Representation: by Stuart Hall

The Open University Kenneth Thompson, Book 6 This book is part of the
Course Team Chair, Author Culture, Media and Identities

SAGE Publications
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David Boswell, Critical reader
Consultant authors Representation:
Peter Braham, Author
Cultural Representations and
David Calderwood, Project Susan Benson, University of
Signifying Practices
controller Cambridge
edited by Stuart Hall
Elizabeth Chaplin, Tutor panel Paul Gilroy, Goldsmiths College,
Identity and Difference
member, Study Guide author University of London
edited by Kathryn Woodward
Lene Connolly, Print buying Christine Gledhill, Staffordshire
Production of Culture/Cultures
controller University
of Production
Jeremy Cooper, BBC producer Henrietta Lidchi, Museum of edited by Paul du Gay
Mankind, London
Margaret Dickens, Print buying Consumption and Everyday Life
co-ordinator Daniel Miller, University of edited by Hugh Mackay
London
REPRESENTATION
Jessica Evans, Critical reader Media and Cultural Regulation
Shaun Moores, Queen Margaret edited by Kenneth Thompson
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College, Edinburgh
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Keith Negus, University of joint responsibility of chapter
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Sean Nixon, University of Essex team commentators.
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Edited by STUART HALL
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©The Open University 1997
REPRESENTATION: ()
First published in 1997
0
The opinions expressed are not necessarily those of the Course Team or of The Open
University. CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS z
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES -I
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photocopying, recording or otherwise, without permission in writing from the
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Introduction
SAGE Publications Ltd

THE WORK OF REPRESENTATION Stuart Hall 13
6 Bonhill Street
2 REPRESENTING THE SOCIAL: FRANCE AND
London EC2A 4PU
FRENCHNESS IN POST-WAR HUMANIST
SAGE Publications Inc. PHOTOGRAPHY Peter Hamilton 75
2455 Teller Road
Thousand Oaks 3 THE POETICS AND THE POLITICS OF EXHIBITING
California 91320 OTHER CULTURES Henrietta Lidchi 151
SAGE Publications India Pvt Ltd
32, M-Block Market 4 THE SPECTACLE OF THE 'OTHER' Stuart Hall 223
Greater Kailash - I
New Delhi 110 048 5 EXHIBITING MASCULINITY Sean Nixon 291
British Library Cataloguing in Publication data 6 GENRE AND GENDER: THE CASE OF SOAP OPERA
A catalogue record for this book is available from The British Library. Christine Gledhill 337
ISBN 0 7619 5431 7 (cased)
Acknowledgements 387
ISBN O 7619 5432 5 (pbk)
Library of Congress catalog card number 96-071228

Index 391
Edited, designed and typeset by The Open University.
Printed in Great Britain by BPC Digital Information Ltd, Exeter, Devon

INTRODUCTION
Stuart Hall
The chapters in this volume all deal, in different ways, with the question of
representation. This is one of the central practices which produce culture
and a key 'moment' in what has been called the 'circuit of culture' (see du
Gay, Hall et al., 1997*). But what does representation have to do with
'culture': what is the connection between them? To put it simply, culture is
about 'shared meanings'. Now, language is the privileged medium in which
we 'make sense' of things, in which meaning is produced and exchanged.
Meanings can only be shared through our common access to language. So
language is central to meaning and culture and has always been regarded as
the key repository of cultural values and meanings.
The circuit of production

culture
But how does language construct meanings? How does it sustain the
dialogue between participants which enables them to build up a culture of
shared understandings and so interpret the world in roughly the same ways?
Language is able to do this because it operates as a representational system.
In language, we use signs and symbols -whether they are sounds, written
words, electronically produced images, musical notes, even objects - to
stand for or represent to other people our concepts, ideas and feelings.
Language is one of the 'media' through which thoughts, ideas and feelings
are represented in a culture. Representation through language is therefore
central to the processes by which meaning is produced. This is the basic,
underlying idea which underpins all six chapters in this book. Each chapter
examines 'the production and circulation of meaning through language' in
different ways, in relation to different examples, different areas of social
* A reference in bold indicates another book, or another chapter in another book, in the series.
2 REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
INTRODUCTION 3
practice. Together, these chapters push forward and develop our
message', and even if the other person couldn't give a very logical account of
understanding of how representation actually works.
hows/he came to understand what I was 'saying'. Above all, cultural
'Culture' is one of the most difficult concepts in the human and social sciences meanings are not only 'in the head'. They organize and regulate social
and there are many different ways of defining it. In more traditional practices, influence our conduct and consequently have real, practical
definitions of the term, culture is said to embody the 'best that has been effects.
thought and said' in a society. It is the sum of the great ideas, as represented in
The emphasis on cultural practices is important. It is participants in a cultt1:re
the classic works of literature, painting, music and philosophy - the 'high
who give meaning to people, objects and events. Things 'in themselves'
culture' of an age. Belonging to the same frame ofreference, but more 'modern'
rarely if ever have any one, single, fixed and unchanging meaning. Even
in its associations, is the use of 'culture' to refer to the widely distributed
something as obvious as a stone can be a stone, a boundary marker or a piece
forms of popular music, publishing, art, design and literature, or the activities
of sculpture, depending on what it means - that is, within a certain context of
of leisure-time and entertainment, which make up the everyday lives of the
use, within what the philosophers call different 'language games' (i.e. the
majority of 'ordinary people' - what is called the 'mass culture' or the 'popular
language of boundaries, the language of sculpture, and so on). It is by our use
culture' of an age. High culture versus popular culture was, for many years,
of things, and what we say, think and feel about them - how we represent
the classic way of framing the debate about culture - the terms carrying a
them - that we give them a meaning. In part, we give objects, people and
powerfully evaluative charge (roughly, high = good; popular = debased). In
events meaning by the frameworks of interpretation which we bring to them.
recent years, and in a more 'social science' context, the word 'culture' is used
In part, we give things meaning by how we use them, or integrate them into
to refer to whatever is distinctive about the 'way oflife' of a people,
our everyday practices. It is our use of a pile of bricks and mortar which
community, nation or social group. This has come to be known as the
makes it a 'house'; and what we feel, think or say about it that makes a 'house'
'anthropological' definition. Alternatively, the word can be used to describe
a 'home'. In part, we give things meaning by how we represent them- the
the 'shared values' of a group or of society- which is like the anthropological
words we use about them, the stories we tell about them, the images of them
definition, only with a more sociological emphasis. You will find traces of all
we produce, the emotions we associate with them, the ways we classify and
these meanings somewhere in this book. However, as its title suggests,
conceptualize them, the values we place on them. Culture, we may say, is
'culture' is usually being used in these chapters in a somewhat different,
more specialized way. involved in all those practices which are not simply genetically programmed
into us - like the jerk of the knee when tapped - but which carry meaning
What has come to be called the 'cultural turn' in the social and human and value for us, which need to be meaningfully interpreted by others, or
sciences, especially in cultural studies and the sociology of culture, has which depend on meaning for their effective operation. Culture, in this sense,
tended to emphasize the importance of meaning to the definition of culture. permeates all of society. It is what distinguishes the 'human' element in social
Culture, it is argued, is not so much a set of things - novels and paintings or life from what is simply biologically driven. Its study underlines the crucial
TV programmes and comics - as a process, a set of practices. Primarily, role of the symbolic domain at the very heart of social life.
culture is concerned with the production and the exchange of meanings - the
Where is meaning produced? Our 'circuit of culture' suggests that, in fact,
'giving and taking of meaning' - between the members of a society or group.
meanings are produced at several different sites and circulated through
To say that two people belong to the same culture is to say that they interpret
several different processes or practices (the cultural circuit). Meaning is what
the world in roughly the same ways and can express themselves, their
gives us a sense of our own identity, of who we are and with whom we
thoughts and feelings about the world, in ways which will be understood by
'belong' - so it is tied up with questions of how culture is used to mark out
each other. Thus culture depends on its participants interpreting
and maintain identity within and difference between groups (which is the
meaningfully what is happening around them, and 'making sense' of the
world, in broadly similar ways. main focus of Woodward, ed., 1997). Meaning is constantly being produced
and exchanged in every personal and social interaction in which we take
This focus on 'shared meanings' may sometimes make culture sound too part. In a sense, this is the most privileged, though often the most neglected,
unitary and too cognitive. In any culture, there is always a great diversity of site of culture and meaning. It is also produced in a variety of different
meanings about any topic, and more than one way of interpreting or media; especially, these days, in the modern mass media, the means of global
representing it. Also, culture is about feelings, attachments and emotions as communication, by complex technologies, which circulate meanings between
well as concepts and ideas. The expression on my face 'says something' about different cultures on a scale and with a speed hitherto unknown in history.
who I am (identity) and what I am feeling (emotions) and what group I feel I (This is the focus of du Gay, ed., 1997.) Meaning is also produced whenever
belong to (attachment), which can be 'read' and understood by other people, we express ourselves in, make use of, consume or appropriate cultural
even ifI didn't intend deliberately to communicate anything as formal as 'a 'things'; that is, when we incorporate them in different ways into the everyday
rituals and practices of daily life and in this way give them value or
4
REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS ANO SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
INTRODUCTION 5
significance. Or when we weave narratives, stories - and fantasies - around
them. (This is the focus of Mackay, ed., 1997.) Meanings also regulate and electronically produced dots on a screen, traffic lights use red, green and
organize our conduct and practices - they help to set the rules, norms and amber - to 'say something'. These elements - sounds, words, notes, gestures,
conventions by which social life is ordered and governed. They are also, expressions, clothes - are part of our natural and material world; b~t their.
therefore, what those who wish to govern and regulate the conduct and ideas importance for language is not what they are but what they do, then funct10n.
of others seek to structure and shape. (This is the focus of Thompson, ed., They construct meaning and transmit it. They signify. They don't have any
1997.) In other words, the question of meaning arises in relation·to all the clear meaning in themselves. Rather, they are the vehicles or media which
different moments or practices in our 'cultural circuit' - in the construction carry meaning because they operate as symbols, which stand for or represent
of identity and the marking of difference, in production and consumption, as (i.e. symbolize) the meanings we wish to communicate. To use another
well as in the regulation of social conduct. However, in all these instances, metaphor, they function as signs. Signs stand for or represent our concepts,
and at all these different institutional sites, one of the privileged 'media' ideas and feelings in such a way as to enable others to 'read', decode or
through which meaning is produced and circulated is language. interpret their meaning in roughly the same way that we do.
So, in this book, where we take up in depth the first element in our 'circuit of Language, in this sense, is a signifying practice. Any r~presentational sy~tem
culture', we start with this question of meaning, language and representation. which functions in this way can be thought of as workmg, broadly speakmg,
Members of the same culture must share sets of concepts, images and ideas according to the principles of representation through language. Thus
which enable them to think and feel about the world, and thus to interpret photography is a representational system, using images on light-sensitive
the world, in roughly similar ways. They must share, broadly speaking, the paper to communicate photographic meaning about a particular person,
same 'cultural codes'. In this sense, thinking and feeling are themselves event or scene. Exhibition or display in a museum or gallery can also be
'systems ofrepresentation', in which our concepts, images and emotions thought of as 'like a language', since it uses objects o~ ~~splay to ?r?d~:e
'stand for' or represent, in our mental life, things which are or may be 'out certain meanings about the subject-matter of the exh1b1hon. Music is like a
there' in the world. Similarly, in order to communicate these meanings to language' in so far as it uses musical notes to communicate feelings and
other people, the participants to any meaningful exchange must also be able ideas, even if these are very abstract, and do not refer in any obvious way to
to use the same linguistic codes - they must, in a very broad sense, 'speak the the 'real world'. (Music has been called 'the most noise conveying the least
same language'. This does not mean that they must all, literally, speak information'.) But turning up at football matches with banners and slogans,
German or French or Chinese. Nor does it mean that they understand with faces and bodies painted in certain colours or inscribed with certain
perfectly what anyone who speaks the same language is saying. We mean symbols, can also be thought of as 'like a language' - in so fa~ as it is a .
'language' here in a much wider sense. Our partners must speak enough of symbolic practice which gives meaning or expression to the ide~ of b~longmg
the same language to be able to 'translate' what 'you' say into what 'I' to a national culture, or identification with one's local commumty. It is part
understand, and vice versa. They must also be able to read visual images in of the language of national identity, a discourse of national belongingness.
roughly similar ways. They must be familiar with broadly the same ways of Representation, here, is closely tied up with both identity and knowledge.
producing sounds to make what they would both recognize as 'music'. They Indeed it is difficult to know what 'being English', or indeed French,
must all interpret body language and facial expressions in broadly similar Germa~, South African or Japanese, means outside of all the ways in which
ways. And they must know how to translate their feelings and ideas into our ideas and images of national identity or national cultures have been
these various languages. Meaning is a dialogue - always only partially represented. Without these 'signifying' systems, we could not ta~e on such
understood, always an unequal exchange. identities (or indeed reject them) and consequently could not bmld up or
sustain that common 'life-world' which we call a culture.
Why do we refer to all these different ways of producing and communicating
meaning as 'languages' or as 'working like languages'? How do languages So it is through culture and language in this sense that the production and
work? The simple answer is that languages work through representation. circulation of meaning takes place. The conventional view used to be that
They are 'systems ofrepresentation'. Essentially, we can say that all these 'things' exist in the material and natural world; that their material or natural
practices 'work like languages', not because they are all written or spoken characteristics are what determines or constitutes them; and that they have a
(they are not), but because they all use some element to stand for or represent perfectly clear meaning, outside of how they are repre~ented. Re?resentat~on,
what we want to say, to express or communicate a thought, concept, idea or in this view, is a process of secondary importance, which enters mto the field
feeling. Spoken language uses sounds, written language uses words, musical only after things have been fully formed and t~eir ~eaning cons:itu~ed. But
language uses notes on a scale, the 'language of the body' uses physical since the 'cultural turn' in the human and social sciences, meamng is thought-
gesture, the fashion industry uses items of clothing, the language of facial to be produced- constructed-rather than simply 'found'. Consequently, i~
expression uses ways of arranging one's features, television uses digitally or what has come to be called a 'social constructionist approach', representat10n
is conceived as entering into the very constitution of things; and thus culture
6 REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS ANO SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
INTRODUCTION 7
is conceptualized as a primary or 'constitutive' process, as important as the
authors in this volume. Elsewhere in this series (in Mackay, ed., 1997, for
economic or material 'base' in shaping social subjects and historical events -
example) alternative approaches are explored, which adopt a more 'creative',
not merely a reflection of the world after the event.
expressive or performative approach to meaning, questioning, for example,
'Language' therefore provides one general model of how culture and whether it makes sense to think of music as 'working like a language'.
representation work, especially in what has come to be known as the semiotic However, by and large, with some variations, the chapters in this book adopt
approach - semiotics being the study or 'science of signs' and their general a broadly 'constructionist' approach to representation and meaning.
role as vehicles of meaning in culture. In more recent years, this
In Chapter 1 on 'The work of representation', Stuart Hall fills out in great:r
preoccupation with meaning has taken a different turn, being more
depth the theoretical argument about meaning, language and representat10n
concerned, not with the detail of how 'language' works, but with the broader
briefly summarized here. What do we mean by saying that 'meaning is
role of discourse in culture. Discourses are ways of referring to or
produced through language'? Using a range of examples - which it is
constructing knowledge about a particular topic of practice: a cluster (or
important to work through for yourself - the chapter takes us through the.
formation) of ideas, images and practices, which provide ways of talking
argument of exactly what this entails. Do things - objects, people, events m
about, forms of knowledge and conduct associated with, a particular topic,
the world- carry their own, one, true meaning, fixed like number plates on
social activity or institutional site in society. These discursive formations, as
their backs, which it is the task of language to reflect accurately? Or are
they are known, define what is and is not appropriate in our formulation of,
meanings constantly shifting as we move from one culture to another, one
and our practices in relation to, a particular subject or site of social activity;
language to another, one historical context, one community: group or sub- , .
what knowledge is considered useful, relevant and 'true' in that context; and
culture, to another? Is it through our systems of representat10n, rather than m
what sorts of persons or 'subjects' embody its characteristics. 'Discursive' has
the world', that meaning is fixed? It is clear that representation is neither as
become the general term used to refer to any approach in which meaning,
simple nor transparent a practice as it first appears and that, in order to .
representation and culture are considered to be constitutive.
unpack the idea, we need to do some work on a range of example~, a~d brmg
There are some similarities, but also some major differences, between the to bear certain concepts and theories, in order to explore and clarify its
semiotic and the discursive approaches, which are developed in the chapters complexities.
which follow. One important difference is that the semiotic approach is
The question - 'Does visual language reflect a truth about the world which is
concerned with the how of representation, with how language produces
already there or does it produce meanings about the world through
meaning - what has been called its 'poetics'; whereas the discursive approach
representing it?' - forms the basis of Chapter 2, 'Representing the social:
is more concerned with the effects and consequences of representation - its
France and Frenchness in post-war humanist photography' by Peter
'politics'. It examines not only how language and representation produce
Hamilton. Hamilton examines the work of a group of documentary
meaning, but how the knowledge which a particular discourse produces
photographers in France in the fifteen years following World War II, all of
connects with power, regulates conduct, makes up or constructs identities
whom, he argues, adopted the representational approach, subject-matter,
and subjectivities, and defines the way certain things are represented,
values and aesthetic forms of a particular practice - what he calls the
thought about, practised and studied. The emphasis in the discursive
'humanist paradigm' - in French photography. This distinctive body of work
approach is always on the historical specificity of a particular form or
produced a very specific image and definition of 'what i~ meant to ~e French'
'regime' of representation: not on 'language' as a general concern, but on
in this period, and thus helped to give a particular meanmg to the idea of
specific languages or meanings, and how they are deployed at particular
belonging to French culture and to 'Frenchness' as a national identity. Wha~,
times, in particular places. It points us towards greater historical specificity -
then, is the status, the 'truth-claims', which these documentary photographic
the way representational practices operate in concrete historical situations
in actual practice. ' images are making? What are they 'documenting'? Are they to be judged by
the authenticity of their representation or by the depth and subtlety of the
The general use of language and discourse as models of how culture, meaning feelings which the photographers put into their images? Do they reflec: 'the
and representation work, and the 'discursive turn' in the social and cultural truth' about French society at that time - or was there more than one kmd of
sciences which has followed, is one of the most significant shifts of direction truth, more than one kind of 'Frenchness', depending on how it was
in our knowledge of society which has occurred in recent years. The represented? How did the image of France which emerges from this work
discussion around these two versions of 'constructionism' - the semiotic and relate to the rapid social changes sweeping through France in that period and
discursive approaches - is threaded through and developed in the six to our (very different?) image of 'Frenchness' today?
chapters which follow. The 'discursive turn' has not, of course, gone
Chapter 3, 'The poetics and the politics of exhibiting other cultures' by .
uncontested. You will find questions raised about this approach and critiques
Henrietta Lidchi, takes up some of the same questions about representation,
offered, as well as different variants of the position explored, by the different
but in relation to a different subject-matter and a different set of signifying
8 REPRESENTATION CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS ANO SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
INTRODUCTION 9
practices. Whereas Chapter 2 deals with the practice of photography- the
production of meaning through images - Chapter 3 deals with exhibition - or 'b ecommgm
· asculi'ne' - in different historical contexts. To address
. these
. N'
ques t10ns, ixon not only expands and applies some of the
. theoretical
.
the production of meaning through the display of objects and artefacts from
spectives from earlier chapters, but adds new ones, mcludmg a
~:;choanalytically
'other cultures' within the context of the modern museum. Here, the
elements exhibited are often 'things' rather than 'words or images' and the informed cultural analysis and film theory.
signifying practice involved is that of arrangement and display within a In the final Chapter 6, 'Genre and gender: the case of soap opera', Chri~tine
physical space, rather than layout on the page of an illustrated magazine or Gledhill takes us into the rich, narrative world of popular cult~re and ~t~
journal. Nevertheless, as this chapter argues, exhibition too is a 'system' or
genres, WI. th an examination of how representation is working1 m telev1s10n
· ·
'practice ofrepresentation' - and therefore works 'like a language'. Every soap opera. These are enormously popular sources of fictiona narrative m
choice - to show this rather than that, to show this in relation to that, to say modern life, circulating meanings throughout popular cultu~e - and
this about that - is a choice about how to represent 'other cultures'; and each increasingly worldwide - which have been traditionally defmed a~
choice has consequences both for what meanings are produced and for how 'feminine' in their appeal, reference and mode of operation. Gledhill unpacks
meaning is produced. Henrietta Lidchi shows how those meanings are the way this gendered identification of a TV genre has been constructed. She
inevitably implicated in relations of power - especially between those who considers how and why such a 'space of representation' sho~ld hav~ opened
are doing the exhibiting and those who are being exhibited. up within popular culture; how genre and gender elements mteract m the
The introduction of questions of power into the argument about narrative structures and representational forms; and how these popular forms
representation is one of the ways in which the book consistently seeks to have been ideologically shaped and inflected. She examines how the .
probe, expand and complexify our understanding of the process of meanings circulated in soap operas - so frequentl.y dis~issed as stereotypical
representation. In Chapter 4, 'The spectacle of the "Other"', Stuart Hall takes and manufactured _ nevertheless enter into the d1scurs1ve. arena where the
up this theme of 'representing difference' from Chapter 3, but now in the meaning of masculine and feminine identifications are bemg contested and
context of more contemporary popular cultural forms (news photos, transformed.
advertising, film and popular illustration). It looks at how 'racial', ethnic and The book uses a wide range of examples from different cultural media and
sexual difference has been 'represented' in a range of visual examples across discourses mainly concentrating on visual language. These examples are a
a number of historical archives. Central questions about how 'difference' is key part of your work on the book- they are not simply 'illustrative'.
represented as 'Other', and the essentializing of 'difference' through Representation can only be properly anal?'sed in relation to th.e actual
stereotyping are addressed. However, as the argument develops, the chapter concrete forms which meaning assumes, m the concret.e practice.s of
takes up the wider question of how signifying practices actually structure the signifying, 'reading' and interpretation; and these reqmre analysis of the
way we 'look' - how different modes of 'looking' are being inscribed by these actual signs, symbols, figures, images, nar~ati:es'. words and sounds - the
representational practices; and how violence, fantasy and 'desire' also play material forms _ in which symbolic meanmg is cuculat~d. The examples
into representational practices, making them much more complex and their rovide an opportunity to practise these skills of analysis and to appl?' them
meanings more ambivalent. The chapter ends by considering some counter-
strategies in the 'politics of representation' - the way meaning can be
f0 many other similar instances which surround us in daily cultural hfe.
struggled over, and whether a particular regime of representation can be It is worth emphasizing that there is no single or 'correct' ans~er ~~ t~e
challenged, contested and transformed. .
ques t ion, 'What does this image mean?' or 'What is this ad, saymg. Smee . ,
there is no law which can guarantee that things will .have ~ne, true meanmg ,
The question of how the spectator or the consumer is drawn into and or that meanings won't change over time, work in this area m .bound to, be
implicated by certain practices of representation returns in Sean Nixon's interpretative - a debate between, not who is 'right' a~d who is 'wrong, but
Chapter 5, 'Exhibiting masculinity', on the construction of new gendered between equally plausible, though sometimes competmg and contested,
identities in contemporary advertising, magazines and consumer industries meanings and interpretations. The best way to 'settle' such co~tes.ted ,
addressed especially to men. Nixon asks whether representational practices readings is to look again at the concrete example and to try to JUSti~y ~~e s .
in the media in recent years, have been constructing new 'masculine 'reading' in detail in relation to the actual practices and ~arms of s1gmficat10n
identities'. Are the different languages of consumer culture, retailing and used, and what meanings they seem to you to be producmg.
display developing new 'subject-positions', with which young men are
increasingly invited to identify? And, if so, what do these images tell us One soon discovers that meaning is not straightforward or tra~spar~nt, and
about how the meanings of masculinity are shifting in late-modern visual does not survive intact the passage through representatio~. It I~ a slippery
culture? 'Masculinity', Nixon argues, far from being fixed and given customer, changing and shifting with context, usage and h1stonc~l
biologically, accretes a variety of different meanings - different ways of 'being' circumstances. It is therefore never finally fixed. It is always puttmg of~ or
'deferring' its rendezvous with Absolute Truth. It is always being negotiated
I0 REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
INTRODUCTION II
and inflected, to resonate with new situations. It is often contested, and
k 'f they are to some degree shared, at least to the extent that they
sometimes bitterly fought over. There are always different circuits of meaning
circulating in any culture at the same time, overlapping discursive onl~ w~; ~· e 'translation' between 'speakers' possible. We should perh~ps
ma e e ec. iv . 1 ·n terms of 'accuracy' and 'truth' and more m
formations, from which we draw to create meaning or to express what we
think. !earn t~/:;f:~t~~;:::~:~gee~s: whic~
process of translation, facilitates
c::ral communication while always recognizin~ t~e ~ers1stence of
Moreover, we do not have a straightforward, rational or instrumental difference and power between different 'speakers w1thm the same
relationship to meanings. They mobilize powerful feelings and emotions, of cultural circuit.
both a positive and negative kind.We feel their contradictory pull, their
ambivalence. They sometimes call our very identities into question. We
struggle over them because they matter - and these are contests from which
serious consequences can flow. They define what is 'normal', who belongs - . of Cu1ture IC. uIt) ures of Production, London,
· (1997)
DUGAY,P. (e d) Productwn
and therefore, who is excluded. They are deeply inscribed in relations of
S /The Open University (Book 4 in this senes .
power. Think of how profoundly our lives are shaped, depending on which
age ES L MACKAY H. and NEGUS, K. (1997) Doing Cultural
meanings of male/female, black/white, rich/poor, gay/straight, young/old, DU GAY, P., HALL, s., JAN , ., TAT lk , London Sage/The Open University
citizen/alien, are in play in which circumstances. Meanings are often Studies: the story of the Sony vva man, '
organized into sharply opposed binaries or opposites. However, these (Book 1 in this series). . . .
binaries are constantly being undermined, as representations interact with s ( d) (1977) Representation: cultural representations an~ signifymg
HALL,. . e . d
one another, substituting for each other, displacing one another along an practices, Lon on, Sage /The Open University (Book 2 in this senes). /Th
unending chain. Our material interests and our bodies can be called to
MACKAY, H · (ed)· (1997) Consumption and Everyday Life, London, Sage e
account, and differently implicated, depending on how meaning is given and Open University (Book 5 in this series).
taken, constructed and interpreted in different situations. But equally
engaged are our fears and fantasies, the sentiments of desire and revulsion, of
Media and Cultural Regulation, London, Sage/The
THOMPSON, K. (e d ·) (19 97)
ambivalence and aggression. The more we look into this process of 0 en University (Book 6 in this series).
representation, the more complex it becomes to describe adequately or p
WOODWARD, · and DiJJerence,
· (1997) Identity
K. (e d) ·u Lon don , Sage/The Open
explain - which is why the various chapters enlist a variety of theories and University (Book 3 in this series).
concepts, to help us unlock its secrets.
The embodying of concepts, ideas and emotions in a symbolic form which

