In 1957 the cultural theorist Roland Barthes wrote an essay entitled ‘The World of Wrestling’. Using his progressive technique of semiotic analysis, he effectively outlined the conventions of contemporary professional wrestling and their uses as a means of delivering a moralising image of good vanquishing evil. Many of the customs Barthes identified in professional wrestling remain today, but there are likewise certain aspects of the spectacle which have evolved in the decades that followed the publication of the essay.
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Structuralism is essentially the study of Saussure’s linguistics applied to the study of the underlying structure of a society’s means of communication(s) that give that society’s words contextual meaning. 1 Roland Barthes may not have been the first to analyse Saussure, but he penetrated its implications more than anyone at the time. Edited by Susan Sontag, A Roland Barthes Reader offers a definitive selection of works by the French intellectual Roland Barthes, including seminal essays, such as ‘Introduction to the Structural Analysis of Narratives’ as well as his more unusual works, such as ‘The World of Wrestling’. Sep 17, 2007.
One of the most vivid images Barthes invoked was that of Thauvin, the perfect example of the stock “bastard octopus” character. Barthes Thauvin as “a fifty-year-old with an obese and sagging body”, whose physicality alone is enough alone to excite a mixture of hate and nausea in the audience. In modern wrestling, however, where the arena is only the setting for an event viewed by a worldwide television audience, the episodic nature of the performance means that wrestlers can no longer be defined by their body type. Their character is part of a limited cast on a television show, and has to be altered periodically to keep the action fresh and the viewers watching week-on-week. Professional wrestling has always been a performance of great efficiency, and naturally, the audio-visual aspects of television production have been exploited by modern wrestling companies. With the body of the wrestler now having no essential bearing on their character, the audio-visual aspects of television serve as a substitute in giving the audience an immediate sense of characterization.
The medium for this characterization is the entrance performance of the wrestler. The music and accompanying video emphasises what Barthes calls “the obviousness of [the wrestler’s] roles,” meaning that any particular wrestler with any kind of body can portray both a good (‘babyface’) character or an evil (‘heel’) character. This quality is essential in any modern professional wrestler, and was perhaps best and most obviously exemplified in the different characters (or ‘gimmicks’) of Samon-American wrestler Rikishi Fatu. Initially a slapstick babyface, Rikishi’s entrance involved upbeat party music and a brightly-coloured video of him dancing and smiling which, crucially, showed no actual wrestling. This video also makes an icon of his large, sagging posterior as a figure of harmless, comic fun, in complete contrast with the treatment of the body of Barthes’s Thauvin. This entrance presentation signals to the audience not only that Rikishi could be expected to behave in a way they would approve of, but that more specifically, he will fulfill his role as comic relief from the more emotionally and physically intense bouts on the match-card.
When Rikishi later underwent a ‘heel-turn’ by admitting to running down fan-favourite Stone Cold Steve Austin in an arena parking-lot, his entrance presentation immediately reflected this change in character. Duly, his theme music became a threatening, ominous score, in which the word ‘bad’ is repeated over and over again, while the accompanying video was dull in colour (predominantly black and white) and depicted him taking apparent pleasure in the violence he was inflicting.
Modern wrestling’s close relationship with television has also allowed the wrestlers to utilize speech when characterizing themselves. Barthes described wrestlers fulfilling their roles through their actions in the context of a regulated fight – a feature which remains to this day – but the modern televised wrestling product has fostered another form of characterization known as the ‘promo.’ One of the purposes of promos delivered by babyface wrestlers is to solidify support among the audience for their campaigns in the ring. The techniques at the disposal of babyfaces to secure this support vary in subtlety, but always aim at the same result: Mick Foley, one of the most endearing wrestlers of his time, would be warmly welcomed with the cheers of the audience as soon as he mentioned the city he was in as part of his promo. Indeed, a sense of involvement for the audience is the most important aspect of a face promo. With that in mind, the most recognisable tool used by faces is the catchphrase. Call-and-response is a major feature of these speech forms: As soon as Dwayne ‘The Rock‘ Johnson, for instance, would launch into a rendition of his popular catchphrase “If you smell …what The Rock is cooking”, the psychology of group identity would impel the audience to complete the phrase for him. Audience approval was thereby guaranteed. Conversely, heels will insult the city they are in, its inhabitants, and even its local sports teams. Their promos will often reject catchphrases, criticize those that use them, and mock the audience for responding to them. Indeed, they will exaggeratedly exclude the audience from their storyline (‘kayfabe’) lives and thereby instill in them a sense that they are inferior to the wrestler, a sense that is usually roundly rejected by the audience with a torrent of boos, which is of course exactly the response the heel has been trying to encourage.
