Roland Barthes – The Photographic Message
Roland Barthes was a french literary theorist, philosopher, writer and academic.
He wrote important texts on photography and he addressed a number of ways in which we can interpret and understand the meaning of photographs.
Barthes proposed a way of reading photographs based on a theory called semiotics.
Semiotics is a theory developed to understand how language works
It asks questions like ‘how do we use language to communicate?” and ‘what is the relationship between he words we use and the real things in the world that we are referring to?’
It comes from the ancient greek term ‘semeion’ which means sign.
It is a way of analysing meanings by looking at the signs, these can be words pictures or symbols
Key theorists
Charles s Pierce
Ferdinand de Saussure
Roland Barthes
Semiotics revel the hidden message of verbal and visual communication. it helps us learn the way that our imaginations fill in gaps and sort out misunderstandings
Aspects of study in semiotics
The sign itself
The codes or systems which are organised
The culture within the codes and signs
Pierce:
icon, index, symbol.
The icon signifies the resemblance or analogical relation that it is trying to represent.
A symbol signifies through language.
An index signifies the relationship with its references often defined by sensory features.
Saussure – Signified
Defined a sign as being composed of the form it takes and concept it represents
Barthes :
The photographic message.
Roland bathes added the linguistic science of semiotics and used it to interrogate culture, using the study pf verbal language to cultural phenomena.
He developed a common vocabulary and method for critical analysis of culture.
As a linguist, Barthes made a distinction between messages and codes.
Message – singular, meaningful unit of discourse.
Code – abstraction created b the reader, reconstructed from the materials provided by the message.
Barthes argues that the distinction between messages and codes is problematic when dealing with photographs because of the special nature.
The reality effect of photographs makes the image appear to be natural rather than constructed..
The photograph transmits the literal reality of the scene depicted. There is no requirement to set up a relay between the object and its image to create a code.
The photographic paradox are photographs that appear to be factual but it is likely that they have connoted messages.
The photographic paradox is a coexistence of two messages. The Denotation and the connotation.
The connotation is what is suggested to the viewer, actions, clothing etc
Conntoation comes in different forms
Perceptive
Cognitive
Ideological and ethical
The denotation is what is literal in the photograph, so it is what you see as it is, the factual elements. Person, text etc
Up until this lecture, I had never realised the way I see images, or the way I pick images apart to understand them. It is a subconscious thing that I do.
Connotation and denotation are easy to do without thinking about it, but when it’s on your mind, it becomes very difficult to do.
Photography Theory 