can be transmitted and meaningfully interpreted is what we mean by
'the practices ofrepresentation'. Meaning must enter the domain of these
practices, if it is to circulate effectively within a culture. And it cannot be
considered to have completed its 'passage' around the cultural circuit until it
has been 'decoded' or intelligibly received at another point in the chain.
Language, then, is the property of neither the sender nor the receiver of
meanings. It is the shared cultural 'space' in which the production of
meaning through language - that is, representation - takes place. The
receiver of messages and meanings is not a passive screen on which the
original meaning is accurately and transparently projected. The 'taking of
meaning' is as much a signifying practice as the 'putting into meaning'.
Speaker and hearer or writer and reager are active participants in a process
which - since they often exchange roles - is always double-sided, always
interactive. Representation functions less like the model of a one-way
transmitter and more like the model of a dialogue - it is, as they say, dialogic.
What sustains this 'dialogue' is the presence of shared cultural codes, which
cannot guarantee that meanings will remain stable forever - though
attempting to fix meaning is exactly why power intervenes in discourse. But,
even when power is circulating through meaning and knowledge, the codes
13
THE WORK OF n
I
REPRESENTATION )>
Stuart Hall ~
m
;;c
0
z
m
I. I Making meaning, representing things 16
1.2 Language and representation 19
1.3 Sharing the codes 21
1.4 Theories of representation 24
1.5 The language of traffic lights 26
1.6 Summary 28
2. I The social part of language 33

2.2 Critique of Saussure's model 34
2.3 Summary 35
3.1 Myth today 39
D
4.1 From language to discourse 44
4.2 Historicizing discourse: discursive practices 46
4.3 From discourse to power/knowledge 47
4.4 Summary: Foucault and representation SI
4.5 Charcot and the performance of hysteria 52
5.1 How to make sense of Velasquez' Las Meninas 56