A direct implication of the relationship of modern wrestling with television is the introduction of extended storylines. In 1957, Barthes wrote that “the spectator is not interested in the rise and fall of fortunes,” and with regards to the singular, unconnected matches that he was watching, this is broadly true. This rise and fall, however, is the very heart of modern wrestling, bringing it even closer to antiquated dramatic conventions than Barthes himself had suggested when he wrote that “it is no more ignoble to attend a wrestled performance of Suffering than a performance of the sorrows of Arnolph or Andromaque.” Wrestling’s narratives are growing evermore sophisticated and multi-faceted: take, again, the example of Rikishi Fatu. His aformentioned heel-turn narrative had specific political connotations in Rikishi’s belief that he and other wrestlers of a non-American ethnic background were being deliberately, and discriminitively, held at a lower status within the company. Rikishi was the heel in this storyline, but not because of his anger at being held back due to his ethnicity (kayfabe): rather he was negatively portrayed because of how he had acted on his beliefs (running over Steve Austin (a pin-up of ‘the Great White Hope’) had enabled The Rock (a fellow Samoan, and relative of Rikishi in real life) to reach the top of the WWF). The story became a Tragedy in which the Hero, Steve Austin fell from grace by trying to run Rikishi over in vengeance, leaving the two men vanquished; Rikishi in defeat, and Austin in arrest.
Not all of modern wrestling’s narratives are Tragic, but it is by far the most commonly-used dramatic mould. Another notable Tragic storyline began with the dismissal of Randy Orton from Triple H’s ‘Evolution‘ stable. That moment has become the foundation of much of Orton’s characterization, and four years later the moment resurfaced in a new storyline. Orton, under the influence of deep-seated anger and jealousy, went about physically dismantling the family (or faction) that Triple H was most associated with: the McMahon family, and in doing so, underwent his fall from grace, eventually being defeated by Triple H at Wrestlemania, a settling where wrestling narratives often find their zenith. Such advances in the dramatic content of professional wrestling only really became possible when it started to incorporate the conventions of television.
This focus on narrative has had positive implications for the messages projected by professional wrestling. A resultant underlying moral is that ‘badness’ or Evil is not inherent in people, but created. The babyfaces never have to justify their Goodness, but heels are never evil without reason, and their actions always have a (deliberately flawed) logic behind them. Rikishi, for instance, acted in an ‘evil’ way because he believed violence and espionage were appropriate ways of combating racial discrimination, and Orton’s actions were a direct result of the evil done to him in the past. Good doesn’t always defeat Evil in modern Wrestling, as in real life, but the narratives of modern wrestling suggest that humanity is generally Good and that those that are turned to Evil should not be forsaken if they learn the error of their ways: both Rikishi and Randy Orton have since been rehabilitated as popular babyfaces since the climaxes of their respective stories.
These evolutions in the conventions of wrestling are ultimately (though not exclusively) indebted to the innovations in the mediation of the spectacle and the consequent importance of extended narratives. This is an evolution that Roland Barthes could not have foreseen, and this response to his essay is not to debunk his observations. His perceptive essay still makes for interesting reading for those wishing to understand or engage with the art-form (for I have no qualms about calling it an art-form) and will continue to explain why the spectacle of wrestling is so compelling to those that follow it.
by David Jackson
Author | Roland Barthes |
---|---|
Original title | Mythologies |
Translator | Annette Lavers |
Country | France |
Language | French |
Subjects | Semiotics Structuralism |
Publisher | Les Lettres nouvelles |
Publication date | 1957 |
1972 |
Mythologies is a 1957 book by Roland Barthes. It is a collection of essays taken from Les Lettres nouvelles, examining the tendency of contemporary social value systems to create modern myths. Barthes also looks at the semiology of the process of myth creation, updating Ferdinand de Saussure's system of sign analysis by adding a second level where signs are elevated to the level of myth.
