Roland Barthes' work is widely referenced within analysis of media texts because of his work on how meaning is constructed according to cultural ideas and influences. How audiences consume these media texts is influenced by their own understanding of society and their own viewpoints.
He described five codes that are woven into any narrative.
- The Hermeneutic Code refers to any element of the story that is not fully explained and hence becomes a mystery to the reader.
- The Proairetic Code also builds tension, referring to any other action or event that indicates something else is going to happen, and which hence gets the reader guessing as to what will happen next.
- The Semantic Code refers to connotation within the story that gives additional meaning over the basic denotative meaning of the word.
- The Symbolic Code is very similar to the Semantic Code, but acts at a wider level, organizing semantic meanings into broader and deeper sets of meaning. This is typically done in the use of antithesis, where new meaning arises out of opposing and conflict ideas.
- The Cultural Code refers to anything that is founded on some kind of canonical works that cannot be challenged and is assumed to be a foundation for truth, for example science or religion.
Find out information about this theorist and create a short presi or powerpoint about his work on Cultural Codes.
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