5.2 The subject of/in representation 58
14
CHAPTER I THE WORK OF REPRESENTATION 15
READING A:
In this chapter we will be concentrating on one of the key processes in the
Norman Bryson 'L . 'cultural circuit' (see du Gay, Hall et al., 1997, and the Introduction to this
' anguage, reflection and still life'
65 volume) - the practices of representation. The aim of this chapter is to
READING B:
Roland Barth es, 'The world of wrestling' introduce you to this topic, and to explain what it is about and why we give it
66 such importance in cultural studies.
READING C:
Roland Barthes, 'Myth today' The concept of representation has come to occupy a new and important place
68 in the study of culture. Representation connects meaning and language to
READING D:
culture. But what exactly do people mean by it? What does representation
Roland Barth es, 'Rhetoric of the image' have to do with culture and meaning? One common-sense usage of the term
69
READING E: is as follows: 'Representation means using language to say something
Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe 'N fl . meaningful about, or to represent, the world meaningfully, to other people.'
of our time' ' ew re ections on the revolution You may well ask, 'Is that all?' Well, yes and no. Representation is an
70 essential part of the process by which meaning is produced and exchanged
READING F:
between members of a culture. It does involve the use of language, of signs
Elaine Showalter, 'The performance of hysteria' and images which stand for or represent things. But this is a far from simple
71
or straightforward process, as you will soon discover.
How does the concept of representation connect meaning and language to
culture? In order to explore this connection further, we will look at a number
of different theories about how language is used to represent the world. Here
we will be drawing a distinction between three different accounts or theories:
the reflective, the intentional and the constructionist approaches to
representation. Does language simply reflect a meaning which already exists
out there in the world of objects, people and events (reflective)? Does
language express only what the speaker or writer or painter wants to say, his
or her personally intended meaning (intentional)? Or is meaning constructed
in and through language (constructionist)? You will learn more in a moment
about these three approaches.
Most of the chapter will be spent exploring the constructionist approach,
because it is this perspective which has had the most significant impact on
cultural studies in recent years. This chapter chooses to examine two major
variants or models of the constructionist approach - the semiotic approach,
greatly influenced by the great Swiss linguist, Ferdinand de Saussure, and
the discursive approach, associated with the French philosopher and
historian, Michel Foucault. Later chapters in this book will take up these two
theories again, among others, so you will have an opportunity to consolidate
your understanding of them, and to apply them to different areas of analysis.
Other chapters will introduce theoretical paradigms which apply
constructionist approaches in different ways to that of semiotics and
Foucault. All, however, put in question the very nature of representation.
We turn to this question first.
I6 REPRESENTATION CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
commun1c . ate about them through language in ways which other people are
What does the word representation really mean, in this context? What does able to understand.
the process of representation involve? How does representation work?
h' m lex process to represent our
Why do we have to go through t is co p h ld' g and walk out of the room,
To put it briefly, representation is the production of meaning through d a glass you are o m
thoughts? If you put own though it is no longer physically
language. The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary suggests two relevant You can still think about the glass'. ehvenl 'Tau can only think with the
meanings for the word: 't th'nk wit a g ass . .l'
there. Actually, you can I . .r d of saying 'Dogs bark. But the
1 To represent something is to describe or depict it, to call it up in the mind A th l'ngu1sts are ion '
concept of the glass. s e I . , y can't speak with the actual glass,
by description or portrayal or imagination; to place a likeness of it before concept of "dog" cannot bark or bh1te. douf glass - GLASS - which is the
us in our mind or in the senses; as, for example, in the sentence, 'This 1 k ·th t e war or .
either. You can on y spea w1. E l' ht refer to obJ'ects which you drmk
picture represents the murder of Abel by Cain.' · · h' h we use m ng is 0 . · h
linguistic sign w ic . es in Representation is t e
h. · h representatwn com · I
2 To represent also means to symbolize, stand for, to be a specimen of, or to water out of. T is is w ere . minds through language. t
Production of the meanmg · f the concepts m our .
substitute for; as in the sentence, 'In Christianity, the cross represents the o h' h enables us to refer to either
suffering and crucifixion of Christ.' t nd language w ic f
is the link between concep s a . deed to imaginary worlds o
the 'real' world of objects, people or events, or m
The figures in the painting stand in the place of, and at the same time, stand fictional objects, people and events. .
for the story of Cain and Abel. Likewise, the cross simply consists of two
stems of representation, involved. Fust,
wooden planks nailed together; but in the context of Christian belief and So there are two processes, two sy f b' cts people and events are
, , b h ·ch all sorts o o Je ,
teaching, it takes on, symbolizes or comes to stand for a wider set of there is the system y w I t 1 representations which we carry
.h t 0 f concepts or men a
meanings about the crucifixion of the Son of God, and this is a concept we correlated wit a se ld not interpret the world
can put into words and pictures. around in our heads. Witho~t them, wehcou eaning depends on the system of
11 11 I the fust place, t en, m
meaningfu y at a . n . th hts which can stand for or
concepts and images forme~ m our o;g t things both inside and outside
'represent' the world, enablmg us to re er o
Here is a simple exercise about representation. Look at any familiar
object in the room. You will immediately recognize what it is. But how our heads. . ,
do you know what the object is? What does 'recognize' mean? h d 'system ofrepresentation, we
Before we move on to look at t e s~con 'd. ery simple version of a rather
h t have JUSt sai is a v
Now try to make yourself conscious of what you are doing - observe what should observe that w a we h e might form concepts for
I · · le enough to see ow w d
is going on as you do it. You recognize what it is because your thought- complex process. tis s1mp . 1 b' cts like chairs, tables an
· ple or matena o Je '
processes decode your visual perception of the object in terms of a things we can perceive - pea f ther obscure and abstract things,
concept of it which you have in your head. This must be so because, if desks. But we also form concepts o ra f 1 touch Think, for example, of
, . 'mple way see, ee or .
you look away from the object, you can still think about it by conjuring it which we can t m any SI . d h' love And as we have
d ath or fnen s ip or · '
up, as we say, 'in your mind's eye'. Go on - try to follow the process as it our concepts of war, or e , b t th1'ngs we never have seen, and
re 1 f 1· 1
happens: There is the object ... and there is the concept in your head marked ' we a so or,m concepts a dou
about peop 1e an d places we have p am Y
which tells you what it is, what your visual image of it means. possibly can't or wont ever see, an t f say angels, mermaids, God, the
h e a clear concep o ' ' . . 1
made up. We may av f M' ddlemarch (the fictional provmcia
Now, tell me what it is. Say it aloud: 'It's a lamp' - or a table or a book or
Devil, or of Heaven and Hell, or o l' Ib th (the heroine of Jane Austen's Pride
the phone or whatever. The concept of the object has passed through your town in George Eliot's novel), or E iza e
mental representation of it to me via the word for it which you have just and Prejudice}. . .
used. The word stands for or represents the concept, and can be used to
d h . , t m of represen t at10n
. ,· That is because it consists,
reference or designate either a 'real' object in the world or indeed even We have calle t is a sys e f d'ff t ways of organizing, clustering,
d . 'd 1 ncepts but o I eren 1 .
some imaginary object, like angels dancing on the head of a pin, which not of in iv1 ua co'fy' 'oncepts an d of es t ablishing complex re at10ns
no one has ever actually seen. 1
arranging and c ass1 mg c , th principles of similarity and
between them. For example, we use e epts or to distinguish them
This is how you give meaning to things through language. This is how you . h 1 t' h'ps between cone
difference to estabhs re a wns I. d th t ·n some respects birds are like
'make sense of' the world of people, objects and events, and how you are able from one another. Thus I have an I ~ t t~ I are similar because they both fly
to express a complex thought about those things to other people, or planes in the sky, based on the fac~ t a eyts they are different, because one
- but I also have an idea that in o~ er respe~ This mixing and matching of
is part of nature whilst the other is man-ma e.
18 REPRESENTATION CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
relations between concepts to form complex ideas and thoughts is possible
because our concepts are arranged into different classifying systems. In this , e' of facial expressions or of gesture, for .ex.ample,
ordinary sense: the languag h f traffic lights. Even music is a
example, the first is based on a distinction between flying/not flying and the ' f fashion of clot es, or o h d
or the 'language o , . b t en different sounds and c or s,
second is based on the distinction between natural/man-made. There are 'language', with complex relat10~s ~ we 't asily be used to reference actual
other principles of organization like this at work in all conceptual systems:
though it is a very spec ial case( smce . titfcan
there elaborated in du Gay, e d ., 1997 ,
things or objects in the world a p~; w~:d, image or object which functions
for example, classifying according to sequence - which concept follows
which - or causality - what causes what - and so on. The point here is that and Mackay, ed., 1997). An~ souh , . i'nto a system which is capable of
we are talking about, not just a random collection of concepts, but concepts · d ith ot er signs , I ·
as a sign, and is orgamze w . . fr m this point of view, 'a language. tis
organized, arranged and classified into complex relations with one another. . d ing meanmg is, 0 · h is
carrymg an express . h' h I have been analysmg ere
. . , ne· and that all the theories of meam~g .
That is what our conceptual system actually is like. However, this does not h t th model of meanmg w ic .
in this sense t a e' .
undermine the basic point. Meaning depends on the relationship between
things in the world - people, objects and events, real or fictional - and the
often described as a lmgmshc o d
which follow this basic model are escn e .
'b d as belonging to 'the lingmshc
conceptual system, which can operate as mental representations of them. t , in the social sciences and cultural studies.
Now it could be the case that the conceptual map which I carry around in my urn f h . culture then are two related ,systems
At the heart o t e mean ing process in · ' meaning
' to the wor ld b Y
head is totally different from yours, in which case you and I would interpret · , Th first enables us to give b
of representation · e h · of equivalences etween
or make sense of the world in totally different ways. We would be incapable f espondences or a c am f
constructing a set o corr b t . deas etc - and our system o
of sharing our thoughts or expressing ideas about the world to each other. In things - people, objects, events, a strac I d d~pe~ds on constructing a set of
fact, each of us probably does understand and interpret the world in a unique t 1 maps The secon d
concepts, our concep ua . t 1 map and a set of signs, arrange or
and individual way. However, we are able to communicate because we share d between our concep ua h
correspon ences . which stand for or represent t ose
broadly the same conceptual maps and thus make sense of or interpret the organized into vanous languages, . , ts and signs lies at the heart
world in roughly similar ways. That is indeed what it means when we say we 1 . b tween thmgs , concep h
concepts. The re at10n e . . The process which links t ese
'belong to the same culture'. Because we interpret the world in roughly d t'10n of meanmg m language.
similar ways, we are able to build up a shared culture of meanings and thus of the elements
three pro uc toget h er is
. w hat we call 'representation'·
construct a social world which we inhabit together. That is why 'culture' is
sometimes defined in terms of 'shared meanings or shared conceptual maps'
(see du Gay, Hall et al., 1997). d n
I . ·1
However, a shared conceptual map is not enough. We must also be able to the same culture must share a broadly s1m1 ar
Just as people who belong to h th same way of interpreting the
represent or exchange meanings and concepts, and we can only do that when they must also s are e .
conceptual map, so . meanings be effective Y
we also have access to a shared language. Language is therefore the second f nly in this way can 1 d f
signs of a language, or o d know which concept stan s or
exchanged between ?eople. :u;f:c~:el~ :;resents which concept? H?w do I
system of representation involved in the overall process of constructing
meaning. Our shared conceptual map must be translated into a common which thing? Or which wor e '11 through language, the meamng of
language, so that we can correlate our concepts and ideas with certain written . h d images w1 carry,
know wh1c soun s or 'th them to you? This may seem
words, spoken sounds or visual images. The general term we use for words, my concepts and what I want to ~ay wl I. because the drawing, painting,
sounds or images which carry meaning is signs. These signs stand for or . 1 . the case of vISua signs, 1 .h
relatively s1mp em blance to the anima wit a
represent the concepts and the conceptual relations between them which we V. of a sheep bears a resem d to
camera or T image . h' h I want to refer. Even so, we nee
carry around in our heads and together they make up the meaning-systems of · ·n a field tow IC h · ot
our culture. woolly coat grazmg I . t d or digital version of a s eep is n
remind ourselves that a drawn or pai~ e ost images are in two dimensions
1 like a 'real' sheep. For one thmg, m .
Signs are organized into languages and it is the existence of common :-:~:e~s the 'real' sheep exists in three dimens10ns.
languages which enable us to translate our thoughts (concepts) into words,
the bear a close resemblance to the
sounds or images, and then to use these, operating as a language, to express Visual signs and images, even w~~n· ~they carry meaning and thus have to
meanings and communicate thoughts to other people. Remember that the things to which they refer, are sh s1~ns. must have access to the two
term 'language' is being used here in a very broad and inclusive way. The be interpreted. In order to interpre~t e~, ~~o a conceptual map which
writing system or the spoken system of a particular language are both systems of representation discusse e~ ier. t of a 'sheep" and a language
obviously 'languages'. But so are visual images, whether produced by hand, correlates the sheep in the field with t e conceepsemblance to ,the real thing or
mechanical, electronic, digital or some other means, when they are used to . ll uage bears some r
system which.,. in v1sua ang . 'argumen t is
This . clearest if we think of a cartoon
express meaning. And so are other things which aren't 'linguistic' in any 'looks like it m some wa~. . f , h , where we need a very
drawing or an abstract pamtmg o a s eep ,
20
REPRESENTATION CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS ANO SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
CHAPTER I THE WORI< OF REPRESENTATION 21
They bear no obvious relationship at all to the things to which they refer. The
letters T,R,E,E, do not look anything like trees in Nature, nor does the word
'tree' in English sound like 'real' trees (if indeed they make any sound at all!).
The relationship in these systems of representation between the sign, the
concept and the object to which they might be used to refer is entirely
arbitrary. By 'arbitrary' we mean that in principle any collection of letters or
any sound in any order would do the trick equally well. Trees would not
mind if we used the word SEERT - 'trees' written backwards - to represent
the concept of them. This is clear from the fact that, in French, quite different
letters and a quite different sound is used to refer to what, to all appearances,
is the same thing - a 'real' tree - and, as far as we can tell, to the same concept
- a large plant that grows in nature. The French and English seem to be using
the same concept. But the concept which in English is represented by the
word, TREE, is represented in French by the word, ARBRE.
FIGURE I.I
William Holman L3 e
Hunt, Our English
The question, then, is: how do people who belong to the same culture, who
Coasts ('Strayed
share the same conceptual map and who speak or write the same language
Sheep'), 1852.
sophisticated conceptual and shared l' . . (English) know that the arbitrary combination of letters and sounds that
all 'reading' the sign in th mgmstic system to be certain that we are makes up the word, TREE, will stand for or represent the concept 'a large
e same way. Even then f' d
wondering whether it really . . we may m ourselves plant that grows in nature'? One possibility would be that the objects in the
b etween the sign and its re£ is at picture
b
of a sheep t ll A h
a a · st e relationship world themselves embody and fix in some way their 'true' meaning. But it is
. eren ecomes less clea t th .
s1ip and slide away from us . t . r-cu , e meanmg begins to not at all clear that real trees know that they are trees, and even less clear that
mo uncertamty M · ·
transparently passing fro · eanmg is no longer they know that the word in English which represents the concept of
m one person to another ...
themselves is written TREE whereas in French it is written ARBRE! As far as
So, even in the case of visual lan ua e they are concerned, it could just as well be written COW or VACHE or indeed
concept and the sign seems fairl g t g., :;ere the relationship between the
XYZ. The meaning is not in the object or person or thing, nor is it in the word.
simple. It is even more diffic It y ~t~a1g . t orward, the matter is far from
It is we who fix the meaning so firmly that, after a while, it comes to seem
words don't look or sound anuyth":l l'wknthten o~ spoken language, where
mg 1 e t e thmg t h· h h natural and inevitable. The meaning is constructed by the system of
part, this is because there are s o w ic t ey refer. In
representation. It is constructed and fixed by the code, which sets up the
different kinds of signs. Visual signs correlation between our conceptual system and our language system in such
are ~hat are called iconic signs. a way that, every time we think of a tree, the code tells us to use the English
That is, they bear, in their form a word TREE, or the French word ARBRE. The code tells us that, in our culture
certain resemblance to the ob'JeC, t ,
- that is, in our conceptual and language codes - the concept 'tree' is
person or event to which they refer. represented by the letters T,R,E,E, arranged in a certain sequence, just as in
A photograph of a tree reproduces Morse code, the sign for V (which in World War II Churchill made 'stand for'
s~me of the actual conditions of our or represent 'Victory') is Dot, Dot, Dot, Dash, and in the 'language of traffic
v1s~al perception in the visual sign. lights', Green= Go! and Red= Stop!
Written or spoken signs, on the other
hand, are what is called indexical. One way of thinking about 'culture', then, is in terms of these shared
conceptual maps, shared language systems and the codes which govern the
FIGURE 1.2 relationships of translation between them. Codes fix the relationships
Q: When is a sheep not a sheep? between concepts and signs. They stabilize meaning within different
A: When it's a work of art. languages and cultures. They tell us which language to use to convey which
(Damien Hirst, Away from the Flock, 1994). idea. The reverse is also true. Codes tell us which concepts are being referred
to when we hear or read which signs. By arbitrarily fixing the relationships
between our conceptual system and our linguistic systems (remember,
. . 1 Miss Smilla's Feeling For Snow (1994,
about Greenland m his no~e , 'fr
'linguistic' in a broad sense), codes make it possible for us to speak and to
h. ll descnbes azz1 ice
·1 . , which is 'kneaded together
.
into
hear intelligibly, and establish the translatability between our concepts and
PP· 5-6), grap ica y 'd . h'ch gradually forms free-floatmg
a soapy mash called po~n ge ice, wld lnoonday hour on a Sunday, freezes
our languages which enables meaning to pass from speaker to hearer and be
k · which one co , '
plates, panca e ~ce,
effectively communicated within a culture. This translatability is not given
, h, distinctions are too fine and elaborate
by nature or fixed by the gods. It is the result of a set of social conventions. It
into a single solid sheet. Sue 1 talk1'ng about the weather! The
is fixed socially, fixed in culture. English or French or Hindi speakers have, h E l' h who are a ways . 1
over time, and without conscious decision or choice, come to an unwritten even for
. t he ng is .
· _do the Inmt ac uat lly experience snow different
. hy
quest10n, owever, is t ggests they conceptualize t e
agreement, a sort of unwritten cultural covenant that, in their various from the English? Their languag~ sys em s~rience actually bounded by
languages, certain signs will stand for or represent certain concepts. This is weather differently. But how far I~ our ~xp
what children learn, and how they become, not simply biological individuals our linguistic and conceptual um verse.
but cultural subjects. They learn the system and conventions of
representation, the codes of their language and culture, which equip them Table I. I Inuit terms for snow and ice
with cultural 'know-how' enabling them to function as culturally competent
subjects. Not because such knowledge is imprinted in their genes, but snow ice siku
because they learn its conventions and so gradually become 'cultured blowing- piqtuluk _ pan, broken - siqumniq
persons' - i.e. members of their culture. They unconsciously internalize the is snowstorming piqtuluktuq _ice water immiugaq
codes which allow them to express certain concepts and ideas through their falling- qanik melts _ to make water immiuqtuaq
systems of representation - writing, speech, gesture, visualization, and so on
- is falling; - is snowing qaniktuq candle- illauyiniq
- and to interpret ideas which are communicated to them using the same
systems. light falling - qaniaraq fiat- qairniq
light - is falling qaniaraqtuq glare- quasaq
You may find it easier to understand, now, why meaning, language and first layer of - in fall apilraun piled- ivunrit
representation are such critical elements in the study of culture. To belong to
deep soft- mauya rough - iwuit
a culture is to belong to roughly the same conceptual and linguistic universe,
packed _ to make water an1u shore- tugiu
to know how concepts and ideas translate into different languages, and how
language can be interpreted to refer to or reference the world. To share these light soft- aquluraq shorefast- tuvaq
things is to see the world from within the same conceptual map and to make sugar- pukak slush- quna
sense of it through the same language systems. Early anthropologists of waterlogged, mushy - masak young- sikuliaq
language, like Sapir and Wharf, took this insight to its logical extreme when _is turning into masak masaguqtuaq
they argued that we are all, as it were, locked into our cultural perspectives or watery- maqayak
'mind-sets', and that language is the best clue we have to that conceptual
wet- misak
universe. This observation, when applied to all human cultures, lies at the
wet falling qanikkuk
root of what, today, we may think of as cultural or linguistic relativism.
wet is falling qanikkuktuq
ACTIVITY 2
- drifting along a surface natiruvik
You might like to think further about this question of how different - is drifting along a surface natiruviktuaq
cultures conceptually classify the world and what implications this has _ lying on a surface apun
for meaning and representation.
snowfake qanik
The English make a rather simple distinction between sleet and snow. is being drifted over with apiyuaq
The Inuit (Eskimos) who have to survive in a very different, more
extreme and hostile climate, apparently have many more words for snow
and snowy weather. Consider the list of Inuit terms for snow from the . t about cultural codes is that, if meaning is the
One implication of this argumen . t but of our social, cultural
Scott Polar Research Institute in Table 1.1. There are many more than in h . f d ut there m na ure,
result, not of somet mg ixe o .' an never be finally fixed. We can
English, making much finer and more complex distinctions. The Inuit · · ntions then meamng c h
and lingmst1c conve , ewhat different meanings - as we ave
have a complex classificatory conceptual system for the weather . all 'agree' to allow words to carry somh by young people of the word
compared with the English. The novelist Peter Hoeg, for example, writing .h h d 'gay' or t e use, '
for example, wit t e wor 1 o' f there must be some fixing of
'wicked!' as a term of approva . course,
24
REPRESENTAT/ON: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
::::~,~ in/anguage, or ~e would never be able to understand one another.
ge up one mornmg and suddenly d . d t think, most of The Iliad! Of course, I can use the word 'rose' to refer to real,
a 'tree' with the letters or the word VYXZ ~c1 e o represent the concept of actual plants growing in a garden, as we have said before. But this is because I
we are saying. On the other hand th . , an bexplect peo?le to follow what
. . , ere is no a so ute or fmal fixing of know the code which links the concept with a particular word or image. I
~eanmg. Social and linguistic conventions do change over time In th cannot think or speak or draw with an actual rose. And if someone says to me
'an~uage of modern managerialism, what we used to call 'stude~t , ' ~ , that there is no such word as 'rose' for a plant in her culture, the actual plant
patients' and 'passengers' ha 11 b s , clients , in the garden cannot resolve the failure of communication between us. Within
significantly between one lan;::ge a:c;:o~~ust:iers'. L~nguistic codes vary the conventions of the different language codes we are using, we are both right
:~rs~:!~;yc;::;:~fwhich are normal and wid:~~ a;~~~b~~~~su~~ ~~~~:ve - and for us to understand each other, one of us must learn the code linking
example of the use ~fo'~mon ~s~ge', and new phrases are coined: think, for the flower with the word for it in the other's culture.
people off work. Even w~::n;~~z~~~u:~ ;oprrdessent th.e probcless of ~irms laying The second approach to meaning in representation argues the opposite case.
. remam sta e their It holds that it is the speaker, the author, who imposes his or her unique
conn~tat10ns shi~t or they acquire a different nuance. The p~oblem is
especially acute m translation. For example does the d 'ff . . meaning on the world through language. Words mean what the author
between know and understand corre ' 1 erence m English intends they should mean. This is the intentional approach. Again, there is
same conceptual distinction as the F;~:;hd~:~ct~ ;o and capt~re exactly the some point to this argument since we all, as individuals, do use language to
connaitre? Perhaps; but can we be sure? e e ween savolI' and convey or communicate things which are special or unique to us, to our way
of seeing the world. However, as a general theory of representation through
The main point is that meaning does not inher . h' . language, the intentional approach is also flawed. We cannot be the sole or
constructed, produced. It is the result of . : 1~ t mgs, ~n the world. It is unique source of meanings in language, since that would mean that we could
produces meaning that mak th. a sigmfymg practice - a practice that
' es mgs mean. express ourselves in entirely private languages. But the essence of language is
communication and that, in turn, depends on shared linguistic conventions
and shared codes. Language can never be wholly a private game. Our private
intended meanings, however personal to us, have to enter into the rules, codes
There are broadly speaking three a h . . and conventions of language to be shared and understood. Language is a
of meaning through language wo kpp;ac es to explammg how representation social system through and through. This means that our private thoughts have
intentional · . .r s. e may call these the reflective, the
think f ~nd the construct10mst or constructivist approaches. You might to negotiate with all the other meanings for words or images which have been
stored in language which our use of the language system will inevitably trigger
o eac as an attempt to answer the questions 'where d .
from?' and 'how can we tell the "t ,, . , o meanmgs come into action.
rue meanmg of a word or image?'
In the reflective approach, meanin is thou h . . . The third approach recognizes this public, social character of language. It
or event in the real world and 1 g f g .t to li: m the ObJect, person, idea reflective or acknowledges that neither things in themselves nor the individual users of
true meaning as it alread; existsa~~:=~~~~t~n~~ike a mgror, to reflect the mimetic approach language can fix meaning in language. Things don't mean: we construct
said, 'A rose is a rose is a rose' In the f th . s e poet ertrude Stein once meaning, using representational systems - concepts and signs. Hence it is
notion of mimesis to explain
.
h 1 our century BC, the Greeks used the
ow anguage, even drawing and pa' t'
consln'clionis1 called the constructivist or constructionist approach to meaning in language.
mirrored or imitated Nature· they thought of H ' in ing, According to this approach, we must not confuse the material world, where
,. 't t' ' h ' omer s great poem The II· d
imi a mg a eroic series of event s th h . ' w ' as things and people exist, and the symbolic practices and processes through
work b . 1 . s. o e t eory which says that langua e which representation, meaning and language operate. Constructivists do not
in th: w~:i:~ y refle~tmg or imitating the truth that is already there andgfixed
, is sometimes called 'mimetic'. deny the existence of the material world. However, it is not the material
world which conveys meaning: it is the language system or whatever system
Of course there is a certain obvious tr th . . .
and language. As we've ointe ~ to ~1met1c theories ofrepresentation we are using to represent our concepts. It is social actors who use the
the shape and texture of~he ob~~~t.:~:~:~~1gns do bear some relationship to
conceptual systems of their culture and the linguistic and other
representational systems to construct meaning, to make the world
pointed out earlier, a two-dimensional visuat!/ repre~:nt. Bu:, as :vas also
meaningful and to communicate about that world meaningfully to others.
should not be confused with the real 1 t . image o a rose is a sign - it
the garden. Remember also that th p an with thorns and blooms growing in Of course, signs may also have a material dimension. Representational
which we fully well understand b~;~~;c~::y wo.rds, s~u~ds and images systems consist of the actual sounds we make with our vocal chords, the
refer to worlds which are wh ll . . ~ entir~ly fictional or fantasy and images we make on light-sensitive paper with cameras, the marks we make
o y imagmary- mcludmg, many people now
with paint on canvas, the digital impulses we transmit electronically.
Representation is a practice, a kind of 'work', which uses material objects and
effects. But the meaning depends, not on the material quality of the sign, but
on its symbolic function. It is because a particular sound or word stands for, lassified and arranged in our mental univers~. Secondly,
from one another, c d ·mages are correlated with colours rn our
symbolizes or represents a concept that it can function, in language, as a sign
there are the ways w?r. s orl1 des Actually of course, a language of
and convey meaning - or, as the constructionists say, signify (sign-i-fy). l' guistic co our-co . ' .
language - our· t rn
of more t h an JUS
. t the i'ndividual words for different
.
pornts on
colours cons1s s 1 de ends on how they function in relation to ?ne
e the colour spectrum. It ~ so f ch are governed by grammar and syntax rn
another - the sorts of thrngs w ~ich allow us to express rather complex ideas.
The simplest example of this point, which is critical for an understanding of written or spoken lanf1~afe~tw 'tis the sequence and position of the colours,
how languages function as representational systems, is the famous traffic In the language of tra ic ig ls, I h. h enable them to carry meaning and
as well as the colours themse ves, w IC
lights example. A traffic light is a machine which produces different
coloured lights in sequence. The effect of light of different wavelengths on thus function as signs. . .
the eye - which is a natural and material phenomenon - produces the ? No the constructionists argue. This is
Does it matter ':hi~~ co.lours :e ~~~~urs, themselves but (a) the fact that they
.
sensation of different colours. Now these things certainly do exist in the
because what s1gmfies is not t e. h d fr e another and (b) the fact that
material world. But it is our culture which breaks the spectrum of light into d b d. f 1ngu1s e om on ,
are different an can e is . Red followed by Green, with
different colours, distinguishes them from one another and attaches names - . d· t particular sequence -
Red, Green, Yellow, Blue - to them. We use a way of classifying the colour they are
. orgamze · rng Amo ab er in
. b et ween wh1'ch says ' in effect, 'Get ready!
.
spectrum to create colours which are different from one another. We sometimes a warnrn f . t put this point in the followrng way.
Lights about to change.' ~onstruc .10n~ t~e ar ue - is not each colour in
represent or symbolize the different colours and classify them according to
different colour-concepts. This is the conceptual colour system of our What signifies, what carnes ~;~~~nfor it. Ii'is !e difference between Red and
itself nor even .the. ~oncep~ o. 'm ortant principle, in general, about
Green whic.h s1gmfies. T~1s i::d':7s~afi return to it on more than one
culture. We say 'our culture' because, of course, other cultures may divide the
colour spectrum differently. What's more, they certainly use different actual
words or letters to identify different colours: what we call 'red', the French call representation and meamn~: hf ll w Think about it in these terms. If you
occasion in the chapters w ic o o . u couldn't use one to mean
couldn't differentiate betwee~ R~~ a~!~:::,;~y, it is only the difference
'rouge' and so on. This is the linguistic code - the one which correlates certain
words (signs) with certain colours (concepts), and thus enables us to
communicate about colours to other people, using 'the language of colours'. 'Stop' and the other to mean ~? n bl the word SHEEP to be linked, in the
h
between the letters p and T w IC en; f~the animal with four legs and a
But how do we use this representational or symbolic system to regulate the English language code, to the conTcep '~h aterial we use to cover ourselves
woolly coat', and the word SHEE to em
traffic? Colours do not have any 'true' or fixed meaning in that sense. Red
does not mean 'Stop' in nature, any more than Green means 'Go'. In other in bed at night'· .
settings, Red may stand for, symbolize or represent 'Blood' or 'Danger' or . . f colours - like any collection of letters rn
'Communism'; and Green may represent 'Ireland' or 'The Countryside' or In principle, any combmahon .o k 1 age - would do, provided they
· l or of sounds m spa en angu ·
'Environmentalism'. Even these meanings can change. In the 'language of wntten . anguage
· 1 d'ff1 nt not to b econ fu se d · Constructionists express this
electric plugs', Red used to mean 'the connection with the positive charge' are suff1c1ent Y ere . , b't r , 'Arbitrary' means that there is no
idea by saying that all signs ar~ ar. I ra yd. its meaning or concept. Since Red
but this was arbitrarily and without explanation changed to Brown! But then
natural relationship betweenh tt ~ sh1gn atnhe code works in principle any
for many years the producers of plugs had to attach a slip of paper telling 'St 'because t a is ow ' .
people that the code or convention had changed, otherwise how would they only means op . . G It is the code that fixes the meanmg, not
colour would do, rn?ludmg ree?. . lications for the theory of
know? Red and Green work in the language of traffic lights because 'Stop' and
the colour itself. This als? h~s ~1der imp It means that signs themselves
'Go' are the meanings which have been assigned to them in our culture by the
representation and meanrng rn an?uagde. d on the relation between a sign
code or conventions governing this language, and this code is widely known · · I tead meanrng epen s
and almost universally obeyed in our culture and cultures like ours - though cannot fix meamng. ns ' d M . the constructionists would
and a concept which is fixed by a co e. eanrng,
we can well imagine other cultures which did not possess the code, in which say, is 'relational'.
this language would be a complete mystery.
ACTIVITY 3 . he
Let us stay with the example for a moment, to explore a little further how,
according to the constructionist approach to representation, colours and the Why not test this point about the arbitrary nature of the sign andtht
lf? c nstruct a code to govern e
'language of traffic lights' work as a signifying or representational system. importance of the code for your~e . o l Yellow and Blue - as in
movement of traffic using two different co ours -
Recall the two representational systems we spoke of earlier. First, there is the
the following:
conceptual map of colours in our culture - the way colours are distinguished
When the yellow light is showing, ...
which allow us to translate our concepts into la~guage -
Now add an instruction allowing pedestrians and cyclists only to cross, if we possess codes . 1 for meaning and representation. They
using Pink. These codes are crucia h
and vice versa. b th esult of social conventions. T ey are a
. t . nature ut are er h' h 1
do not ex1s m . h d, s of meaning' _ w ic we earn
Provided the code tells us clearly how to read or interpret each colour, and f r culture - ours are map Th'
crucial part o ou . . b ome members of our culture. is
everyone agrees to interpret them in this way, any colour will do. These are and unconsciously mternah~e as we t~c s introduces the symbolic domain of
just colours, just as the word SHEEP is just a jumble of letters. In French the constructionist approach to angu~ge u . .nto the very heart of social life
same animal is referred to using the very different linguistic sign MOUTON. life, where war ds and things function as signs, I
Signs are arbitrary. Their meanings are fixed by codes. itself.
As we said earlier, traffic lights are machines, and colours are the material
effect of light-waves on the retina of the eye. But objects - things - can also ACTIVITY 4 we can uickly demonstrate its
All this may seem rather abstract.. B~t q
function as signs, provided they have been assigned a concept and meaning relevance by an example from pamtmg.
within our cultural and linguistic codes. As signs, they work symbolically -
Look at the painting of a still I ~ y C bbage Melon and Cucumber
they represent concepts, and signify. Their effects, however, are felt in the . l'f b the Spanish painter, Juan Sanchez
material and social world. Red and Green function in the language of traffic FIGURE l.l ( 1 1627) entitled Qumce, a ' h
Catan 152 - ' . t has made every effort to use t e
lights as signs, but they have real material and social effects. They regulate Juan Cotan, (Figure 1.3). It seems as if thelp a1n erfl t these four obJ'ects, to capture or
Quince, Cabbage, . · ' urate y to re ec
the social behaviour of drivers and, without them, there would be many more 'language of pamtmg ace 1 fa reflective or mimetic form of
traffic accidents at road intersections. Melon and 'imitate nature'. Is th.is, .then, an e~amtph e'~rue meaning' of what already
Cucumber, t t' a pamtmg reflectmg e . d
represen a 10n - kitchen? Or can we f m d the operation of certam co es,
exists in Cotan's
c. 1602.
We have come a long way in exploring the nature of representation. It is time

to summarize what we have learned about the constructionist approach to
representation through language.
Representation is the production of meaning through language. In