Mythologies[edit]
Mythologies is split into two: Mythologies and Myth Today, the first section consisting of a collection of essays on selected modern myths and the second further and general analysis of the concept.The first section of Mythologies describes a selection of modern cultural phenomena, chosen for their status as modern myths and for the added meaning that has been conferred upon them. Each short chapter analyses one such myth, ranging from Einstein's Brain to Soap Powders and Detergents. They were originally written as a series of bi-monthly essays for the magazine Les Lettres Nouvelles.
In a typical example, Barthes describes the image that has been built up around red wine and how it has been adopted as a French national drink, how it is seen as a social equaliser and the drink of the proletariat, partly because it is seen as blood-like (as in Holy Communion) and points out that very little attention is paid to red wine's harmful effects to health, but that it is instead viewed as life-giving and refreshing — 'in cold weather, it is associated with all the myths of becoming warm, and at the height of summer, with all the images of shade, with all things cool and sparkling.'[1]
In another chapter, Barthes explores the myth of professional wrestling. He describes how, unlike in the sport of boxing, the aim of theatrical stunt fighting is not to discover who will win or 'a demonstration of excellence',[2] it is a staged spectacle acting out society's basic concepts of good and evil, of 'Suffering, Defeat and Justice'.[3] The actors pretending to be wrestlers, like characters in a pantomime, portray grossly-exaggerated stereotypes of human weakness: the traitor, the conceited, the 'effeminate teddy-boy'. The audience expects to watch them suffer and be punished for their own transgressions of wrestling's rules in a theatrical version of society's ideology of justice.[citation needed]
Essays in English translation of Mythologies[edit]
- 'The World of Wrestling' (professional wrestling)
- 'The Romans in Films' (the 1953 American film Julius Caesar)
- 'The Writer on Holiday' (an article in Le Figaro about André Gide's travels in the Congo)
- 'The 'Blue Blood' Cruise' (a yachtcruise taken by European royalty to celebrate the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II)
- 'Blind and Dumb Criticism'
- 'Soap-powders and Detergents' (advertisements for Omo and Persil detergents)
- 'The Poor and the Proletariat' (Charlie Chaplin)
- 'Operation Margarine' (From Here to Eternity; the Jules Roy play Les Cyclones; Graham Greene's The Living Room; advertisements for Astra brand margarine)
- 'Dominici, or the Triumph of Literature' (the Dominici Affair)
- 'The Iconography of the Abbé Pierre'
- 'Novels and Children' (Elle magazine on women novelists)
- 'Toys'
- 'The Face of Garbo' (Greta Garbo in Queen Christina)
- 'Wine and Milk'
- 'Steak and Chips'
- 'The Nautilus and the Drunken Boat' (the novels of Jules Verne)
- 'The Brain of Einstein'
- 'The Jet-man'
- 'The Blue Guide'
- 'Ornamental Cookery' (food photography in Elle magazine)
- 'Neither-Nor Criticism'
- 'Striptease'
- 'The New Citroën' (the Citroën DS 19)
- 'Photography and Electoral Appeal' (photographs of French politicians)
- 'The Lost Continent'
- 'Plastic'
- 'The Great Family of Man' (the touring photography exhibition known in English-speaking countries as The Family of Man)
- 'The Lady of the Camellias'
Myth today[edit]
In the second half of the book Barthes addresses the question of 'What is a myth, today?' with the analysis of ideas such as: myth as a type of speech, and myth on the wings of politics.
The front cover of the Paris Match magazine that Barthes analyzes
Following on from the first section, Barthes justifies and explains his choices and analysis. He calls upon the concepts of semiology developed by Ferdinand de Saussure, who described the connections between an object (the signified) and its linguistic representation (such as a word, the signifier) and how the two are connected.[4] Working with this structure Barthes continues to show his idea of a myth as a further sign, with its roots in language, but to which something has been added. So with a word (or other linguistic unit) the meaning (apprehended content) and the sound come together to make a sign. To make a myth, the sign itself is used as a signifier, and a new meaning is added, which is the signified. But according to Barthes, this is not added arbitrarily.[5] Although we are not necessarily aware of it, modern myths are created with a reason. As in the example of the red wine, mythologies are formed to perpetuate an idea of society that adheres to the current ideologies of the ruling class and its media.[6]
Roland Barthes Wrestling
Barthes demonstrates this theory with the example of a front cover from Paris Match edition no. 326, of July 1955,[7] showing a young black soldier in French uniform saluting. The signifier: a saluting soldier, cannot offer us further factual information of the young man's life. But it has been chosen by the magazine to symbolise more than the young man; the picture, in combination with the signifieds of Frenchness, militariness, and relative ethnic difference, gives us a message about France and its citizens. The picture does not explicitly demonstrate 'that France is a great empire, that all her sons, without any colour discrimination, faithfully serve under her flag,' etc.,[8] but the combination of the signifier and signified perpetuates the myth of imperial devotion, success and thus; a property of 'significance' for the picture.
