Reflection #5 - Structuralism

 

Defamiliarization.   Making the everyday - unfamiliar or the ordinary strange.  This was an interesting discussion this past week.  I understood this better after we examined a clip from the movie Go Bananas, by Woody Allen.   With the imminent assassination of the leader in the movie and how the newscaster, Howard Cousell, made the experience like a sporting event, defamiliarized the scene. 

In examining Ferdinand Saussure’s study of linguistics and structuralism, learning about semiotics was interesting in that signifier and signified are the key to language and how we communicate.  The idea that signs are broken down into what you see, is what you think - reinforces this belief.  Saussure’s work emphasizes thinking in binaries.  Ie. cat/dog, mother/father, etc., therefore when we examine something  we don’t comprehend one without the other.  When analyzing this semiotic theory, it allows us to understand how something can be exchangeable with what is represents as in the case of Michael Jordan.  He expands out to many commodities.

Following this structuralistic approach to literature, I am more able to look at a text now and break it down in a way that was foreign to me before.  It isn’t something that particularly excites me, however.  When I read a story, I prefer to get lost in the plot, versus breaking it down to understand the signifier and signified.  How much fun is there in that?  I hope that when people read my novel, they won’t get hung up in the structure and just get lost in the story.