representation, constructionists argue, we use signs, organized into languages
of different kinds, to communicate meaningfully with others. Languages can
use signs to symbolize, stand for or reference objects, people and events in
the so-called 'real' world. But they can also reference imaginary things and
fantasy worlds or abstract ideas which are not in any obvious sense part of
our material world. There is no simple relationship of reflection, imitation or
one-to-one correspondence between language and the real world. The world
is not accurately or otherwise reflected in the mirror of language. Language
does not work like a mirror. Meaning is produced within language, in and
through various representational systems which, for convenience, we call
'languages'. Meaning is produced by the practice, the 'work', of
representation. It is constructed through signifying - i.e. meaning-producing
- practices.
How does this take place? In fact, it depends on two different but related
systems of representation. First, the concepts which are formed in the mind
function as a system of mental representation which classifies and organizes
the world into meaningful categories. If we have a concept for something, we
can say we know its 'meaning'. But we cannot communicate this meaning
without a second system of representation, a language. Language consists of
signs organized into various relationships. But signs can only convey meaning
30
REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTA TIO NS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
the language of painting used to rodu .
the question, what does the p . Pt. ce a certam meaning? Start with
Th am mg mean toy ? Wh . . ' shaped the semiotic approach to the problem of representation in a wide
. en go on to ask, how is it sa in i - ou. at is it saying'?
this painting? y g t how does representation work in variety of cultural fields. You will recognize much about Saussure's thinking
from what we have already said about the constructionist approach.
Write down any thoughts at all that co
painting. What do thes b' me to you on looking at the For Saussure, according to Jonathan Culler (1976, p. 19), the production of
. e o Jects say to yo ? Wh meaning depends on language: 'Language is a system of signs.' Sounds,
tngger off? u· at meanings do they
images, written words, paintings, photographs, etc. function as signs within
language 'only when they serve to express or communicate ideas ... [To]
READ/f\/G A communicate ideas, they must be part of a system of conventions ... ' (ibid.).
Material objects can function as signs and communicate meaning too, as we
Now read the edited extract from .
critic and theorist Norm B an.analysis of the still life by the art saw from the 'language of traffic lights' example. In an important move,
. ' an ryson mcluded R d' Saussure analysed the sign into two further elements. There was, he argued,
th is chapter. Don't be c d ' . as ea mg A at the end of
. oncerne at this st 'f h the form (the actual word, image, photo, etc.), and there was the idea or
1ittle difficult and you d 't d' age, 1 t e 1anguage seems a
. on un erstand all the t p· concept in your head with which the form was associated. Saussure called
pomts about the way represent t. . erms. ick out the main
Bryson. a wn works m the painting, according to the first element, the signifier, and the second element - the corresponding
concept it triggered off in your head - the signified. Every time you hear or
Bryso~ is by no means the only critic of C , ' . . read or see the signifier (e.g. the word or image of a Walkman, for example), it
doesn t provide the only 'correct' d' ota:11 s pamtmg, and certainly
point of the example is that h h tea mg of it. That's not the point. The
the 'language of painting' d e e pfus us ~o see how, even in a still life
correlates with the signified (the concept of a portable cassette-player in your
head). Both are required to produce meaning but it is the relation between
. oes not nct10n simpl t 0 fl ' them, fixed by our cultural and linguistic codes, which sustains
meanmg which is already th . Y re ect or imitate a representation. Thus 'the sign is the union of a form which signifies
ere m nature butt 0
Th e act of painting is a sig ~-r..n· d
. ' pro uce meanings. (signifier) ... and an idea signified (signified). Though we may speak ... as if
m1png practice Tak t ·
w h at Bryson says about the fi 11 . .. e no e, m particular, of they are separate entities, they exist only as components of the sign ... (which
o owmg pomts:
1 the way the pamtmg · · mvites
· you th · is) the central fact of language' (Culler, 1976, p. 19).
its 'mode of seeing'· in part th fu' e :newer, to look-what he calls
•. ' ' e nct10n of the l · Saussure also insisted on what in section 1 we called the arbitrary nature of
you, th e viewer, in a certain l t' . anguage Is to position
re a 10n to meanmg the sign: 'There is no natural or inevitable link between the signifier and the
2 the relationship to food wh. h . .
ic is posed by the paintin signified' (ibid.). Signs do not possess a fixed or essential meaning. What
3 how, according to Bryson 'math . g. signifies, according to Saussure, is not RED or the essence of 'red-ness', but
distort the painting so a ; b . ematical form' is used by Catan to the difference between RED and GREEN. Signs, Saussure argued 'are
.
d istorted s o rmg out a partic l .
meaning in pa· t' b u ar meanmg. Can a members of a system and are defined in relation to the other members of that
in ing e 'true'?
4 the meaning of the difference between ' system.' For example, it is hard to define the meaning of FATHER except in
space: the language of pa· t' .creatural' and 'geometric' relation to, and in terms of its difference from, other kinship terms, like
m mg creates its own k' d f
If necessary, work throu h the e . . . m o space. MOTHER, DAUGHTER, SON and so on.
points. g xtract agam, pickmg up these specific
This marking of difference within language is fundamental to the production
of meaning, according to Saussure. Even at a simple level (to repeat an
earlier example), we must be able to distinguish, within language, between
SHEEP and SHEET, before we can link one of those words to the concept of
an animal that produces wool, and the other to the concept of a cloth that
covers a bed. The simplest way of marking difference is, of course, by means
The social constructionist view of l of a binary opposition - in this example, all the letters are the same except P
~een ~iscussing owes a great deal toa~;:~e and re?resentation which we have and T. Similarly, the meaning of a concept or word is often defined in
lmgmst, Saussure, who was bo . G or~ and mfluence of the Swiss relation to its direct opposite - as in night/ day. Later critics of Saussure were
p . rn m eneva m 1857 d'd
ans, and died in 1913 H · kn ' I much of his work· to observe that binaries (e.g. black/white) are only one, rather simplistic, way
F . e is own as th ':£ th m
or our purposes' his importance lies . e ~ er of modern linguistics'. of establishing difference. As well as the stark difference between black and
but in his general view of representat'' not I~ ~s detail~d work in linguistics, white, there are also the many other, subtler differences between black and
wn an t e way his model of language
dark grey, dark grey and light grey, grey and cream and off-white, off-white and
brilliant white, just as there are between night, dawn, daylight, noon, dusk,
32 REPRESENTATION CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS ANO SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
and so on. However, his attention to binary oppositions brought Saussure to
the revolutionary proposition that a language consists of signifiers, but in . . er to sa something meaningful, we have to 'enter
order to produce meaning, the signifiers have to be organized into 'a system of viewers. And smce, m ordf ld y anings which pre-date us, are already
, h all sorts o o er me 1 1
differences'. It is the differences between signifiers which signify. language , w ere never cleanse language comp ete y,
tared from previous eras, we can . hich might modify or distort
s 1 h ther hidden meamngs w
Furthermore, the relation between the signifier and the sigmfied, which is screening out al t e o , l can't entirely prevent some of the
t Y For examp e, we · d h
fixed by our cultural codes, is not - Saussure argued - permanently fixed. what we want o s.a . h word BLACK from returning to mm w en we
Words shift their meanings. The concepts (signifieds) to which they refer negative connotat10ns oft e AY A BLACK DAY ON THE STOCK
also change, historically, and every shift alters the conceptual map of the dl . l'k 'WEDNESD
read a hea ine I e,
- 'd'
. t d e d · There is a constant sh mg o
1
, 'f th's was not men
culture, leading different cultures, at different historical moments, to classify EXCHANGE , e:en I I . mar in - something in excess of what we
and think about the world differently. For many centuries, western societies meaning in all mterpretahon, a
.
~
h. h ther meanmgs overs a
h dow the statement or the
have associated the word BLACK with everything that is dark, evil, intend to say- m w ic. ~ awakened to life, giving what we say a
forbidding, devilish, dangerous and sinful. And yet, think of how the text where other associations areb n essential aspect of the process
' . t tion ecomes a
perception of black people in America in the 1960s changed after the phrase different twist. So mt~rpre a d k The reader is as important as the
'Black is Beautiful' became a popular slogan - where the signifier, BLACK, ·
by which meanmg is gi · ven an ta
. en.E .gnifier given or encode d w1'th
was made to signify the exact opposite meaning (sigmfied) to its previous writer in the production of mean:ng. vetryds1 decoded by the receiver (Hall,
· f lly mterpre e or
associations. In Saussure's terms, 'Language sets up an arbitrary relation meaning has to be meanmg ub . t lligibly received and interpreted are
between signifiers of its own choosing on the one hand, and signifieds of its 1980). Signs which have not ~en m,e
not, in any useful sense, 'meanmgful.
own choosing on the other. Not only does each language produce a different
set of signifiers, articulating and dividing the continuum of sound (or writing
or drawing or photography) in a distinctive way; each language produces a I e
different set of signifieds; it has a distinctive and thus arbitrary way of
organizing the world into concepts and categories' (Culler, 1976, p. 23). d . 'd dl . t t arts · The first consisted of theh general
Saussure iv1 e ang uagemo wop h' h ll 1'ts users musts are, I'f't'I is
h l' · t' c system, w ic a · h
The implications of this argument are very far-reaching for a theory of rules and codes oft e mgms I . . The rules are the principles wh1c
f commumcahon.
representation and for our understanding of culture. If the relationship to be of use as a means o d th enable us to use language to say
l a language an ey ·
between a signifier and its signified is the result of a system of social we learn when we earn . . h the preferred word order is
1
conventions specific to each society and to specific historical moments - whatever we want. For example, mthEng last'), whereas in Latin, the verb
b b . t ('the cat sat on e m ' d
then all meanings are produced within history and culture. They can never subject-ver -o Jee sure called this underlying rule-governe
be finally fixed but are always subject to change, both from one cultural usually comes at the end. Saus duce well-formed sentences,
h · h enables us to pro . 1
context and from one period to another. There is thus no single, unchanging, structure of language, w ic h d part consisted of the part1cu ar
h1nguc l stem) T e secon
universal 'true meaning'. 'Because it is arbitrary, the sign is totally subject to the langue (the anguage sy . . h' h- using the structure and rues
1
history and the combination at the particular moment of a given signifier and acts of speaking or writing or drawmg, wl ic ker or writer. He called this
d d by an actua spea
signified is a contingent result of the historical process' (Culler, 1976, p. 36). of the langue - are pro uce the language as a system of
This opens up meaning and representation, in a radical way, to history and parole. 'La langue is the system ofla~~uage, 'ting] the speech acts which are
forms whereas parole is actual speec or wn 29,
change. It is true that Saussure himself focused exclusively on the state of
the language system at one moment of time rather than looking at linguistic ma d e ,poss1'ble by the language' (Culler, 1976, p. ). th
change over time. However, for our purposes, the important point is the way . tructure of rules and codes (langue) was e
For Saussure, the underlymg s h' h ld be studied with the law-like
this approach to language unfixes meaning, breaking any natural and f1 the part w IC GOU .
social part o anguage, . 1 d l'mited nature. It was his
inevitable tie between signifier and signified. This opens representation to f ·
Precision o a science because of its c ose , 1 , h' h
. f 'ts 'deep structure w ic
the constant 'play' or slippage of meaning, to the constant production of new d
Preference for stu ymg an. 1 guage at this 1eve 1 o I
meanings, new interpretations. h' d 1 f language structuralist. The
stniu rdisl 11 S e and is mo e o ' ) h
made people ca aussur . .d 1 c.h-act or utterance (parole , e
th ind1v1 ua spee h
However, if meaning changes, historically, and is never finally fixed, then it second part of language, e Th . re an infinite number of sue
, f , f language ere we
follows that 'taking the meaning' must involve an active process of regarded as the sur ace o 1 .' 't bly lacked those structural
H
P ossible utterances. enc e , para e. inev1
interpretation. Meaning has to be actively 'read' or 'interpreted'. . da t hich would have enabl e d us
intcrprn la ti on
.
Properties - formmg a c ose 1 d and hm1te se - w
Consequently, there is a necessary and inevitable imprecision about d S 's model appeal to many later
'f' ll , What ma e aussure h
language. The meaning we take, as viewers, readers or audiences, is never to study it 'scienh ica y. d haracter of language at t e
h h 1 sed structure c
exactly the meaning which has been given by the speaker or writer or by other scholars was the fact t at t e ~ ~ , rding to Saussure, enabled it to be
level of its rules and laws, wh1c , acco
34 REPRESENTAT/ON: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
studied scientifically, was combined with the capacity to be free and
unpredictably creative in our actual speech acts. They believed he had bl · that Saussure t ended to focus on the formal d aspects of
arks. This has the great a ~an a
t ge of
offered them, at last, a scientific approach to that least scientific object of Another pro em is ll .
inquiry - culture. 1 U age - how language actua y w tice worthy of detailed study m
ang ntation as a prac
making us examine represe lan ua e for itself, and not just as an
In separating the social part of language Uangue) from the individual act of 1
't own right. It forces us to lookh at g ld~ However Saussure's focus on
1 ' ·ndow on t e war ·
communication (parole), Saussure broke with our common-sense notion of s
empty, transparen , w1 1 sive. The attention 'to its forma1 aspe els did
how language works. Our common-sense intuition is that language comes language may have been too ex~~re interactive and dialogic featur~s of.
from within us-from the individual speaker or writer; that it is this speaking divert attention away from the ll d as it functions in actual situations,
or writing subject who is the author or originator of meaning. This is what ge - language as it is actua y use , k
langua d'ff t kinds of spea ers. It is thus not surprising that, k
we called, earlier, the intentional model ofrepresentation. But according to . dialogue between 1 eren . 1 - for example, between spea ers
m uestions of power m anguage
Saussure's schema, each authored statement only becomes possible because for Saussure, q d sitions - did not arise.
the 'author' shares with other language-users the common rules and codes of of different status an po h. h lay behind the
the language system - the langue - which allows them to communicate with
As has often been the cas~, e thou h influential in alerting ~s to certam
th 'scientific' dream w ic ·
each other meaningfully. The author decides what she wants to say. But she
cannot 'decide' whether or not to use the rules of language, if she wants to be structuralist impulse of his ~ork, edg to be illusory. Language is not an
understood. We are born into a language, its codes and its meanings. aspects of how language ;vor s.' ~~~:law-like precision of a science. La~er
Language is therefore, for Saussure, a social phenomenon. It cannot be an ob1'ect which can be studied wit , 'structuralism' but abandoned its
Ult . 1earne d from Saussure
ural theorists . 1s . not a ,c1ose d'
rned. But it is
individual matter because we cannot make up the rules of language c mams ru e-gove 1
individually, for ourselves. Their source lies in society, in the culture, in our scientific premise. Language re . f rmal elements. Since it is constant y
shared cultural codes, in the language system - not in nature or in the system which can be .re.d.uced to~~:n~ed. Meaning continues to be produ~ed
individual subject. h g
c an ing , it is by defm1tion opeh" h can never b e pre d1'cted beforehand and bits
through language in forms w IC t be halted. Saussure may have een
We will move on in section 3 to consider how the constructionist approach to 'sliding', as we describe.cl it above, ca~~~ a good structuralist, he tended t?
representation, and in particular Saussure's linguistic model, was applied to t
mpted to the former view because, ent as if it had stood still,
a wider set of cultural objects and practices, and evolved into the semiotic e 1 system at one mom '
study the state of the anguage h Nevertheless it is the case
method which so influenced the field. First we ought to take account of some and he could halt the flow of language-c. aflngen.ced by Saussure's radical
of the criticisms levelled at his position.
that many of those w h o h ave been most . 1m delsue of representation, have b m'lt
break with all reflective and intenti?nat'f1:ioand 'structuralist' approach, but
b . 'tating his scien 1 IC ' t
u on his work, not y im1 h1 r more open-ended- i.e. pos -
by applying his model in a muc oose ,
structuralist' - way.
Saussure's great achievement was to force us to focus on language itself, as a
social fact; on the process of representation itself; on how language actually
works and the role it plays in the production of meaning. In doing so, he
saved language from the status of a mere transparent medium between things 3 . ?
and meaning. He showed, instead, that representation was a practice. . r discussion of theories of representatwn.
How far, then, have we come m ?u roaches. The reflective or .
However, in his own work, he tended to focus almost exclusively on the two We began by contrasting three d:fferentdaptp nsparent relationship of imitation
aspects of the sign - signifier and signified. He gave little or no attention to h d a direct an ra h
mimetic approac propose . ) d th'ngs The intentional t eory
how this relation between signifie1fsignified could serve the purpose of what . b words (signs an I . . Th
or reflection etween . t' s of its author or sub1ect. e
earlier we called reference - i.e. referring us to the world of things, people t . to the mten ion . h'
reduced representa ion 1 nd mediated relations ip
and events outside language in the 'real' world. Later linguists made a constructionist theory propo sed a comp tex·na thought and language; we h ave
distinction between, say, the ll1eaning of the word BOOK and the use of the between things in the world, o~r concep ~1 The correlations between these
word to refer to a specific book lying before us on the table. The linguist, focused at greatest length on this aptro~cth signifying - are governed by our
Charles Sanders P:ierce, whilst adopting a similar approach to Saussure, paid levels - the material, the concep~~:. a~his s:t of interconnections which
greater attention to the relationship between signifiers/signifieds and what he cultural and linguistic codes an 1 ~ h much this general model of how
called their referents. What Saussure called signification really involves both produces meaning. W~ then sh~w:he or:duction of meaning owed to ~he
meaning and reference, but he focused mainly on the former.
systems of representation work m ~he key point was the link provided by
work of Ferdinand de Saussure. Here,. d by language (whether speech,
the codes between the forms of expression use
36
REPRESENTATION CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
writing CHAPTER I THE WORI< OF REPRESENTATION 37

. . . , draw·mg, or oth er types of re resent . .
s1gnifters - and the mental co t p . at10n) - which Saussure called the
Th ncep s associated 'th th ING B
e connection between these t WI em - the signifieds.
d . wo systems of re t ·
an signs, organized into languages roduc pres:n at10n produced signs; You should now read the brief extract from Barthes's 'reading' of 'The
reference objects, people and ev t'? h 'ed meanmgs, and could be used to world of wrestling', provided as Reading B at the end of this chapter.
ens mt e real' world.
In much the same way, the French anthropologist, Claude Levi-Strauss,
studied the customs, rituals, totemic objects, designs, myths and folk-tales of
so-called 'primitive' peoples in Brazil, not by analysing how these things
s were produced and used in the context of daily life amongst the Amazonian
peoples, but in terms of what they were trying to 'say', what messages about
Saussur ' · the culture they communicated. He analysed their meaning, not by
es ~am contribution was to the stud . . . .
However, srnce his death hI's th . h y of lrngmshcs rn a narrow sense interpreting their content, but by looking at the underlying rules and codes
f ' eones ave b ·d ·
oundation for a general approach t l een WI e1y deployed, as a through which such objects or practices produced meaning and, in doing so,
model of representation which h ~ anguag~ and meaning, providing a he was making a classic Saussurean or structuralist 'move', from the paroles of
objects and practices. Saussure h~s e~n applied to. a wide range of cultural a culture to the underlying structure, its langue. To undertake this kind of
lecture-notes, collected posthum Im~e ~ fo~~saw this possibility in his famous work, in studying the meaning of a television programme like Eastenders, for
General Linguistics (1960) h ohus y y Is students as the Course in example, we would have to treat the pictures on the screen as signifiers, and
h l' ' w ere e looked fo dt ' . use the code of the television soap opera as a genre, to discover how each
t e Ife of signs within society I sh 11 ll . rwar o A SCience that studies
semeion "signs" .. '(p 16) Th·:· a ca It semiology, from the Greek image on the screen made use of these rules to 'say something' (signifieds)
· · · Is general ap h
:ulture, and of culture as a sort of 'Ian ua e~roa~ to the study of signs in which the viewer could 'read' or interpret within the formal framework of a
Is now generally known by th t g . g., which Saussure foreshadowed particular kind of television narrative (see the discussion and analysis of TV
e erm semiotics. '
semiotics
soap operas in Chapter 6).
The underlying argument behind the sem· t' .
cultural objects convey m . 10 Ic approach Is that, since all In the semiotic approach, not only words and images but objects themselves
meaning, they must makeeaninfg, ~nd all cultural practices depend on can function as signifiers in the production of meaning. Clothes, for example,
l'k use o signs· and ins £ h
I e language works, and be amenable,to a o a~ as t . ey do, they must work may have a simple physical function - to cover the body and protect it from
use of Saussure's linguistic conce t ( ~ an~ly~I~ wh:ch basically makes the weather. But clothes also double up as signs. They construct a meaning
parole distinctions his idea 0 f pd sle:g. t e Sigrnfrnr/signified and langue/ and carry a message. An evening dress may signify 'elegance'; a bow tie and
· ' un er ying cod d
ar bItrary nature of the s· ) Th . es an structures, and the tails, 'formality'; jeans and trainers, 'casual dress'; a certain kind of sweater in
M yth ologies (1972) the F Ign · us, when rn his 11 · the right setting, 'a long, romantic, autumn walk in the wood' (Barthes, 1967).
h . . co ect10n of essays
' renc cnhc R l dB h ' FIGURE 1.4
wrestling', 'Soap powders and deter ~n~s'a~ art es, studied 'The world of Wrestling as a
These signs enable clothes to convey meaning and to function like a language
Blue Guide.c; to Europe' h b h g .' ~he face of Greta Garbo' or 'The language of
- 'the language of fashion'. How do they do this?
' e roug t a sem10t1c a h
po~~l~r c1, '' ure, treating these pproac to bear on 'reading' 'excess'. ACTIVITY 5
achvitrns dlld objects as signs, as a
language.through which meaning is Look at the example of clothes in a magazine fashion spread (Figure 1.5).
commumcated. For example, most of Apply Saussure's model to analyse what the clothes are 'saying'? How
us would think of a wrestling match as would you decode their message? In particular, which elements are
a competitive game or sport designed operating as signifiers and what concepts - signifieds - are you applying
for one wrestler to gain victory over an to them? Don't just get an overall impression - work it out in detail. How
~pponent. Barthes, however, asks, not is the 'language of fashion' working in this example?
"':ho won?' but 'What is the meaning of
this event?' He treats it as a text to be The clothes themselves are the signifiers. The fashion code in western
read. He 'reads' the exaggerated consumer cultures like ours correlates particular kinds or combinations of
gestures of wrestlers as a grandiloquent clothing with certain concepts ('elegance', 'formality', 'casual-ness',
language of what he calls the pure 'romance'). These are the signifieds. This coding converts the clothes into
spectacle of excess. signs, which can then be read as a language. In the language of fashion, the
signifiers are arranged in a certain sequence, in certain relations to one
another. Relations may be of similarity - certain items 'go together'
38
REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS ANO SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
(e.g. casual shoes with J·eans) · D1'fferences
are a~so marked - no leather belts with social ideology- the general beliefs, conceptual frameworks and value
evem~g wear. Some signs actually create systems of society. This second level of signification, Barthes suggests, is
meanmg by exploiting 'difference': e.g. more 'general, global and diffuse ... '. It deals with 'fragments of an
Doc Ma~ten boots with flowing long skirt. ideology ... These signifieds have a very close communication with culture,
These bits of clothing 'say something' - knowledge, history and it is through them, so to speak, that the environmental
they convey meaning. Of course, not world [of the culture] invades the system [of representation]' (Barthes, 1967,
everybody reads fashion in the same way
pp. 91-2).
,There, are
B differences of gender, age , cl ass,.
rac~ . ut all those who share the same
fash10n code will interpret the signs in
roughly the same ways · 'Oh , Jeans
. d on't
look right for that event. It's a formal In his essay 'Myth today', in Mythologies, Barthes gives another example
occasion-it demands someth'mg more which helps us to see exactly how representation is working at this second,
el egant.' broader cultural level. Visiting the barbers' one day, Barthes is shown a copy
of the French magazine Paris Match, which has on its cover a picture of 'a
You may have noticed that, in this young Negro in a French uniform saluting with his eyes uplifted, probably
example: we ?ave moved from the very fixed on the fold of the tricolour' (the French flag) (1972b, p. 116). At the first
narrow lmgmstic level from which we level, to get any meaning at all, we need to decode each of the signifiers in the
d~ew examples in the first section, to a image into their appropriate concepts: e.g. a soldier, a uniform, an arm raised,
':Ider, cultural level. Note, also, that two eyes lifted, a French flag. This yields a set of signs with a simple, literal
lmked operations are required to complete message or meaning: a black soldier is giving the French flag a salute
the re?re~entation process by which (denotation). However, Barthes argues that this image also has a wider,
me~nmg Is produced. First, we need a cultural meaning. If we ask, 'What is Paris Match telling us by using this
basic ~ode which links a particular piece of picture of a black soldier saluting a French flag?', Barthes suggests that we
material which is cut and sewn in a . may come up with the message: 'that France is a great Empire, and that all
particular way (signifier) to our mental cone . . .. her sons, without any colour discrimination, faithfully serve under her flag,
particular cut of material to ept of it (s1gnif1ed) - say a
our concept of 'a dress' or,. , ( FIGURE 1.5 and that there is no better answer to the detractors of an alleged colonialism
only some cultures would 'read' th . 'f' . Jeans · Remember that than the zeal shown by this Negro in serving his so-called oppressors'
e s1gm rnr m this w · d Advertisement for
th e concept of (i.e. have classified l th . ' ay, or m eed possess Gucci, in Vogue, (connotation) (ibid.).
'jeans'.) The comb1'nat1'on of . 'f~ o es mto) a dress', as different from
s1gm rnr and · ·r d · September I 995.
sign. Then, having recognized the mater· ~1gm 18 is what ~aussure called a Whatever you think of the actual 'message' which Barthes finds, for a proper
produced a sign we can progr t Ia as a dress, or as Jeans, and semiotic analysis you must be able to outline precisely the different steps by
. ' ess o a second wid l l h. .
signs to broader cultural them ' er eve ' w ich lmks these which this broader meaning has been produced. Barthes argues that here
, es, concepts or mea . f
evening dress to 'formality' or ,
1 , . nmgs - or example, an representation takes place through two separate but linked processes. In the
the first, descriptive level the l:ve1a~c; 'Jean~ to 'casualness'. Barthes called first, the signifiers (the elements of the image) and the signifieds (the
connotation. Both of co;r e. o henotahon: the second level, that of denotation concepts - soldier, flag and so on) unite to form a sign with a simple denoted
, se, require t e use of codes.
connotation
message: a black soldier is giving the French flag a salute. At the second
Denotation is the simple basic descri t' stage, this completed message or sign is linked to a second set of signifieds -
and most people would ~gre ' th p iv: level, where consensus is wide
a broad, ideological theme about French colonialism. The first, completed
l evel - connotation_ these eon
· 'f'
e meamng ('d e ' ,.
h'
')
r ss ' Jeans · At the second
. s1gm iers w ich w h b meaning functions as the signifier in the second stage of the representation
simple level by using our convent' e ave een able to 'decode' at a
process, and when linked with a wider theme by a reader, yields a second,
read their meaning enter a w1'd rnnal cdoknceptual classifications of dress to
. ' er, secon ind of d ,h more elaborate and ideologically framed message or meaning. Barthes gives
fash10n' - which connects them to b d h co e - t e 1anguage of this second concept or theme a name - he calls it 'a purposeful mixture of
them with what, we may call the wi~~; s;r t e~es. and meanings, linking
"French imperiality" and "militariness"'. This, he says, adds up to a
'elegance', 'formality' 'casualn , d' mant1c fields of our culture: ideas of
, ess an roman , Th. 'message' about French colonialism and her faithful Negro soldier-sons.
meaning is no longer a descriptive level of b .ce . . is second, wider Barthes calls this second level of signification the level of myth. In this
beginning to interpret the compl t d . ?
v10us mterpretation. Here we are
reading, he adds, 'French imperiality is the very drive behind the myth. The
e e signs m terms of the wider realms of
concept reconstitutes a chain of causes and effects, motives and intentions ...
40
REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
Through the concept ... a whole new h. . .
the concept of French im erialit . Isto? ".' IS Implanted in the myth ...
to the general history of !ranee y . : . IS agaI~ tied to the totality of the world:
difficulties' (Barthes, 1972b, p. ,1t:9~~s colomal adventures, to its present .,,l"I S'WHISI lt'.'\IJ I) S'rS!l\\S
lh 111 ! ""
'\ ·' ' '· '
WI ill\ f f'Rlll!.(l'i{l~
(li ()(
READING C
Turn to the short extract from 'Myth today' (Re d. C h

chapter), and read Barthes's account of how a mg ~t t e end of this
representation M k myth funct10ns as a system of
· a e sure you understand what B th
staggered systems' and by the idea that myth. ' ar ~s means by 'two
second-order language). Is a meta- anguage' (a
For another example of this two-sta e r . . . .