I am at the barber’s, and copy of Paris-Match is offered to me. On the cover, a young Negro in a French uniform is saluting, with his eyes uplifted, probably fixed on a fold of the tricolour. All this is the meaning of the picture. But whether naively or not, I see very well what it signifies to me: that France is a great Empire, that all her sons, without any colour discrimination, faithfully serve under the flag, and that there is no better answer to the detractors of an alleged colonialism than the zeal shown by this Negro in serving his so-called oppressors ..[9]
Myth and power[edit]
Exploring the concept of myth, Barthes seeks to grasp the relations between language and power. He assumes that myth helps to naturalize particular worldviews.[10]
According to Barthes, myth is based on humans’ history, and myth cannot naturally occur. There are always some communicative intentions in myth. Created by people, myth can easily be changed or destroyed. Also, myth depends on the context where it exists. By changing the context, one can change the effects of myth. At the same time, myth itself participates in the creation of an ideology. According to Barthes, myth doesn’t seek to show or to hide the truth when creating an ideology, it seeks to deviate from the reality. The major function of myth is to naturalize a concept, a belief. Myth purifies signs and fills them with a new meaning which is relevant to the communicative intentions of those who are creating the myth. In the new sign, there are no contradictions that could raise any doubts regarding the myth. Myth is not deep enough to have these contradictions; it simplifies the world by making people believe that signs have inherent meaning. Myth “abolishes the complexity of human acts, it gives them the simplicity of essences…”[11]
Why do people believe in myth? The power of myth is in its impressive character. It seeks to surprise the audience. This impression is way more powerful than any rational explanations which can disprove the myth. So, myth works not because it hides its intentions, but because the intentions of myth have been naturalized. Through the usage of myths, one can naturalize “the Empire, [the] taste for Basque things, the Government.”[12]
Speaking of myth and power, Barthes asserts that myth is a depoliticized speech. He uses the term ex-nomination (or exnomination), by which he 'means 'outside of naming'. Barthes' point was that dominant groups or ideas in society become so obvious or common sense that they don't have to draw attention to themselves by giving themselves a name. They're just the 'normality', against which everything else can be judged.'[13] For example he says, '[the bourgeoisie] makes its status undergo a real ex-nominating operation: the bourgeoisie is defined as the social class which does not want to be named' (italics in original).[14] Myth removes our understanding of concepts and beliefs as created by humans. Instead, myth presents them as something natural and innocent. Drawing upon Karl Marx, Barthes states that even the most natural objects include some aspect of politics. Depending on how strong the political side of myth is, Barthes defines the strong and the weak myths (des mythes forts et des mythes faibles).[15] Depoliticization of the strong myths happens abruptly, as the strong myths are explicitly political. The weak myths are the myths which have already lost their political character. However, this character can be brought back by “the slightest thing”.[16]
The model of semiosis suggested by Barthes.
Vinnie moore hot licks pdf. Barthes also provides a list of rhetorical figures in bourgeoisie myths:
- The inoculation. The government admits the harm brought by one of the institutes. Focusing on one institute, myth hides the inconsistency of the system. Inoculation consists in 'admitting the accidental evil of a class-bound institution in order to conceal its principal evil.' A 'small inoculation of acknowledged evil' protects against 'the risk of a generalized subversion.'[17][18]
- The privation of History. A history standing behind a myth gets removed. People don’t wonder where the myth comes from; they simply believe it.[19]
- Identification. The ideology of bourgeoisie seeks for sameness. It denies all the concepts that don’t fit into the system. The bourgeoisie either ignores subjects that differ from them, or they put the efforts to make this subject the same as the bourgeoisie.[20]
- Tautology. The myths of the bourgeoisie define the concepts through the same concepts (Barthes provides an example of theatre, “Drama is drama”)[21]
- Neither-Norism (le ninisme). Two concepts are defined by each other, and both of the concepts are considered inconsistent.[22]
- The quantification of quality. Myth measures reality by numbers, not by quality. This way, myth simplifies reality.[23]
- The statement of fact. Myth doesn’t explain the reality. Myth asserts a certain picture of the world without explanation just like a proverb does.[24]
The model of semiosis suggested by Barthes seeks to link signs with the social myths or ideologies that they articulate.[25]
Mythologisation and cultural studies[edit]
Barthes refers to the tendency of socially constructed notions, narratives, and assumptions to become 'naturalised' in the process, that is, taken unquestioningly as given within a particular culture. Barthes finishes Mythologies by looking at how and why myths are built up by the bourgeoisie in its various manifestations. He returns to this theme in later works including The Fashion System.
