown artists

New Citroen as Nautilus Round shaped Exaltation of glass Soap bubbles

Toys as microcosms

French toys are a small model of the adult world, a microcosms: army, the post office, transports, school, medicine

The toys prefigure in the children the world of the adult They learn to accept is as natural, inevitable

The social order is like a second nature, expressed as an imitation –abdication: even the dolls are able to urinate

The children is essentially an owner, not a creator: doesn’t invent the world, he used it

All is ready made by plastic, a product of chemistry, not nature

Disappearance of wood toys, with their natural warm The wood toys last a long time and live with the child Are a product of the era of the craftsman, not of industry

Block toys

Different logic

The children are creators, demiurges

They create the world and the forms they want to, not necessarily the one that are imposed them

Margarine: your uncle will be furious!

Astra’s commercial

Margarine? Unthinkable! “Your uncle will be furious!” The commercial show a prejudice

Then the eyes are opened and margarine is a delicious food … And cheap It goes further than butter, and cost less

Alchemical transformation of values

Metaphor of political propaganda What does it matter if the political and economical order is a little

brutal? It allows us to live cheaply

Romans in films

Many clichés All the Ancient Romans are presented with fringes Symbol of virtue, conquest, self righteousness, simplicity Evidence of the being a good Roman

Many Anglo-Saxons actors are ridiculous in their Ancient Roman looks

For Barthes, only Marlon Brando is Latin in off to be credible

Another clichés: the Roman’s face sweat constantly, being full of Vaseline

It’s a strange symbol for moral feeling: the Roman are beings tormented by virtues or violent things

Banality: to sweat is to think Degraded spectacle of the sweating of thoughts

Only Caesar isn’t sweating: it’s becaouse he is the object of the crime, he doesn’t know about it, so he doesn’t think and sweat

Roman Brando

Julius Caesar 1953 Theatrical Trailer

adaptation of Shakespeare's play by Joseph L. Mankiewicz for MGM starring Marlon Brando. Brando's performance resulted in his third consecutive Best Actor nomination in 1953.

Marlon Brando in Julius Caesar (1953) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KXhfjOkKPM&feature=related

Troy

Achilles dies: Directed by: Wolfgang Petersen http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0g8uTZmKM4&feature=related

Greta Garbo

The Divine The iconographical image of female beauty Mystical feeling In Queen Christina the make is like a mask sculpted in snow Perfect and ephemeral

A platonic idea of a human creature

The perfection of Garbo is more intellectual than formal Her mask is a sum of lines and their thematic harmony

Garbo is the archetype of the lyricism of women It creates awe and charm

Audrey Hepburn is another model, more individualized, suitable for different themes (woman-kitten-child): its more “substance” than idea

If Garbo is an Idea, Hepburn is an Event

Greta Garbo: the Idea

QUEEN CHRISTINA 1933

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52xrA9hQhI8

MGM 1933. Greta Garbo, John GilbertIn 1632, after her father, King Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden, dies on the battlefield, six-year-old Christina is crowned ruler. Reared by her father as a boy, Christina accepts the crown as the "king" of Sweden and then vows to her court, which is headed by Chancellor Oxenstierna, that Sweden will fight until it wins the war.

Audrey Hepburn: the Event

Chaplin and Modern Times

Problem in socialist films or drama: the worker is fulfilled with sense of destiny, obviously he is a revolutionary

In Modern Times, Chaplin offer a more realist image of the worker that is still blind: interested only in basic needs, he is a man who’s hungry

He is totally alienated, at the hands of his masters-employers and police

The artificial worker’s life is well expressed by the food dispensing machine

Showing the blindness of the worker, Chaplin is able to show also the blindness of the public

The anarchy of Chaplin seems the most efficient form of revolution in art

No socialist work succeeded in expressing the condition of the worker so well

In Brecht there is the representation of the workers’ conscious fight for their right, but the texts are poor of aesthetic force

Charlie Chaplin - Modern times

Charlie Chaplin - Modern times part 1/9 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0XjRivGfiw

Charlie Chaplin - Modern times part 2/9 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvNQiF89Pek&feature=related