now to another of Barthes's ~ g p ocess of Sigmficat10n, we can turn
iamous essays.
ACTIVITY 6
Now, look carefully at the
advertisement for Panzani
products (Figure 1.6) and, with
Barthes's analysis in mind, do
the following exercise:
1 What sigmfiers can you
identify in the ad? l) t) "-' ! PR:! -\ .\\ l ! [) R l \ ! I!
2 What do they mean? What

are their signifieds?
3 Now, look at the ad as a
whole, at the level of 'myth'. FIGURE 1.7 Barthes suggests that we can read the Panzani ad as a 'myth' by linking its
What is its wider, cultural An image of completed message (this is a picture of some packets of pasta, a tin, a sachet,
message or theme? Can you 'Englishness' some tomatoes, onions, peppers, a mushroom, all emerging from a half-open
construct one? - advertisement string bag) with the cultural theme or concept of 'Italianicity' (or as we would
for Jaguar. say, 'Italian-ness'). Then, at the level of the myth or meta-language, the
READING D Panzani ad becomes a message about the essential meaning of Italian-ness as
a national culture. Can commodities really become the signifiers for myths
Now read the second extract
of nationality? Can you think of ads, in magazines or television, which work
from Barthes, in which he offers
in the same way, drawing on the myth of 'Englishness'? Or 'Frenchness'? Or
an interpretation of the Panzani
'American-ness'? Or 'Indian-ness'? Try to apply the idea of 'Englishness' to
ad for spaghetti and vegetables
the ad reproduced as Figure 1.7.
in a string bag as a 'myth' about
Italian national culture. The
extract from 'Rhetoric of the
image', in Image-Music-Text r s
(l 9 77), is included as Reading D
at the end of this chapter. What the examples above show is that the semiotic approach provides a
method for analysing how visual representations convey meaning. Already,
in Roland Barthes's work in the 1960s, as we have seen, Saussure's
'linguistic' model is developed through its application to a much wider field
FIGURE 1.6 of signs and representations (advertising, photography, popular culture, travel,
'ltalian-ness' and the Panzani ad. fashion, etc.). Also, there is less concern with how individual words function
as signs in language, more about the application of the language model to a
much broader set of cultural practices. Saussure held out the promise that the . rse (rather than just language). His project, he
whole domain of meaning could, at last, be systematically mapped. Barthes, t hrough what he called d1scou b . understand themselves in our
1 'h w human emgs · d'iv1'dua1
too, had a 'method', but his semiotic approach is much more loosely and sa1. d ' was to ana yse ko wledge about ' t h e socia . 1, the embodied m . .
interpretively applied; and, in his later work (for example, The Pleasure of the culture' and how our no b d ced in different periods. With its
Text, 1975), he is more concerned with the 'play' of meaning and desire across and shared meanings' comes to d~ pro ~shared meanings, you can see that
texts than he is with the attempt to fix meaning by a scientific analysis of mphasis on cultural understan mg an . d bt d to Saussure and Barthes
language's rules and laws. e . still to some degree m e e .
Foucault's proiect wa.s 17) while in other ways departmg
(see Dreyfus and Rabmow, 1982, P· h more historically grounded,
F It's work was muc h
radically from then:. ~ucau 'f ·res than the semiotic approach. As e
Subsequently, as we observed, the project of a 'science of meaning' has
appeared increasingly untenable. Meaning and representation seem to more attentive to h1stoncal spec1 ~c1 I f' . , were his main concern.
belong irrevocably to the interpretative side of the human and cultural S aid 'relations of power, no t r elations o t' meanmg .
were the various disciplmes o
f
sciences, whose subject matter - society, culture, the human subject - is ' . fF ult's atten 10n
The particular obiects o ouca . 1 . ces - what he called 'the
not amenable to a positivistic approach (i.e. one which seeks to discover . h h and socia scien . t
knowledge mt ~ u~an , These had acquired an increasingly prommen
scientific laws about society). Later developments have recognized the subjectifying social sciences . 1 d were in many instances,
necessarily interpretative nature of culture and the fact that interpretations . 1 1 . modern cu ture an , . ld
and influentia ro em. h' h l'ke religion in earlier times, cou
never produce a final moment of absolute truth. Instead, interpretations are considered to be the discourses w ic , I
always followed by other interpretations, in an endless chain. As the French ive us the 'truth' about knowledge. . .
philosopher, Jacques Derrida, put it, writing always leads to more writing. g . me of the subsequent chapters m this
Difference, he argued, can never be wholly captured within any binary We will return to Foucault's work m so t to introduce Foucault and the
1 Ch t r 5) Here, we wan . 'd .
system (Derrida, 1981). So any notion of a final meaning is always endlessly book (for examp e, ap e . . b tl'ning three of his maior 1 eas.
put off, deferred. Cultural studies of this interpretative kind, like other discursive approach to repres.entation y ou I d knowledge; and the question
. . the issue of power an 1
qualitative forms of sociological inquiry, are inevitably caught up in this his concept of discourse, t t by giving you a genera
. h b ful however, to s ar
'circle of meaning'. of the subject. It m1g t e u~e ,d what over-stated) terms, of how he
flavour in Foucault's graphic (an somhe . t'c approach to representation.
In the semiotic approach, representation was understood on the basis of the ' . . f th t oft e sem10 I
saw his project d1ffermg rom ah l'k th t of Saussure and Barthes, based on
way words functioned as signs within language. But, for a start, in a culture, He moved away from an approac 'I e ad e based on analysing what he
· 'fy' tructure towar son
meaning often depends on larger units of analysis - narratives, statements,
groups of images, whole discourses which operate across a variety of texts,
'the domain of sigm mg s .
called 'relations of force, strategic ev
d elopments and tactics':
areas of knowledge about a subject which have acquired widespread
authority. Semiotics seemed to confine the process of representation to h ld not be to the great model of
language, and to treat it as a closed, rather static, system. Subsequent Here I believe one's poii:it of refert:n:a~ o~:ar and battle. The history
Janguage (langue) and s1?ns, but h f of a war rather than that of a
developments became more concerned with representation as a source for the d d termmes us has t e orm
production of social knowledge - a more open system, connected in more which bears an e f not relations of meaning ...
language: relations o power 80 114-5)
intimate ways with social practices and questions of power. In the semiotic (Foucault, 19 , PP·
approach, the subject was displaced from the centre of language. Later
theorists returned to the question of the subject, or at least to the empty space
which Saussure's theory had left; without, of course, putting him/her back in . Marxism
Rejecting both Hegelian . (w hat he calls 'the dialectic') and semiotics,
the centre, as the author or source of meaning. Even if language, in some Foucault argued that:
sense, 'spoke us' (as Saussure tended to argue) it was also important that in
certain historical moments, some people had more power to speak about . . . f contradictions, nor semiotics, a.s ~h~.
Neither the dialectic, as logic o t f the intrinsic intelhg1b1hty of
some subjects than others (male doctors about mad female patients in the late · t· can accoun or d
structure of commun1ca wn, f d' the always open and hazar ous
nineteenth century, for example, to take one of the key examples developed
conflicts. 'Dialectic' is a way o eva Hmg l'an skeleton and 'semiology' is
in the work of Michel Foucault). Models of representation, these critics fl' t b ducing it to a ege I , d . 't to
reality of con ic .y re. 1 d and lethal character by re ucmg 1
argued, ought to focus on these broader issues of knowledge and power. way of avoiding its v10lent, b oo y . 1
a f1 ge and dia ague.
the calm Platonic form o angua (ibid.)
Foucault used the word 'representation' in a narrower sense than we are
using it here, but he is considered to have contributed to a novel and
significant general approach to the problem of representation. What
~()ncerned him was the production of knowledge (rather than just meaning)
44 REPRESENTATION CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES CHAPTER I THE WORK OF REPRESENTATION 45
d real, material existence in the world. What he does argue is that 'nothing has
any meaning outside of discourse' (Foucault, ~972). As Laclau and Mo_uffe
The first point to note, then, is the shift of attention in Foucault from put it, 'we use [the term discourse] to emphasize the fact that :very so~ial
'language' to 'discourse'. He studied not language, but discourse as a system configuration is meaningful' (1990, p. 100). The concept of discourse is not
ofrepresentation. Normally, the term 'discourse' is used as a linguistic about whether things exist but about where meaning comes from.
concept. It simply means passages of connected writing or speech. Michel
Foucault, however, gave it a different meaning. What interested him were the IJl"IG E
rules and practices that produced meaningful statements and regulated Turn now to Reading E, by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe, a short
discourse in different historical periods. By 'discourse', Foucault meant 'a extract from New Reflections on the Revolution of our Time (1990), from
group of statements which provide a language for talking about - a way of which we have just quoted, and read it carefully. What they argue is that
representing the knowledge about - a particular topic at a particular physical objects do exist, but they have no fixed ~e.ani~g; they only take
historical moment. ... Discourse is about the production of knowledge on meaning and become objects of knowledge w1thrn discourse. Make
through language. But ... since all social practices entail meaning, and sure you follow their argument before reading further.
meanings shape and influence what we do - our conduct - all practices have 1 In terms of the discourse about 'building a wall', the distinction
a discursive aspect' (Hall, 1992, p. 291). It is important to note that the between the linguistic part (asking for a brick) and the physical act
concept of discourse in this usage is not purely a 'linguistic' concept. It is (putting the brick in place) does not matter. The firs~ is lingu~st~c, the
about language and practice. It attempts to overcome the traditional second is physical. But both are 'discursive' - meanmgful w1thm
distinction between what one says (language) and what one does (practice). discourse.
Discourse, Foucault argues, constructs the topic. It defines and produces the
2 The round leather object which you kick is a physical object - a ball.
objects of our knowledge. It governs the way that a topic can be meaningfully
But it only becomes 'a football' within the context of the rules of the
talked about and reasoned about. It also influences how ideas are put into
game, which are socially constructed.
practice and used to regulate the conduct of others. Just as a discourse 'rules
in' certain ways of talking about a topic, defining an acceptable and 3 It is impossible to determine the meaning of an object outside of its
intelligible way to talk, write, or conduct oneself, so also, by definition, it context of use. A stone thrown in a fight is a different thing ('a projectile')
'rules out', limits and restricts other ways of talking, of conducting ourselves from a stone displayed in a museum ('a piece of sculpture').
in relation to the topic or constructing knowledge about it. Discourse,
This idea that physical things and actions exist, but they only take on
Foucault argued, never consists of one statement, one text, one action or one meaning and become objects of knowledge within discourse, is at the heart of
source. The same discourse, characteristic of the way of thinking or the state the constructionist theory of meaning and representation. Foucault argues
of knowledge at any one time (what Foucault called the episteme), will
that since we can only have a knowledge of things if they have a meaning, it
appear across a range of texts, and as forms of conduct, at a number of
is discourse - not the things-in-themselves - which produces knowledge.
different institutional sites within society. However, whenever these
Subjects like 'madness', 'punishment' and 'sexuality' only exist meaningfully
discursive events 'refer to the same object, share the same style and ...
within the discourses about them. Thus, the study of the discourses of
support a strategy ... a common institutional, administrative or political drift
madness, punishment or sexuality would have to include the following
and pattern' (Cousins and Hussain, 1984, pp. 84-5), then they are said by
elements:
Foucault to belong to the same discursive formation. discursive formation
1 statements about 'madness', 'punishment' or 'sexuality' which give us a
Meaning and meaningful practice is therefore constructed within discourse. certain kind of knowledge about these things;
Like the semioticians, Foucault was a 'constructionist'. However, unlike 2 the rules which prescribe certain ways of talking about these topics and
them, he was concerned with the production of knowledge and meaning, not exclude other ways - which govern what is 'sayable' or 'thinkable' about
through language but through discourse. There were therefore similarities, insanity, punishment or sexuality, at a particular historical moment;
but also substantive differences between these two versions.
3 'subjects' who in some ways personify the discourse - the madman, the
The idea that 'discourse produces the objects of knowledge' and that nothing hysterical woman, the criminal, the deviant, the sexu~lly perverse .
which is meaningful exists outside discourse, is at first sight a disconcerting person; with the attributes we would expect these subJects t~ have, given
proposition, which seems to run right against the grain of common-sense the way knowledge about the topic was constructed at that hme;
thinking. It is worth spending a moment to explore this idea further. Is 4 how this knowledge about the topic acquires authority, a sense of
Foucault saying - as some of his critics have charged - that nothing exists embodying the 'truth' about it; constituting the 'truth of the matter', at a
outside of discourse? In fact, Foucault does not deny that things can have a historical moment;
5 the practices within institutions for dealing with the subjects - medical
treatment for the insane, punishment regimes for the guilty, moral
disease existed separate fro~ ~~e b~y~y its course through the human body
d to the modern idea that disease arose
discipline for the sexually deviant - whose conduct is being regulated
and organized according to those ideas; within and could b~ m~ppe . ue~·ft changed medical practice. It gave
(McNay, 1994). This d1scurs1ve ,s ,1 aze' which could now 'read' the course of
greater importance to thee!~~\:o~ :t what Foucault called 'the visi~le body'
6 acknowledgement that a different discourse or episteme will arise at a
disease simply by a p~w
later historical moment, supplanting the existing one, opening up a new
, t laid down in accordance with a now
of the patient - followmg the ro~ e~ ~~las' (Foucault, 1973, pp. 3-4). This
discursive formation, and producing, in its turn, new conceptions of
'madness' or 'punishment' or 'sexuality', new discourses with the power familiar geometry ... the anatom1ca , wer of surveillance vis-a-vis the
and authority, the 'truth', to regulate social practices in new ways. grea t er kno wledge increased the doctors po
P atient. lt ued
. d all these subjects, Foucau arg ,
Knowledge about and practices arou~f They did not and could not
were historically and c~lturally .s~e~~;~~urses, i.e. outside the ways they
The main point to get hold of here is the way discourse, representation,
meaningfully exist outside specified d . knowledge and regulated by the
knowledge and 'truth' are radically historicized by Foucault, in contrast to W d . d' rse pro uce m . d
ere represente in iscou , h . es of a particular society an
the rather ahistorical tendency in semiotics. Things meant something and . d d' · l'nary tee mqu . ·
discursive practices an isc1p I h' . 1 ontinuities of which h1stonans
were 'true', he argued, only within a specific historical context. Foucault did tl t . th trans- istonca c b k
not believe that the same phenomena would be found across different ·me · Far from accep mgl' ed that more s1gm. 'f'cant
1 were the radical rea s,
are so fond, Foucault be ieve iod and another, between one
historical periods. He thought that, in each period, discourse produced ruptures and discontinuities between one per
forms of knowledge, objects, subjects and practices of knowledge, which discursive formation and another.
differed radically from period to period, with no necessary continuity
between them.
3 d
Thus, for Foucault, for example, mental illness was not an objective fact,
which remained the same in all historical periods, and meant the same thing more concerned with how knowledge
In his later work Foucault becam.e even t' . specific institutional settings
in all cultures. It was only within a definite discursive formation that the h d · rsi ve prac ices m
was put to work throug iscu f d on the relationship between
object, 'madness', could appear at all as a meaningful or intelligible to regulate the conduct of others. He ocuse t d within what he called an
construct. It was 'constituted by all that was said, in all the statements that d h w power opera e ,
knowledge and power, an o 1 . (techniques). Foucault s
named it, divided it up, described it, explained it, traced its development, d 't techno ogies ·
institutional apparatus an I s . h t for example, included a vanety
indicated its various correlations, judged it, and possibly gave it speech by h tus of pums men , . . t'
conception oft e appara l' . tic - 'discourses, institu wns,
articulating, in its name, discourses that were to be taken as its own' (1972, l' · tic and non- mgms
of diverse elements, mgms . 1 dministrative measures,
p. 32). And it was only after a certain definition of 'madness' was put into a t regulations, aws, a t
rchitectural arrangemen s, 't' s morality philanthropy, e c.
practice, that the appropriate subject - 'the madman' as current medical and h'l h'c propos1 10n , '
psychiatric knowledge defined 'him' - could appear. scientific statements, p 1 osop 1. 'b d . a play of power, but it is also
· h 1 ays inscn e in h
. .. The apparatus is t us. a w d. ates of k now1e dge .... This is what t e
Or, take some other examples of discursive practices from his work. There always linked to certam co-~r mf 1 t' ns of forces supporting and
· · · trateg1es o re a 10 )
have always been sexual relations. But 'sexuality', as a specific way of apparatus consISts m. s ' (F ucault 1980b, pp. 194, 196 .
su orted by types of knowledge o ' .
talking about, studying and regulating sexual desire, its secrets and its
pp . k sub'ects of investigation the relations
This approach took as one of~~ t:? bod~ in modern society. It saw
fantasies, Foucault argued, only appeared in western societies at a particular
.
historical moment (Foucault, 1978). There may always have been what we
between knowledge, power .a h din relations of power because it
now call homosexual forms of behaviour. But 'the homosexual' as a specific knowledge as always inextncably enml e.s e f social conduct in practice (i.e.
kind of social subject, was produced, and could only make its appearance, . l' d to the regu ation o .
was always bemg
'b d' app
') 18This foregroun d'mg 0 f the relation between discourse,
within the moral, legal, medical and psychiatric discourses, practices and
to particular o ies · . 'f ant development in the
institutional apparatuses of the late nineteenth century, with their particular knowledge and power marked a s1gm i: h'ch we have been outlining. It
theories of sexual perversity (Weeks, 1981, 1985). Similarly, it makes ht presentat10n w I 't
constructionist approac o re 1 t h of a purely formal theory and gave I
nonsense to talk of the 'hysterical woman' outside of the nineteenth-century d resentation from the c u c es .
view of hysteria as a very widespread female malady. In The Birth of the rescue rep . d, ldly' context of operation.
a historical, practical an wor , , knowledge and
Clinic (1973), Foucault charted how 'in less than half a century, the medical
h' concern with discourse, .
understanding of disease was transformed' from a classical notion that You may wonder to what extent t isl t those of the classical sociological
·power bro light Foucault's interests c oser o
theories of ideology, especially Marxism with its concern to identify the class
positions and class interests concealed within particular forms of knowledge. 1. tion and effectiveness of power/know1e dge w as more important, he
app ica f . 't th'
Foucault, indeed, does come closer to addressing some of these questions ht than the question o its ru ·
about ideology than, perhaps, formal semiotics did (though Roland Barthes thoug , h th' b t
Knowledge lmked to po_we~f true. All knowledge, once applied in the real
. not only assumes the authority of 't e tru u
was also concerned with questions of ideology and myth, as we saw earlier).
But Foucault had quite specific and cogent reasons why he rejected the has the power to make Jtse . th t nse at least 'becomes true'. Knowledge,
classical Marxist problematic of 'ideology'. Marx had argued that, in every world, has real effects, and md at s; thers ent~ils constraint, regulation and
epoch, ideas reflect the economic basis of society, and thus the 'ruling ideas' once used to regulate th~ con uc o '~h is no power relation without the
are those of the ruling class which governs a capitalist economy, and the disciplining ?f p~achces .. Tl~u~f kno:.~edge, nor any knowledge that does
correspond to its dominant interests. Foucault's main argument against the correlative constitution of a fie h f e power relations' (Foucault,
not presuppose and constitute at t e same im ,
classical Marxist theory of ideology was that it tended to reduce all the
1977a, p. 27). .
relation between knowledge and power to a question of class power and class
interests. Foucault did not deny the existence of classes, but he was strongly th' k we 'know' in a particular penod about,
According to Foucault, what we m 1 t control and punish criminals.
opposed to this powerful element of economic or class reductionism in the . h bearing on how we regu a e, .
say, cnme as a . . d It is put to work, through certam
Knowledge does not ope:ate ~n a ~~1 ~·
Marxist theory of ideology. Secondly, he argued that Marxism tended to
in specific situations, historical
contrast the 'distortions' of bourgeois knowledge, against its own claims to technologies and strategies o . app ica wn,d . hment you must study
'truth' - Marxist science. But Foucault did not believe that any form of contexts and institutional regimes. To stu y pums /kn,owledge - has
thought could claim an absolute 'truth' of this kind, outside the play of . f d' nd power - power
how the combinat10n o is:ourse a. d th criminal has had certain real
discourse. All political and social forms of thought, he believed, were d t · ceptwn of cnme an e '
produce a cer am con . h d how these have been set
inevitably caught up in the interplay of knowledge and power. So, his work effects both for criminal and for the pun~s. er, ~n .
rejects the traditional Marxist question, 'in whose class interest does into practice in certain historically specific pnson. regimes.
language, representation and power operate?'
This led Foucault t? speak, ~o so whatever the period, setting, context -
t of the 'Truth' of knowledge in the absolute
Later theorists, like the Italian, Antonio Gramsci, who was influenced by
sense - a Truth which remamed , . ftruth Thus it may or
but of a discursive format10n sus ~1m.
Marx but rejected class reductionism, advanced a definition of 'ideology' · t · · ng a regime o · '
'tably leads to delinquency and
which is considerably closer to Foucault's position, though still too
may not be true that single. pare~tmgb1nev1 and punishes single parents
preoccupied with class questions to be acceptable to him. Gramsci's notion . B 'f one believes it to e so, .d
was that particular social groups struggle in many different ways, including cnme. ut every ·11 have real consequences for both parents and ch1l ren
1 I h.
ideologically, to win the consent of other groups and achieve a kind of according y, t is WI , . f 't 1 ffects even if in some absolute
and will become 'true m terms .o ~ s rea e In ,the human and social
ascendancy in both thought and practice over them. This form of power sense it has never been conclusive y proven.
Gramsci called hegemony. Hegemony is never permanent, and is not sciences, Foucault argued:
reducible to economic interests or to a simple class model of society. This
has some similarities to Foucault's position, though on some key issues they ' . uth is a thing of this world; it is produced
differ radically. (The question of hegemony is briefly addressed again in Truth isn t outside power.... Tr f t . t And it induces regular
Chapter 4.) . f ltiple forms o cons ram · .. ,
only by virtue o mu . . f truth its 'general po1ihcs
effects of power. Each societY_ has its r~~~~ ~t acce~ts and makes
What distinguished Foucault's position on discourse, knowledge and power of truth; that is, the types of ~1scours;. tances which enable one to
from the Marxist theory of class interests and ideological 'distortion'? function as true, the mechamsms an ms b which each is
Foucault advanced at least two, radically novel, propositions. distinguish true and falsefsthatemen~~ ~~= ~:~;;d ~ith saying what
sanctioned ... the status o t ose w
1 Knowledge, power and truth
counts as true. (Foucault, 1980, p. 131)
The first concerns the way Foucault conceived the linkage between
knowledge and power. Hitherto, we have tended to think that power 2 New conceptions of power
operates in a direct and brutally repressive fashion, dispensing with polite
Secondly, Foucault advanced an a ~~ f
It ether novel conception of power. We
things like culture and knowledge, though Gramsci certainly broke with that in a single direction - from top to
model of power. Foucault argued that not only is knowledge always a form of tend to think of power as always ~af' ia mg the sovereign the state, the
d · f m a spec1 ic source - ' .
power, but power is implicated in the questions of whether and in what bottom - an commg ro 1 h power does not 'function m
d For Foucau t, owever, ,.
circumstances knowledge is to be applied or not. This question of the ruling class an so on. . polized by one centre. It is
the form of a chain' - it circulates. It is never mono
deployed and exercised through a net-like organization' (Foucault, 1980,
p. 98). This suggests that we are all, to some degree, caught up in its . the bod b means of instruments of torture and .
inscribed v10lently on . y y f h'ch is that it should be public,
circulation - oppressors and oppressed. It does not radiate downwards, either . t a practice the essence o w I
from one source or from one place. Power relations permeate all levels of execut10n, e c. - The mo d ern farm of d1' sciplinary regulation and power,
visible to everyone. . . . d lized. risoners are shut away from the
by contrast, is private, md1v1 u:er th~~ h continually under surveillance
social existence and are therefore to be found operating at every site of social
public and often from one an~th , t . ~ dividualized. Here, the body has
life-in the private spheres of the family and sexuality as much as in the
public spheres of politics, the economy and the law. What's more, power is from the authorities; and pums men is m .
not only negative, repressing what it seeks to control. It is also productive. It become the Sl. te of a new kind of disciplinary regime. .
'doesn't only weigh on us as a force that says no, but ... it traverses and
. . 1 the natural body which all human bemgs
produces things, it induces pleasure, forms of knowledge, produces discourse. Of course this 'body' is not s1mp y d d i'th1'n discourse according to
·
P ossess at all times. Th' body is pro uce w '
It needs to be thought of as a productive network which runs through the
whole social body' (Foucault, 1980, p. 119). · · is .
f mations - t h e st at e 0 f know ledge about crime and
the different d1scurs1ve or , b th to change or deter criminal
. · 1 h t nts as 'true a au ow ..
the cnm1na 'w a cou 'f' aratus an d t ec h no log1'es of punishment preva11mg
The punishment system, for example, produces books, treatises, regulations,
behaviour, the spec1 ic app . . . d t1'on of the body - a sort of
new strategies of control and resistance, debates in Parliament, . · d · ll histonc1ze concep
at the time. This is a ra ica Y. f /knowledge write their meanings
surface on which different regimes ~t ~o;e~mprinted by history and the
conversations, confessions, legal briefs and appeals, training regimes for
and effects. It thinks of the body ~s o faH; b dy' (Foucault, 1977a, p. 63).
prison officers, and so on. The efforts to control sexuality produce a veritable
explosion of discourse - talk about sex, television and radio programmes, processes of history's deconstruct10n o e o
sermons and legislation, novels, stories and magazine features, medical and
counselling advice, essays and articles, learned theses and research
programmes, as well as new sexual practices (e.g. 'safe' sex) and the d
pornography industry. Without denying that the state, the law, the sovereign entation is not easy to summarize. He is
or the dominant class may have positions of dominance, Foucault shifts our Foucault's approach to repr~s f kn 1 dge and meaning through
attention away from the grand, overall strategies of power, towards the many, concerned with the product10n o ~w e articular texts and
localized circuits, tactics, mechanisms and effects through which power discourse. Foucault does i~d~e~ anad.ydse BP the is more inclined to analyse
· th sem10ticians I · u .
circulates - what Foucault calls the 'meticulous rituals' or the 'micro- representat10ns, ·
as· ef. ation to w h'ic h a t e xt or a practice belongs. His
physics' of power. These power relations 'go right down to the depth of the whole discursive 1orm 'd db the human and social sciences,
society' (Foucault, 1977a, p. 27). They connect the way power is actually concern is with knowledge prov1 e .y t' d belief the regulation
d d tandmg prac ice an ,
working on the ground to the great pyramids of power by what he calls a which organizes con uct, un ers . A, Ith h his work is clearly done in
. 11 hole populations. oug .
capillary movement (capillaries being the thin-walled vessels that aid the of bodies as we as w fl db the 'turn to language' which
exchange of oxygen between the blood in our bodies and the surrounding the wake of, and prof~un.dly in uenceo r:, resentation, his definition of
tissues). Not because power at these lower levels merely reflects or marked the constructwmst approach t p d . 1 des many other elements
b d th language an me u
'reproduces, at the level of individuals, bodies, gestures and behaviour, the discourse is much roa er an 1 . 'h. h Saussure's approach, with its
d · •t f al regu at10n w IC
general form of the law or government' (Foucault, 1977a, p. 2 7) but, on the of practice an msti u rnn . s much more historically
. . f 1 ded Foucau1t is a1way .
contrary, because such an approach 'roots [power] in forms of behaviour, lingmstic ocus, exc u . /k 1 d as always rooted in particular
. . . f ms of power now e ge 1d
bodies and local relations of power which should not at all be seen as a specific, seemg. or · f F It the production of know e ge
Above all or oucau ,
contexts and iston~s.
h
simple projection of the central power' (Foucault, 1980, p. 201). . ' f ower and the body; and this greatly
is alwa s crossed with quest10ns o p .
To what object are the micro-physics of power primarily applied, in expands y t h e scope of w hat is involved in representat10n.
Foucault's model? To the body. He places the body at the centre of the . t his work is that he tends to absorb too
struggles between different formations of power/knowledge. The techniques The major critique levelled a~ams h ff t f encouraging his followers to
. 'd' ' and this hast e e ec o . h
of regulation are applied to the body. Different discursive formations and much into iscourse , . . d structural factors m t e
. fl 0 f th material economic an
apparatuses divide, classify and inscribe the body differently in their neglect them uence e S ' 't'cs also find his rejection of any
. f /k ledge ome en I . f
respective regimes of power and 'truth'. In Discipline and Punish, for operat10n o power now . . . £ our of the idea of a 'regime o
f, h' · th human sciences m av h
example, Foucault analyses the very different ways in which the body of the criterion o trut. m e will to make things 'true') vulnerable to t e
criminal is 'produced' and disciplined in different punishment regimes in truth' and the will-to-power (the h . l'ttle doubt about the major
1 . . N vertheless t ere is I .
France. In earlier periods, punishment was haphazard, prisons were places charge of re ativ1sm. e ' theories of representation
.
impac t w h'ic h h1's work has had on contemporary
into which the public could wander and the ultimate punishment was
and meaning.
52 REPRESENTATION CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES CHAPTER I THE WORI< OF REPRESENTATION 53
d e The painting could be said to capture and represent, visually, a discursive