Roland Barthes The World Of Wrestling Pdf Online
References[edit]
- ^Barthes, Mythologies, p. 60
- ^Barthes, Mythologies, p.15
- ^Barthes, Mythologies, p.19
- ^Carol Sanders (2 December 2004). The Cambridge Companion to Saussure. Cambridge University Press. pp. 162–. ISBN978-0-521-80486-8.
- ^Laurie Schneider Adams (9 March 2018). The Methodologies of Art: An Introduction. Taylor & Francis. pp. 172–. ISBN978-0-429-97407-6.
- ^Associate Professor of Psychology Brady Wagoner; Brady Wagoner (4 December 2009). Symbolic Transformation: The Mind in Movement Through Culture and Society. Routledge. pp. 98–. ISBN978-1-135-15090-7.
- ^Jessica Evans; Stuart Hall (6 July 1999). Visual Culture: The Reader. SAGE Publications. pp. 55–. ISBN978-0-7619-6248-9.
- ^Barthes, Mythologies, p.116
- ^Mireille Rosello (2010). The Reparative in Narratives: Works of Mourning in Progress. Liverpool University Press. pp. 61–. ISBN978-1-84631-220-5.
- ^'International Encyclopedia of Communication'. International Encyclopedia of Communication.
- ^Barthes. Mythologies. p. 143.
- ^Barthes. Mythologies. p. 131.
- ^McKee, Alan (2003). 'How do I know what's a likely interpretation?'. Textual analysis: a beginner's guide. London Thousand Oaks, California: Sage Publications. p. 106. ISBN9780761949930.See also: Wasson, Richard (Fall 1980). 'Myth and the ex-nomination of class in The Time Machine'. The Minnesota Review. Johns Hopkins University Press. 15: 112–122.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
- ^Lakoff, Robin Tolmach (2000). 'The neutrality of the status quo'. The language war. Berkeley: University of California Press. p. 53. ISBN9780520928077.Barthes, Roland (1972). Mythologies. London: Cape. p. 138. OCLC222874772.
- ^Barthes, Roland (1957). Mythologies. Paris: Éditions du Seuil. pp. 218.
- ^Barthes. Mythologies. p. 144.
- ^Mythologies, p. 150.
- ^Chela Sandoval (2000). Methodology of the Oppressed. University of Minnesota Press. pp. 137–. ISBN978-0-8166-2736-3.
- ^Mythologies, p. 151.
- ^Barthes, Mythologies, p. 151
- ^Barthes. Mythologies. p. 152.
- ^Barthes, Mythologies, p. 153
- ^Barthes, Mythologies, p. 153
- ^Barthes, Mythologies, p. 153
- ^'International Encyclopedia of Communication'. International Encyclopedia of Communication.
Roland Barthes The World Of Wrestling Pdf Download
Bibliography[edit]
- Barthes, Roland, Mythologies. Paris, Editions du Seuil, 1957.
- Barthes, Roland, translated by Annette Lavers. Mythologies. London, Paladin, 1972. ISBN0-374-52150-6. Expanded edition (now containing the previously untranslated 'Astrology'), with a new introduction by Neil Badmington, published by Vintage (UK), 2009. ISBN978-0-09-952975-0
- Barthes, Roland, translated by Richard Howard. The Eiffel Tower and Other Mythologies. New York, Hill and Wang, 1979. ISBN0-520-20982-6
- Welch, Liliane. 'Reviews: Mythologies by Roland Barthes: Annette Lavers.' The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism. Volume 31, Number 4. (Summer 1973).
Roland Barthes World Of Wrestling
See also[edit]
Roland Barthes The World Of Wrestling Pdf Free
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