'event' - the emergence of a new regime of knowledge. Charcot's great
In the. following examP1e, we WI'll try to apply Foucault's method to a distinction, which drew students from far and wide to study with him
par t Icu1ar example F' h
famous French s ~h·I~u~~ 1 .8 s ows a painting by Andre Brouillet of the (including, in 1885, the young Sigmund Freud from Vienna), was his
lecturing on theps~bje~~ ~I; fe:dl n~urolo~ist, Jean-Martin Charcot (1825-93), demonstration 'that hysterical symptoms such as paralysis could be
produced and relieved by hypnotic suggestion' (Showalter, 1987, p. 148).
his famous Paris clinic at La Sale At~~tena to students in the lecture theatre of
ape nere. Here we see the practice of hypnosis being applied in practice.
ACTIVITY 7 Indeed, the image seems to capture two such moments of knowledge
Look at Brouillet's painting (Figure 1 ·8) · What d oes I't revea1 as a production. Charcot did not pay much attention to what the patients said
. (though he observed their actions and gestures meticulously). But Freud and
representat10n of the study of hysteria?
his friend Breuer did. At first, in their work when they returned home, they
Brouillet shows a hysterical t' t b · used Charcot's hypnosis method, which had attracted such wide attention as
attended by two w F pa ien emg supported by an assistant and
omen. or many years hyste . h db a novel approach to treatment of hysteria at La Salpetriere. But some years
identified as a female mal d d ' na a een traditionally later they treated a young woman called Bertha Pappenheim for hysteria, and
conclusively that ha y ~n although Charcot demonstrated
many ystencal symptoms were t b f d. she, under the pseudonym 'Anna O', became the first case study written up
significant proportion of his patients were d' ~ e oun m men, and a in Freud and Breuer's path-breaking Studies in Hysteria (1974/1895). It was
Showalter observes that 'for Ch iag~ose male hysterics, Elaine the 'loss of words', her failing grasp of the syntax of her own language
not medically, a female malady'a~~~i7too, ;1:)ter~~remains symbolically, if (German), the silences and meaningless babble of this brilliantly intellectual,
man who took hi · , . . ' P: · arcot was a very humane
He diagnosed h st p~hents suff~rmg .senously and treated them with dignity. poetic and imaginative but rebellious young woman, which gave Breuer and
(much as has h:s ena as. a genu~ne ailment rather than a malingerer's excuse Freud the first clue that her linguistic disturbance was related to her
illnesses, like a:O~::i:d~~~ :~

11
1;~. afte~ m~ny struggles, with other
resentment at her 'place' as dutiful daughter of a decidedly patriarchal father,
and thus deeply connected with her illness. After hypnosis, her capacity to
Charcot's treatment regime h). h IS pa~ntmg represents a regular feature of speak coherently returned, and she spoke fluently in three other languages,
before an audience of medi,c:i s~:;f a~sie:;~~~!~:t~: ~a!ents display~d though not in her native German. Through her dialogue with Breuer, and her
malady, ending often with a full hysterical seizure. y ptoms of theu ability to 'work through' her difficult relationship in relation to language,
'Anna O' gave the first example of the 'talking cure' which, of course, then
provided the whole basis for Freud's subsequent development of the
psychoanalytic method. So we are looking, in this image, at the 'birth' of two
new psychiatric epistemes: Charcot's method of hypnosis, and the conditions
which later produced psychoanalysis.
The example also has many connections with the question of representation.
In the picture, the patient is performing or 'representing' with her body the
hysterical symptoms from which she is 'suffering'. But these symptoms are
also being 're-presented' - in the very different medical language of diagnosis
and analysis - to her (his?) audience by the Professor: a relationship which
involves power. Showalter notes that, in general, 'the representation of
female hysteria was a central aspect of Charcot's work' (p.148). Indeed, the
clinic was filled with lithographs and paintings. He had his assistants
assemble a photographic album of nervous patients, a sort of visual inventory
of the various 'types' of hysterical patient. He later employed a professional
photographer to take charge of the service. His analysis of the displayed
symptoms, which seems to be what is happening in the painting,
accompanied the hysterical 'performance'. He did not flinch from the
spectacular and theatrical aspects associated with his demonstrations of
hypnosis as a treatment regime. Freud thought that 'Every one of his
f IGURE I •8 A ndre, BroU1·11 et, A clinical lesson at La Salpetriere (given by Charcot), 1887. "fascinating lectures'" was 'a little work of art in construction and
54 CHAPTER I THE WORK OF REPRESENTATION SS
REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
composition'. Indeed Freud noted 'h On the other hand, Foucault did include the subject in his theorizing, though
than after he had mad~ the effort b , .e .never appeared greater to his listeners he did not restore the subject to its position as the centre and author of
train of thought by the gre t t fr, ykgivmg the most detailed account of his representation. Indeed, as his work developed, he became more and more
' a es an ness about his doubt dh · ·
reduce the gulf between teacher and .1, (G s an esitations, to concerned with questions about 'the subject', and in his very late and
pupi ay, 1988, p. 49).
unfinished work, he even went so far as to give the subject a certain reflexive
ACTIVITY 8 awareness of his or her own conduct, though this still stopped short of
Now look carefully at the picture a ain and b . . . restoring the subject to his/her full sovereignty.
said about Foucault's method f ~ , earmg m mmd what we have
the following questions: o an approach to representation, answer Foucault was certainly deeply critical of what we might call the traditional
conception of the subject. The conventional notion thinks of 'the subject' as
1 Who commands the centre of the picture? an individual who is fully endowed with consciousness; an autonomous and
2 Who or what is its 'subject? Are (1) and (2) the same? stable entity, the 'core' of the self, and the independent, authentic source of
action and meaning. According to this conception, when we hear ourselves
3 Can you tell that knowledge is being produced here? How?
speak, we feel we are identical with what has been said. And this identity of
4 ~hat do you notice about relations of power in the picture? H the subject with what is said gives him/her a privileged position in relation to
t ey represented? How does the fi d . . ow are
picture represent this? arm an spatrnl relationships of the meaning. It suggests that, although other people may misunderstand us, we
always understand ourselves because we were the source of meaning in the
5 DescribeWh
whom? the t'gaze'
d ofh th e peop 1e ·in the image: who is looking at
first place.
· a oes t at tell us?
However, as we have seen, the shift towards a constructionist conception of
6 What do the age and gender of the participants tell us?
language and representation did a great deal to displace the subject from a
7 What message does the patient's body convey? privileged position in relation to knowledge and meaning. The same is true
8 Is there a sexual meaning in the image? If so, what? of Foucault's discursive approach. It is discourse, not the subjects who speak
9 What is the. relationship of you, the viewer, to the image.
. ? it, which produces knowledge. Subjects may produce particular texts, but
D they are operating within the limits of the episteme, the discursive formation,
10 o you notice anything else about the image which we have missed?
the regime of truth, of a particular period and culture. Indeed, this is one of
READING F
Foucault's most radical propositions: the 'subject' is produced within
discourse. This subject of discourse cannot be outside discourse, because it
Now read the account of Charcot and La S 1 ~ . , must be subjected to discourse. It must submit to its rules and conventions,
Showalter in 'Th f a petnere offered by Elaine
e per ormance of hysteria' fro Th p, to its dispositions of power/knowledge. The subject can become the bearer of
reproduced as Reading Fat the end of th' m e emale Malady,
two photographs of Charcot's h t . 1 is chapter..Look carefully at the the kind of knowledge which discourse produces. It can become the object
make of their captions? ys enca women patients. What do you through which power is relayed. But it cannot stand outside power/
knowledge as its source and author. In 'The subject and power' (1982),
Foucault writes that 'My objective ... has been to create a history of the
different modes by which, in our culture, human beings are made subjects ...
It is a form of power which makes individuals subjects. There are two
"
IS s .
1 meanings of the word subject: subject to someone else's control and
dependence, and tied to his (sic) own identity by a conscience and self-
We have traced the shift in Foucault's work fr . knowledge. Both meanings suggest a form of power which subjugates and
knowledge, and their relation to t' f om language to discourse and
ques 10ns o power B t h . . makes subjectto' (Foucault, 1982, pp. 208, 212). Making discourse and
you might ask is the subJ'ect? S · u w ere m all this,
' · aussure tended to b l' h th b' representation more historical has therefore been matched, in Foucault, by an
question of representation L h a o is e su Ject from the
appears in Saussure's sch~maa:sg~:;e, e argu~d, ~p.eaks us. The subject equally radical historicization of the subject. 'One has to dispense with the
(paroles) But h author of mdividual speech-acts constituent subject, to get rid of the subject itself, that's to say, to arrive at an
. , as we ave seen Saussure did t th. k h
paroles was one at which a 'sci~ t'f , 1 . no m t at the level of the analysis which can account for the constitution of the subject within a
conducted I n i ic ana ysis of language could be historical framework' (Foucault, 1980, p. 115).
. . n one sense, Foucault shares this . . . . .
discourse, not the sub]' ect wh' h d position. For him, it is Where, then, is 'the subject' in this more discursive approach to meaning,
' ic pro uces knowl d n·
enmeshed with power b t 't . e ge. iscourse is
, u i is not necessary to f d, b' , representation and power?
ruling class, the bourgeoisie the st t t f m a su Ject - the king, the
, a e, e c. - or power/knowledge to operate.
56 REPRESENTATION CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS ANO SIGNIFYING PRACTICES CHAPTER I THE WORI< OF REPRESENTATION 57
Foucault's 'subject' seems to be produced through discourse in two different 'nter It was ongma. . ll y call e d 'The Empress with her Ladies and. a Dwarf';
f h
senses or places. First, the discourse itself produces 'subjects' - figures who pa1 .h . t of 1666 it had acquired the title of 'A Portrait o t e
but by t e mven ory , C t
personify the particular forms of knowledge which the discourse produces. f S ain with her Ladies In Waiting and Servants, by the our
These subjects have the attributes we would expect as these are defined by In~anta
Pamter an
o dpP 1
a ace
Chamberlain Diego Velasquez'. It was subsequently called
. . h
the discourse: the madman, the hysterical woman, the homosexual, the M . 'The Maids of Honour'. Some argue that the pamtmg s ows
Las enrnas - · d · h h ·d f
individualized criminal, and so on. These figures are specific to specific s uez working on Las Meninas itself and was pamte wit t e a1 .o ~
Vela q . l'k 1 The most widely held and convmcmg
discursive regimes and historical periods. But the discourse also produces a mirror - but this now seems un I e y. t 't f th
place for the subject (i.e. the reader or viewer, who is also 'subjected to' ex lanation is that Velasquez was working on a full-length par ra~ o e
discourse) from which its particular knowledge and meaning most makes Ki~g and Queen, and that it is the royal couple who a~e reflected m the
sense. It is not inevitable that all individuals in a particular period will . the back wall It is at the couple that the prmcess and her
mirror on · . t t as he
become the subjects of a particular discourse in this sense, and thus the tt dants are looking and on them that the artist's gaze appears o res 1
bearers of its power/knowledge. But for them - us - to do so, they - we - a en b k f m h1's canvas The reflection artfully includes the royal coup e
steps ac ro · 1 t
must locate themselves/ourselves in the position from which the discourse in the picture. This is essentially the account which Foucau t accep s.
makes most sense, and thus become its 'subjects' by 'subjecting' ourselves to
its meanings, power and regulation. All discourses, then, construct subject- ACTIVITY 9
s Ltbjoct-positions
positions, from which alone they make sense. Look at the picture carefully, while we summarize Foucault's argument.
This approach has radical implications for a theory of representation. For it

suggests that discourses themselves construct the subject-positions from
which they become meaningful and have effects. Individuals may differ as to
their social class, gendered, 'racial' and ethnic characteristics (among other
factors), but they will not be able to take meaning until they have identified
with those positions which the discourse constructs, subjected themselves to
its rules, and hence become the subjects of its power/knowledge. For
example, pornography produced for men will only 'work' for women,
according to this theory, if in some sense women put themselves in the
position of the 'desiring male voyeur' - which is the ideal subject-position
which the discourse of male pornography constructs - and look at the models
from this 'masculine' discursive position. This may seem, and is, a highly
contestable proposition. But let us consider an example which illustrates the
argument.
5.1 u
Foucault's The Order of Things (1970) opens with a discussion of a painting
by the famous Spanish painter, Velasquez, called Las Meninas. It has been a
topic of considerable scholarly debate and controversy. The reason I am
using it here is because, as all the critics agree, the painting itself does raise
certain questions about the nature of representation, and Foucault himself
uses it to talk about these wider issues of the subject. It is these arguments
which interest us here, not the question of whether Foucault's is the 'true',
correct or even the definitive reading of the painting's meaning. That the
painting has no one, fixed or final meaning is, indeed, one of Foucault's most
powerful arguments.
FIGURE 1.9
The painting is unique in Velasquez' work. It was part of the Spanish court's Diego Velasquez,
royal collection and hung in the palace in a room which was subsequently las Meninas,
destroyed by fire. It was dated '1656' by Velasquez' successor as court 1656.
58 REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES CHAPTER I THE WORK OF REPRESENTATION 59
Las Meninas shows the interior of a room - . , Representation and the subject are the painting's underlying message - what it
some other room in the S .hR perhaps the pamter s studio or
though in its deeper rece~:~1:ath oy;l Pa~ace, the Escorial. The scene, -,
is about, its sub-text.
the right. 'We are looking at a .etr a:k, is ?athed in light from a window on 2 Clearly, representation here is not about a 'true' reflection or imitation of
, pie ure m which the · t · ·
out at us, says Foucault (1970 4) p~m er ism turn looking reality. Of course, the people in the painting may 'look like' the actual people
painter himself Velasquez H, ~· . . hTo the left, lookmg forwards, is the in the Spanish court. But the discourse of painting in the picture is doing a
. ' · e is m t e act of p · t' d .
raised, 'perhaps .. · consi'd ermg
. w h eth er to dd am mg· an . .his brush is great deal more than simply trying to mirror accurately what exists.
canvas' (p. 3). He is looking at h1' d 1 ah some fm1shmg touch to the
. s mo e w o is 'tt' · 3 Everything in a sense is visible in the painting. And yet, what it is 'about'
w h ich we are looking but ' si mg m the place from
, we cannot see wh th d 1. - its meaning- depends on how we 'read' it. It is as much constructed
canvas on which Velasquez i' . t' h . o e mo e is because the
s pam mg as its ba kt · around what you can't see as what you can. You can't see what is being
turned away from our gaze I th c o us, its face resolutely
.. · n e centre of the p · t' painted on the canvas, though this seems to be the point of the whole
tra d ihon recognizes as the l'ttl . am mg stands what
come to watch the proceedi~gse ~~n~es~ the Infanta Maragarita, who has exercise. You can't see what everyone is looking at, which is the sitters,
looking at, but she is not the, ·b. et'1sft e centre of the picture we are unless we assume it is a reflection of them in the mirror. They are both in
·h su Jee o Velasquez' h and not in the picture. Or rather, they are present through a kind of
wit her an 'entourage of d . canvas. T e Infanta has
uennas, maids of h . substitution. We cannot see them because they are not directly represented:
and her dog (p 9) The c t' onour, courtiers and dwarfs'
· · our rnrs stand beh · d
Her maids of honour stand on either side o/~e , towa~ds the back on the right.
but their 'absence' is represented - mirrored through their reflection in the
the front are two dwarfs on £ . r, frammg her. To the right at mirror at the back. The meaning of the picture is produced, Foucault argues,
. ' ea amous court Je t Th through this complex inter-play between presence (what you see, the visible)
figur~s, like that of the painter himself ar 1 s .er. e eyes of many of these
the picture at the sitters. , e ookmg out towards the front of and absence (what you can't see, what has displaced it within the frame).
Representation works as much through what is not shown, as through
Who are they - th e f igures at whom everyone is lo k' what is.
look at and whose portraits on th o mg but whom we cannot
though at first we think e canvas we are forbidden to see? In fact 4 In fact, a number of substitutions or displacements seem to be going on
we cannot see the th · '
because, behind the Infanta's h d d ~' e picture tells us who they are
here. For example, the 'subject' and centre of the painting we are looking at
· ea an a little t th 1 ft f
picture, surrounded by a heavy d fr ~ e e o . thed centre
woo en ame is a m. .
of the
seems to be the Infanta. But the 'subject' or centre is also, of course, the
at 1ast - are reflected the sitt h . , Irror, an in the mirror - sitters - the King and Queen - whom we can't see but whom the others are
. ers, w o are m facts t d . h looking at. You can tell this from the fact that the mirror on the wall in which
w ich we are looking: 'a reflect1' th h ea e mt e position from
· h on at s ows us 't · the King and Queen are reflected is also almost exactly at the centre of the
in everyone's gaze' (p 1S) Th f' qm e simp 1Y what is lacking
. · · e igures refl t d · h . field of vision of the picture. So the Infanta and the Royal Couple, in a sense,
Kmg, Philip IV, and his wife M . B ~c e mt e mirror are, in fact the
, anana. es1de th · ' share the place of the centre as the principal 'subjects' of the painting. It all
th e b ack wall, is another 'fra , b h' . e mirror, to the right of it in
. me ' ut t is is not a . fl . ' depends on where you are looking from - in towards the scene from where
is a doorway leading backT.ra d t f h mirror re ectmg forwards· it
•• , r s ou o t e roo 0 h ' you, the spectator, is sitting or outwards from the scene, from the position of
on different steps 'a man stand t. f 1 m. n t e stair, his feet placed
' s ou m u I-length 'lh ' the people in the picture. If you accept Foucault's argument, then there are
entered or is just leaving th . s1 ouette . He has 1'ust
e scene and is look' t · fr two subjects to the painting and two centres. And the composition of the
what is going on in it but 'conte t t . mg a it om behind, observing
himself' (p. 10). n o surpnse those within without being seen picture - its discourse - forces us to oscillate between these two 'subjects'
without ever finally deciding which one to identify with. Representation in
the painting seems firm and clear - everything in place. But our vision, the
5 way we look at the picture, oscillates between two centres, two subjects, two
e SU n positions of looking, two meanings. Far from being finally resolved into
Las Meninas to make some gene f .

Who or what is the subject of this aintin ? .
g. In his comments, Foucault uses
some absolute truth which is the meaning of the picture, the discourse of the
painting quite deliberately keeps us in this state of suspended attention, in
and specifically about the role ofrathpombt~ about his theory of representation this oscillating process of looking. Its meaning is always in the process of
e SU Ject:
emerging, yet any final meaning is constantly deferred.
1 'Foucault reads the paintin in term
(Dreyfus and Rabinow, 1982 g 20) A s of repres~ntation and the subject' 5 You can tell a great deal about how the picture works as a discourse, and
' P· · s well as bemg · t'
us (represents) a scene in h' h . a pam mg which shows what it means, by following the orchestration of looking- who is looking at
· w ic a portrait of th K' d
b emg painted, it is also a painting which tell e mg an . Queen of Spain is what or whom. Our look - the eyes of the person looking at the picture, the
representation and the sub. t k s us somethmg about how spectator - follows the relationships of looking as represented in the picture.
1ec war . It produces its own kind of knowl e dge.
60 REPRESENTATION .· CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS ANO SIGNIFYING PRACTICES CHAPTER I THE WORK OF REPRESENTATION 61
know the figure of the Infanta is important because her attendants are • 1 You can imagine what fun Foucault had with
in the place of the Sovereign.
:~king at her. But we know that someone even more important is sitting in this substitution. .
front of the scene whom we can't see, because many figures -the Infanta, the
. . 1 from the way the discourse of representat10n
jester, the painter himself- are looking at them! So the spectator (who is also Foucault argues that it is c .ear t b 1 ked at and made sense of from that
'subjected' to the discourse of the painting) is doing two kinds oflooking. · th 'nting that it mus e oo ·
works m e pai. . . f. fr hich we the spectators, are lookmg.
Looking at the scene from the position outside, in front of, the picture. And at b' ct-posit10n m front o it om w ' b
one su Je . . fr hich a camera would have to e
the same time, looking out of the scene, by identifying with the looking being This is also the pomt-of-view om w A d 1 and behold the person whom
done by the figures in the painting. Projecting ourselves into the subjects of the .. d· d r to film the scene. n , 0 ' .
pos1t10ne m or e , , 'tt' in this position is The Sovereign -
painting help us as spectators to see, to 'make sense' of it. We take up the Velasquez chooses to re~rese:t .s1b I~~ the 'subject of' the painting (what it is
0 1
positions indicated by the discourse, identify with them, subject ourselves to 'master of all he surveys - w :? h horn the discourse sets in
its meanings, and become its 'subjects'. about) and the 'subject in' the pamt~ng - t e o~ei;:nd understands it all by a
place, but who, simultaneously, ma es sense o
6 It is critical for Foucault's argument that the painting does not have a look of supreme mastery.
completed meaning. It only means something in relation to the spectator who
is looking at it. The spectator completes the meaning of the picture. Meaning is
therefore constructed in the dialogue between the painting and the spectator.
Velasquez, of course, could not know who would subsequently occupy the
position of the spectator. Nevertheless, the whole 'scene' of the painting had to
be laid out in relation to that ideal point in front of the painting from which any
. f .. f resentation. Representation
spectator must look if the painting is to make sense. The spectator, we might We started with a fairly simple de ifmt10nlto reu~e language (broadly defined
say, is painted into position in front of the picture. In this sense, the discourse b hich members o a cu ure
is the process Y w . 'f ·n s stem) to produce
produces a subject-position for the spectator-subject. For the painting to work, as any system which deploys. s~gns, an_Y s1tghne\~p~r?ant premise that things -
the spectator, whoever he or she may be, must first 'subject' himself/herself to . Al d this dehmt10n carnes .
meanmg. rea y, . world - do not have in themselves any fixed,
objects, people, e~ents, I~ the .
the painting's discourse and, in this way, become the painting's ideal viewer,
. t within human cultures - who
the producer of its meanings -its 'subject'. This is what is meant by saying that final or true meamng. It i: u~ - m soc1~ y,s conse uently, will always
make things mean, who s1gmfy'. ~~anmgther Th~re is no guarantee that
the discourse constructs the spectator as a subject - by which we mean that it
constructs a place for the subject-spectator who is looking at and making sense change, from one culture or per10 o ano .. 1 . gin another
of it. . . 1 ill have an eqmva ent meanm '
every obJeCt m one cu ture ~ t' radically, from one another in
7 Representation therefore occurs from at least three positions in the painting. precisely because cultures differ, somel:~;y and assign meaning to the
First of all there is us, the spectator, whose 'look' puts together and unifies the their codes - the ways the_Y carv: u~, c entation is the acceptance of a
different elements and relationships in the picture into an overall meaning. world. So one important idea a ou repres lture and another a certain lack
This subject must be there for the painting to make sense, but he/she is not degree. oflcultural rdehl~~:i:~~~:~e~o~~:a~~lation as we mov; from the
represented in the painting. of eqmva ence, an h
mind-set or conceptual universe of one culture or anot er.
Then there is the painter who painted the scene. He is 'present' in two places at . . ht resentation, contrasting it
once, since he must at one time have been standing where we are now sitting, We call this the constructwrnst ~ppro~c lo rep h s Now if culture is a
. h h ,-Flective and the mtentwna approac e . , .
in order to paint the scene, but he has then put himself into (represented with bot t e re1. d 't k? In the constructionist perspective,
t' e how oes i wor .
himself in) the picture, looking back towards that point of view where we, the process, a prac ic ' . . b forging links between three
spectator, have taken his place. We may also say that the scene makes sense representation invol~es ~akmg :e:1~~ b;oadly call the world of things,
and is pulled together in relation to the court figure standing on the stair at the different orders of thmgs. what g t orld _the mental concepts
d · s· the concep ua1 w
back, since he too surveys it all but - like us and like the painter - from people, events a~ expe~1e~~~ ~nd the signs, arranged into languages, which
somewhat outside it. we carry around m our ea ' t N w if you have to make a link
'stand for' or communicate these:oncep s. d ~i~ these at least for a time so
8 Finally, consider the mirror on the back wall. If it were a 'real' mirror, it between systems which are not t e sam~, an corresponds to what in another
should now be representing or reflecting us, since we are standing in that that other people know what, in o:e sys :~h allows us to translate between
position in front of the scene to which everyone is looking and from which system, then there must be somet i~g w ~ct concept and so on. Hence the
everything makes sense. But it does not mirror us, it shows in our place the them- telling us what word to use or w a ,
King and Queen of Spain. Somehow the discourse of the painting positions us notion of codes.
62 REPRESENTATION CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES
Producing meaning depends on the practice of interpretation, and .

truchon w h'ic h is
· at the heart of culture, to its full depths. What
1 we have
d
interpretation is sustained by us actively using the code - encoding, putting cons : h elatively clear account of a set of comp ex, an as
offered here is, we ope, a r . . .
things into the code - and by the person at the other end interpreting or yet tentative, ideas in an unfm1shed proJect.
decoding the meaning (Hall, 1980). But note, that, because meanings are
always changing and slipping, codes operate more like social conventions
than like fixed laws or unbreakable rules. As meanings shift and slide, so s
inevitably the codes of a culture imperceptibly change. The great advantage
of the concepts and classifications of the culture which we carry around with BARTHE S , R · (196 7) The Elements of Semiology, London, Cape.
us in our heads is that they enable us to think about things, whether they are BARTHES, R. (1972) Mythologies, London, Cape.
there, present, or not; indeed, whether they ever existed or not. There are BARTHES, R. (1972a) 'The world of wrestling' in Mythologies, London, Cape.
concepts for our fantasies, desires and imaginings as well as for so-called
'real' objects in the material world. And the advantage of language is that BARTHES, R. (197 2b) 'Myth today' in Mythologies, London, Cape. W
our thoughts about the world need not remain exclusive to us, and silent. BARTHES, R. (1975) The Pleasure of the Text, New York, Hall and ang.
We can translate them into language, make them 'speak', through the use of ( 1977) Image-Music-Text, Glasgow, Fontana.
BARTHES , R · · t'
signs which stand for them - and thus talk, write, communicate about them
BRYSON, N · (
1990) Looking at the Overlooked: four essays on still life pam mg,
to others.
London, Reaktion Books. .
Gradually, then, we complexified what we meant by representation. It came (1984) Michel Foucault, Basingstoke, Macmillan.
COUSINS, M. an d HUSS AIN A
' .
to be less and less the straightforward thing we assumed it to be at first -
which is why we need theories to explain it. We looked at two versions of CULLER, J. (1976) Saussure, London, Fontana.
constructionism - that which concentrated on how language and DERRIDA, J. (1981) Positions, Chicago, IL, University of Chicago Press.
signification (the use of signs in language) works to produce meanings, which
DREYFUS' H. an d RABINOW ' P . (eds) (1982) Beyond Stucturalism and
after Saussure and Barthes we called semiotics; and that, following Foucault, Hermeneutics, Brighton, Harvester. .
which concentrated on how discourse and discursive practices produce IC It of Productwn, London,
DU GAY, P. (ed.) (1997) Production o~ Cu 1:ure . u) ures
knowledge. I won't run through the finer points in these two approaches
S e/The Open University (Book 4 m this senes .
again, since you can go back to them in the main body of the chapter and
ag LL s JANES L MACKAY, H. an
d NEGUS ' K . (1997) Doing Cultural
.
refresh your memory. In semiotics, you will recall the importance of signifier/ DU GAY, P., HA ' ., ' ., Jk L d n Sage/The Open University
signified, langue/parole and 'myth', and how the marking of difference and Studies: the story of the Sony Wa man, on o ,
binary oppositions are crucial for meaning. In the discursive approach, you (Book 1 in this series). .
will recall discursive formations, power/knowledge, the idea of a 'regime of LT M (1970) The Order of Things, London, Tavistock.
FOUCA U , · T · t k
truth', the way discourse also produces the subject and defines the subject- The Archaeology of Knowledge, London, av1s oc .
FOUCAULT, · M (1972)
positions from which knowledge proceeds and indeed, the return of questions
M (1973) The Birth of the Clinic, London, Tavistock.
about 'the subject' to the field ofrepresentation. In several examples, we tried FOUCAULT, · h ll L /
to get you to work with these theories and to apply them. There will be further FOUCAULT, M. (1978) The History of Sexuality, Harmondswort , A en ane
debate about them in subsequent chapters.
Penguin Books. .
. . 1. d p nish London Tavistock.
Notice that the chapter does not argue that the discursive approach overturned FOUCAULT, M. (1977a) D1sc1p me an u ' ' c t
everything in the semiotic approach. Theoretical development does not (1977b) 'Nietzsche genealogy, history', in Language, oun er-
FOUCAULT, M. '
usually proceed in this linear way. There was much to learn from Saussure Memory, Practice, Oxford, Blackwell.
and Barthes, and we are still discovering ways of fruitfully applying their
FOUCAULT, M. (1980) Power/Knowledge, Brighton, Harvester. .
insights - without necessarily swallowing everything they said. We offered
1982) 'The subject and power' in Dreyfus and Rabmow (eds).
you some critical thoughts on the subject. There is a great deal to learn from FOUCAULT, M. ( l'
Foucault and the discursive approach, but by no means everything it claims is R J (1974) Studies on Hysteria, Harmondsworth, Pe ican.
FREUD, s. an d BREUE ' .
correct and the theory is open to, and has attracted, many criticisms. Again, in First published 1895.
later chapters, as we encounter further developments in the theory of • -F time,
· London , Macmillan.
GAY,P. (1988)Freud:alife1orour .
representation, and see the strengths and weaknesses of these positions
applied in practice, we will come to appreciate more fully that we are only at HALL, s. (1980) 'Encoding and decoding' in Hall, S. et al. (eds) Culture, Medw,
the beginning of the exciting task of exploring this process of meaning Language, London, Hutchinson.
64 REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS ANO SIGNIFYING PRACTICES 65
HALL, s ..(1992) 'The We.st and the Rest', in Hall, S. and Gieben, B. (eds) or in contact with a surface, they would decay more ;a
Formatwns of Modermty, Cambridge, Polity Press/The Open University. quickly). Placed in a kitchen, next to plates and m
HOEG, P. (1994) Miss Smilla's Feeling For Snow, London , Fl am1ngo.
. knives, bowls and pitchers, the objects would )>
inevitably point towards their consumption at
and MOUFFE, c. (1990) 'Post-Marxism without apologies' in 0
LACLAU, E.
Laclau, E., New Reflections on the Revolution o1our 'n1'me , Lo n d on, ''
verso. 'n too the images have as their
rth Co t a ' ,
table, but the cantarero maintains the idea of the
objects as separable from, dissociated from, their
function as food. In Quince, Cabbage, Melon and
-z
MCNAY, L. (1994) Foucault: a critical introduction, Cambridge, Polity Press. V\ 1 d' t function the separation of the viewer
MACKAY,~· (e~.) (1997) Consumption and Everyday Life, London S /Th

.1ru.rne ra e .
the previous mode of seemg [... ]:they Cucumber [Figure 1.3] no-one can touch the G)
Open Umvers1ty (Book 5 in this series).
SAUSSURE, F. DE (1960)
' age e
Course in General Linguistics, London, Peter Owen.
frolll dition the habitual and abolish the endless
decon. . g and fatigue of wor ldl y v1s10n,
eclrpslll
. . rep 1acmg
.
suspended quince or cabbage without disturbing
them and setting them rocking in space: their
motionlessness is the mark of human absence,
,,
V>
SHOWALTER, E. (1987) The Female Malady, Londo n, v·uago.

these
with brilliance. The enemy is a mode of
. which thinks rt
seerng
. knows m
. a d vance w h at rs
. distance from the hand that reaches to eat; and it 0;a
rth looking at an w at rs not: agamst t at, t h e
d h . . h renders them immaculate. Hanging on strings, the
WEEKS, J. (1981) Sex, Politics and Society' London , Lo ngman. wo . of th'mgs seen quince and the cabbage lack the weight known to
. a e presents the constant surpnse
WEEKS, J. (1985) Sexuality and its Discontents, London, Routledge. ~: t~e first time. Sight is taken back to a [primal] the hand. Their weightlessness disowns such ()
intimate knowledge. Having none of the familiarity
sage
t b efore it learned how to scotomise [break up/
divide] the visual field, how to screen out the that comes from touch, and divorced from the idea I
unimportant and not see, but scan. In place of the of consumption, the objects take on a value that is )>
abbreviated forms for which the world scans, Catan nothing to do with their role as nourishment. -0
supplies forms that are articulated at immense What replaces their interest as sustenance is their -I
length, forms so copious or prolix that one cannot interest as mathematical form. Like many painters m
see where or how to begin to simplify them. They of his period in Spain, Catan has a highly ;a
offer no inroads for reduction because they omit
nothing. Just at the point where the eye thinks it
developed sense of geometrical order; but whereas
the ideas of sphere, ellipse and cone are used for 0
knows the form and can afford to skip, the image
proves that in fact the eye had not understood at all
example in El Greco to assist in organising pictorial
composition, here they are explored almost for
zm
what it was about to discard. their own sake. One can think of Quince, Cabbage,
The relation proposed in Catan between the viewer Melon and Cucumber as an experiment in the kind
and the foodstuffs so meticulously displayed seems of transformations that are explored in the branch
to involve, paradoxically, no reference to appetite of mathematics know as topology. We begin on the
or to the function of sustenance which becomes left with the quince, a pure sphere revolving on its
coincidental; it might be described as anorexic, axis. Moving to the right, the sphere seems to peel
taking this word in its literal and Greek sense as off its boundary and disintegrate into a ball of
meaning 'without desire'. All Colan's still lifes are concentric shells revolving around the same
rooted in the outlook of monasticism, specifically vertical axis. Moving to the melon the sphere
the monasticism of the Carthusians [monks], whose becomes an ellipse, from which a segment has been
order Catan jointed as a lay brother in Toledo in cut; a part of the segment is independently shown.
1603. What distinguishes the Carthusian rule is its At the right the segmented shapes recover their
stress on solitude over communal life: the monks continuous boundary in the corrugated form of the
live in individual cells, where they pray, study - cucumber. The curve described by all these objects
and eat - alone, meeting only for the night office, taken together is not at all informal but precisely
morning mass and afternoon vespers. There is total logarithmic; it follows a series of harmonic or
abstention from meat, and on Fridays and other fast musical proportions with the vertical co-ordinates
days the diet is bread and water. Absent from of the curve exactly marked by the strings. And it
Cotan's work is any conception of nourishment as is a complex curve, not just the arc of a graph on a
involving the conviviality of the meal - the sharing two-dimensional surface . In relation to the quince,
of hospitality[ ... ]. The unvarying stage of his the cabbage appears to come forward slightly; the
paintings is never the kitchen but always the melon is further forward than the quince, the
cantarero, a cooling-space where for preservation melon slice projects out beyond the ledge, and the
the foods are often hung on strings (piled together, cucumber overhangs it still further. The arc is
66 REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES READINGS FOR CHAPTER ONE 67
therefore not on the same plane as its co-ordinates Sometimes the wrestler triumphs with a repulsive
public calls Thauvin la barbaque,
it curves in three dimensions: it is a true hyperbol~ sneer while kneeling on the good sportsman;
[ ..• J d ead flesh ') so that the passionate
. :meat , fr sometimes he gives the crowd a conceited smile
•stinking . of the crowd no 1onger stems om
The mathematical engagement of these forms . ndernnat1on b t ·nstead from the very depth of its which forebodes an early revenge; sometimes,
co :rnent, u i . . pinned to the ground, he hits the floor
shows every sign of exact calculation, as though the ·ts judge .11 thereafter let itself be frenetically
1 Jt wi . · ostentatiously to make evident to all the intolerable
scene were being viewed with scientific, but not [T]he function of the wrestler is not to win; it is to bu:rnours. . . dea of Thauvin which will
·1ed in an h' nature of his situation; and sometimes he erects a
go e~actly .thro~gh th~ motions which are expected
i . .
with creaturely, interest. Geometric space replaces einbro1 . 1 with this physical ongm: is
in entire Y · 1 complicated set of signs meant to make the public
creatural space, the space around the body that is of him. It is said that JUdo contains a hidden con f or . f ctly correspond to the essentia
. ns will per e understand that he legitimately personifies the
known by touch and is created by familiar symbolic aspect; even in the midst of efficiency 't act1° . f his personage.
'ls ever-entertaining image of the grumbler, endlessly
movements of the hands and arms. Cotan's play gestures are measured, precise but restricted, viscosity o
. the body of the wrestler that we confabulating about his displeasure.
with geometric and volumetric ideas replaces this drawn accurately but by a stroke without volume therefore in h
cocoon-like space, defined by habitual gestures, Wrestling, on the contrary, offers excessive It is f' t key to the contest. I know from t e
. d the irs of Thauvin's actions, h'is treac h enes,
fin · We are therefore dealing with a real Human
with an abstracted and homogeneous space which ?estures, exploited to the limit of their meaning. In 11
start t~at a d acts of cowardice, will not fail to Comedy, where the most socially-inspired nuances
has broken with the matrix of the body. This is the )Udo, a man who is down is hardly down at all, he elt1es an . . . h of passion (conceit, rightfulness, refined cruelty, a
cru to the first image of ignobihty e gave
point: to suppress the body as a source of space. rolls over, he draws back, he eludes defeat, or, if the easure up · 11' 1 dt sense of 'paying one's debts') always felicitously
rn t st him to carry out mte igent y an o
That bodily or tactile space is profoundly unvisual: latter is obvious, he immediately disappears; in e·Jcan ru find the clearest sign which can receive them,
the things we find there are things we reach for _ a wrestling, a man who is down is exaggeratedly so, rn ' d tail all the gestures of a kind of
the last e baseness and thus fill · to t h e b nm · th e express them and triumphantly carry them to the
knife, a plate, a bit of food - instinctively and and completely fills the eyes of the spectators with arnorp h ous ' . h confines of the hall. It is obvious that at such a
the most repugnant bastard there is: t e
almost without looking. It is this space, the true the intolerable spectacle of his powerlessness. irnage 0 f pitch, it no longer matters whether the passion is
topus Wrestlers therefore have a
home of blurred and hazy vision, that Cotan's bastar d -0 C · genuine or not. What the public wants is the image
This function of grandiloquence is indeed the same · as peremptory as those of the characters
rigours aim to abolish. And the tendency to ~~~e . . of passion, not passion itself. There is no more a
as that of ancient theatre, whose principle, of the Commedia dell' Arte, who display m
geometrise fulfils another aim, no less severe: to problem of truth in wrestling than in the theatre. In
language and props (masks and buskins) concurred
disavow the painter's work as the source of the advane e , i·n their costumes and attitudes, the future both, what is expected is the intelligible
composition and to re-assign responsibility for its
in the exaggeratedly visible[ ... ]. The gesture of the contents of their parts: just as Pantaloon can n~ver
vanquished wrestler [signifies] to the world a be anything but a ridiculous cuckold, Harleqm~ an representation of moral situations which are
forms elsewhere - to mathematics, not creativity. usually private. This emptying out of interiority to
defeat which, far from disguising, he emphasizes tute servant and the Doctor a stupid pedant, m
In much of still life, the painter first arrays the the benefit of its exterior signs, this exhaustion of
and holds like a pause in music [... ]. [This is] :e same way Thauvin will never be anything but
objects into a satisfactory configuration, and then the content by the form, is the very principle of
meant to signify the tragic mode of the spectacle. an ignoble traitor, Reinieres (a tall blond fellow
uses that arrangement as the basis for the triumphant classical art. [... ]
In wrestling, as on the stage in antiquity, one is not with a limp body and unkempt hair) the moving
composition. But to organise the world pictorially
ashamed of one's suffering, one knows how to cry, image of passivity, Mazaud (short and arrogant like Source: Barthes, 1972a, pp. 16-18.
in this fashion is to impose upon it an order that is
one has a liking for tears. a cock) that of grotesque conceit, and Orsano (an
infinitely inferior to the order already revealed to
the soul through the contemplation of geometric effeminate teddy-boy first seen in a blue-and-pink
Each sign in wrestling is therefore endowed with
form: Cotan's renunciation of composition is a an absolute clarity, since one must always dressing-gown) that, doubly humorous, of a
vindictive salope, or bitch (for I do not think that
further, private act of self-negation. He approaches understand everything on the spot. As soon as the
painting in terms of a discipline, or ritual: always adversaries are in the ring, the public is the public of the Elysee-Montmartre, like Littre,
the same cantarero, which one must assume has believes the word salope to be a masculine).
overwhelmed with the obviousness of the roles. As
been painted in first, as a blank template; always in the theatre, each physical type expresses to The physique of the wrestlers therefore constitutes
the same recurring elements, the light raking at excess the part which has been assigned to the a basic sign, which like a seed contains the whole
forty-five degrees, the same alternation of bright contestant. Thauvin, a fifty-year-old with an obese fight. But this seed proliferates, for it is at every
greens and yellows against the grey ground, the and sagging body, whose type of asexual turn during the fight, in each new situation, that
same scale, the same size of frame. To alter any of hideousness always inspires feminine nicknames the body of the wrestler casts to the public the
these would be to allow too much room for displays in his flesh the characters of baseness ... ' magical entertainment of a temperament which
personal self-assertion, and the pride of creativity; [H]is part is to represent what, in the classical finds its natural expression in a gesture. The
down to its last details the painting must be concept of the salaud, the 'bastard' (the key- different strata of meaning throw light on each
presented as the result of discovery, not invention, concept of any wrestling-match), appears as other, and form the most intelligible of spectacles.
a picture of the work of God that completely effaces organically repugnant. The nausea voluntarily Wrestling is like a diacritic writing: above the
the hand of man (in Cotan visible brushwork would provoked by Thauvin shows therefore a very fundamental meaning of his body, the wrestler
be like blasphemy). extended use of signs: not only is ugliness used arranges comments which are episodic but always
here in order to signify baseness, but in addition opportune, and constantly help the reading of the
Source: Bryson, 1990, pp. 65-70.
ugliness is wholly gathered into a particularly fight by means of gestures, attitudes and mimicry
repulsive quality of matter: the pallid collapse of which make the intention utterly obvious.
68 REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS ANO SIGNIFYING PRACTICES READINGS FOR CHAPTER ONE 69
semiologist no longer needs to ask himself relation of redundancy with the connoted sign of
questions about the composition of the langua the linguistic message (the Italian assonance of the
b' h ge- name Panzani) and the knowledge it draws upon is
o Ject, e no longer has to take into account th
In myth, we find again the tri-dimensional pattern details o~ the linguistic schema; he will only n:ed already more particular; it is a specifically 'French'
which I have just described: the signifier, the ~o know its total term, or global sign, and only knowledge (an Italian would barely perceive the
signified and the sign. But myth is a peculiar masmuch as this term lends itself to myth · Th'lS ls · a Panzani advertisement: some connotation of the name, no more probably than he
we h ave
sys~em, i~ that it is constructed from a semiological why th~ ~emiologist is entitled to treat in the sa:rne j-!ere f sta a tin a sachet, some tomatoes, would the Italianicity of tomato and pepper), based
k ts o pa ' ' on a familiarity with certain tourist stereotypes.
cham which existed before it: it is a second-order way wntmg and pictures: what he retains from pac e ers a mushroom, all emerging from a
·0 ns pepp ' Continuing to explore the image (which is not to
semiological system. That which is a sign (namely them is the fact that they are both signs, that they orll 'en string bag, in yellows and greens on a red
the a.ssociative total of a concept and an image) in both re.ac~ t~e threshold of myth endowed with the half-op d Let us try to 'skim off' the different say that it is not entirely clear at the first glance),
backgroun . . there is no difficulty in discovering at least two
the fust system, becomes a mere signifier in the .same s1gmfymg function, that they constitute on e g es it contams.
JUst as much as the other, a language-object. rnessa other signs: in the first, the serried collection of
second. We must here recall that the materials of
. a e immediately yields a first message different objects transmits the idea of a total
m~th~cal speech (the language itself, photography, Theim gbstance is lmgmst1c;
· · · its
· support s are th e
Source: Barthes, 1972b, pp. 11 4 . 5 . culinary service, on the one hand as though
pamtmg, posters, rituals, objects, etc.), however whose su
. n which is marginal, and the labels, these Panzani furnished everything necessary for a
different at the start, are reduced to a pure capt10
. · ' serted into the natural d'ispos1tion
. . of t h e
carefully balanced dish and on the other as though
signifying function as soon as they are caught by being in
The code from which this message has
myth. Myth sees in them only the same raw scene [··· l · the concentrate in the tin were equivalent to the
en is none other than that of the French natural produce surrounding it; in the other sign,
material; their unity is that they all come down to been t ak . .
language; the only knowledge reqmred to decipher the composition of the image, evoking the memory
the status of a mere language. Whether it deals
. · knowledge of writing and French. In fact, of innumerable alimentary paintings, sends us to
with alphabetical or pictorial writing, myth wants it lS a
this message can itself be further broken down, for an aesthetic signified: the 'nature morte' or, as it is
t~ see in them only a sum of signs, a global sign, the
the sign Panzani gives not simply the name of the better expressed in other languages, the 'still life';
fmal term of a first semiological chain. And it is
firm but also, by its assonance, an additional the knowledge on which this sign depends is
precisely this final term which will become the first
signified, that of 'Italianicity'. The linguistic heavily cultural. [... ]
term of the greater system which it builds and of
message is thus twofold (at least in this particular
which it is only a part. Everything happens as if Source: Barthes, 1977, pp. 33-5.
image): denotational and connotational. Since,
myth shifted the formal system of the first
however, we have here only a single typical sign,
significations sideways. As this lateral shift is
namely that of articulated (written) language, it will
~s~ential for the analysis of myth, I shall represent
be counted as one message.
it m the following way, it being understood, of
course, that the spatialization of the pattern is here Putting aside the linguistic message, we are left
only a metaphor: with the pure image (even if the labels are part of it,
anecdotally). This image straightaway provides a
I Signifier series of discontinuous signs. First (the order is
j 2 Signified
unimportant as these signs are not linear), the idea
Language{ { 3 Sign that what we have in the scene represented is a
MYTH I SIGNIFIER II SIGNIFIED return from the market. A signified which itself
implies two euphoric values: that of the freshness
Ill SIGN of the products and that of the essentially domestic
preparation for which they are destined. Its
signifier is the half-open bag which lets the
It can be seen that in myth there are two provisions spill out over the table, 'unpacked'. To
semi.ological systems, one of which is staggered in read this first sign requires only a knowledge which
relation to the other: a linguistic system, the is in some sort implanted as part of the habits of a
language (or the modes of representation which are very widespread culture where 'shopping around
ass.imilated to it), which I shall call the language- for oneself' is opposed to the hasty stocking up
ob1ect, ~ecause it is the language which myth gets (preserves, refrigerators) of a more 'mechanical'
hold of m order to build its own system; and myth civilization. A second sign is more or less equally
itself, which I shall call metalanguage, because it is evident; its signifier is the bringing together of the
a second language, in which one speaks about the tomato, the pepper and the tricoloured hues
first. When he reflects on a metalanguage, the (yellow, green, red) of the poster; its signified is
Italy or rather Italianicity. This sign stands in a
70 REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES READINGS FOR CHAPTER ONE 71
syst~m of socially constructed rules does not mea. , , say in our terminology, every
11 at lS IO ' . . .
that it thereby ceases to be a physical object. .A [... ] T b d' cursive object is constituted m the
stone exists independently of any system of social .dentity or is . [ ]
l fan action. . · ·
relati~ns, but it is, ~or instance, either a projectile or context o . .
an obJect of aesthetic contemplation only within a roblem to be considered is the followmg:
specific discursive configuration. A diamond in Tb e otber p sume that there is . . t'
a stnct equa 10n
The first of the great European theorists of hysteria
·fwe as
the market or at the bottom of a mine is the same even 1 h social and the discursive, what can we
was Jean-Martin Charcot (1825-1893), who carried
Discourse tween t e f
physical object; but, again, it is only a commodity be t the natural world, about the facts o out his work in the Paris clinic at the Salpetriere.
aboU
[... ]Let us suppose that I am building a wall with within a determinate system of social relations. For saY . biology or astronomy that are not Charcot had begun his work on hysteria in 1870.
bysics, · ful t t l'f
another bricklayer. At a certain moment I ask my that same reason it is the discourse which P parently integrated in meamng . o a I res While he believed that hysterics suffered from a
workmate to pass me a brick and then I add it to the constitutes the subject position of the social agent, ap t d by men? The answer is that natura1 hereditary taint that weakened their nervous
struc e
wall. The first act - asking for the brick - is and not, therefore, the social agent which is the con lso discursive facts. And they are so for
system, he also developed a theory that hysteria
facts are a .
linguistic; the second - adding the brick to the wall origin of discourse - the same system of rules that . le reason that the idea of nature is not had psychological origins. Experimenting with
tbe simP. g that is already there, to be rea d from t h e
-is extralinguistic. Do I exhaust the reality of both makes that spherical object into a football, makes ometh m hypnosis, Charcot demonstrated that hysterical
acts by drawing the distinction between them in me a player. The existence of objects is s ces of things but is itself the result of a
symptoms such as paralysis could be produced and
appearan '
terms of the linguistic/extralinguistic opposition? independent of their discursive articulation [... ]. n d complex historical and social relieved by hypnotic suggestion. Through careful
slow a tion To call something a natura1 ob'1ect is ·
Evidently not, because, despite their differentiation cons tru C . observation, physical examination, and the use of
in those terms, the two actions share something [. .. ]This, however, leaves two problems unsolved. f conceiving it that depends upon a hypnosis, Charcot was able to prove that hysterical
a way O . . .
that allows them to be compared, namely the fact The first is this: is it not necessary to establish here classificatory system. Agam, this does not put mto symptoms, while produced by emotions rather than
that they are both part of a total operation which is a distinction between meaning and action? Even if . on the fact that this entity which we call a
by physical injury, were genuine, and not under the
ques t I d
we accept that the meaning of an action depends on
the building of the wall. So, then, how could we stone exl.sts , in the sense of being present here anconscious control of the patient. Freud, who
characterize this totality of which asking for a brick a discursive configuration, is not the action itself now, independently of my will; nevertheless the studied at the Salpetriere from October 1885 to
and positioning it are, both, partial moments? something different from that meaning? Let us fact of its being a stone depends on a way of February 1886, gave Charcot the credit for
Obviously, if this totality includes both linguistic consider the problem from two angles. Firstly, classifying objects that is historical and contingent.
establishing the legitimacy of hysteria as a disorder.
and non-linguistic elements, it cannot itself be from the angle of meaning. Here the classical If there were no human beings on earth, those According to Freud, 'Charcot's work restored
either linguistic or extralinguistic; it has to be prior distinction is between semantics - dealing with the objects that we call stones would be there dignity to the subject; gradually the sneering
to this distinction. This totality which includes meaning of words; syntactics - dealing with word nonetheless; but they would not be 'stones', attitude which the hysteric could reckon meeting
within itself the linguistic and the non-linguistic, is order and its consequences for meaning; and because there would be neither mineralogy nor a with when she told her story, was given up; she was
what we call discourse. In a moment we will pragmatics - dealing with the way a word is language capable of classifying them and no longer a malingerer, since Charcot had thrown
justify this denomination; but what must be clear actually used in certain speech contexts. The key distinguishing them from other objects. We need the whole weight of his authority on the side of the
from the start is that by discourse we do not mean a point is to what extent a rigid separation can be not stop for long on this point. The entire reality and objectivity of hysterical phenomena.'
combination of speech and writing, but rather that established between semantics and pragmatics - development of contemporary epistemology has Furthermore, Charcot demonstrated that hysterical
speech and writing are themselves but internal that is, between meaning and use. From established that there is no fact that allows its symptoms also occurred in men, and were not
components of discursive totalities. Wittgenstein onwards it is precisely this separation meaning to be read transparently. simply related to the vagaries of the female
which has grown ever more blurred. It has become reproductive system. At the Salpetriere there was
Now, turning to the term discourse itself, we use it increasingly accepted that the meaning of a word is Reference
even a special wing for male hysterics, who were
to emphasize the fact that every social entirely context-dependent. As Hanna Fenichel Pitkin, H.F. (1972) Wittgenstein and Justice,
frequently the victims of trauma from railway
configuration is meaningful. If I kick a spherical Pitkin points out: Berkeley, CA, University of Californa Press.
accidents. In restoring the credibility of the
object in the street or if I kick a ball in a football
hysteric, Freud believed, Charcot had joined other
match, the physical fact is the same, but its Wittgenstein argues that meaning and use are
meaning is different. The object is a football only intimately, inextricably related, because use Source: Laclau and Mouffe, 1990, psychiatric saviors of women and had 'repeated on
to the extent that it establishes a system of relations helps to determine meaning. Meaning is learned pp. 100-103. a small scale the act of liberation commemorated in
the picture of Pinel which adorned the lecture hall
with other objects, and these relations are not given from, and shaped in, instances of use; so both its
of the Salpetriere' (Freud, 1948, p. 18).
by the mere referential materiality of the objects, learning and its configuration depend on
but are, rather, socially constructed. This pragmatics .... Semantic meaning is Yet for Charcot, too, hysteria remained
systematic set of relations is what we call compounded out of cases of a word's use , symbolically, if not medically, a female malady. By
discourse. The reader will no doubt see that, as we including all the many and varied language far the majority of his hysterical patients were
showed in our book, the discursive character of an games that are played with it; so meaning is very women, and several, such as Blanche Wittmann,
object does not, by any means, imply putting its much the product of pragmatics. known as the 'Queen of the Hysterics,' became
existence into question. The fact that a football is celebrities who were regularly featured in his
only a football as long as it is integrated within a (Pitkin, 1972)
books, the main attractions at the Salpetriere's Bal
des Folles, and hypnotized and exhibited at his
72 REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS ANO SIGNIFYING PRACTICES READINGS FOR CHAPTER ONE 73
popular public lectures. Axel Munthe, a doctor Albert Lande, had been brought in to take charge of observed outside of the Parisian clinical setting,
practicing in Paris, wrote a vivid description of a full-fledged photographic service. Its methods many of his contemporaries, as well as subsequent
Charcot's Tuesday lectures at the Salpetriere: 'The included not only the most advanced technology medical historians, have suspected that the
huge amphitheatre was filled to the last place with and apparatus, such as laboratories, a studio With women's performances were the result of
a multicoloured audience drawn from tout Paris, platforms, a bed, screens, black, dark-gray, and suggestion, imitation, or even fraud. I~ Charcot's
authors, journalists, leading actors and actresses, light-gray background curtains, headrests, and an own lifetime, one of his assistants admitted that
fashionable demimondaines.' The hypnotized iron support for feeble patients, but also elaborate some of the women had been coached in order to
women patients put on a spectacular show before adminstrative techniques of observation, selection produce attacks that would please the maitre
this crowd of curiosity seekers. of models, and record-keeping. The photographs of (discussed in Drinker, 1984, PP· 144-8). .
women were published in three volumes called Furthermore, there was a dramatic increase m the
Some of them smelt with delight a bottle of Iconographie photographique de la Salpetriere. incidence of hysteria during Char~ot's ten~re at the
ammonia when told it was rose water, others Thus Charcot's hospital became an environment in Salpetriere. From only 1percentm1845, it ro~e to
would eat a piece of charcoal when presented to which female hysteria was perpetually presented, 17.3 percent of all diagnoses in 18~3, at th: height
them as chocolate. Another would crawl on all represented, and reproduced. of his experimentation with hysterical patients (see
fours on the floor, barking furiously when told Goldstein, 1982, pp. 209-10).
she was a dog, flap her arms as if trying to fly Such techniques appealed to Charcot because his
approach to psychiatric analysis was strongly When challenged about the legitimacy of hystero-
when turned into a pigeon, lift her skirts with a
visual and imagistic. As Freud has explained, epilepsy, however, Charcot vigorously defended
shriek of terror when a glove was thrown at her
Charcot 'had an artistically gifted temperament - as the objectivity of his vision. 'It seems that h!stero-
feet with a suggestion of being a snake. Another
he said himself, he was a 'visuel', a seer.... He was epilepsy only exists in France,' he declar:d m a
would walk with a top hat in her arms rocking it
accustomed to look again and again at things that lecture of 1887, 'and I could even say, as it has
to and fro and kissing it tenderly when she was
told it was her baby. were incomprehensible to him, to deepen his sometimes been said, that it only exists at the
impression of them day by day until suddenly Salpetriere, as if I had created it by the force of my
(Munthe, 1930, pp. 296, 302-3)
understanding of them dawned upon him' (Freud, will. It would be truly marvellous if I were thus
1948, pp. 10-11). Charcot's public lectures were able to create illnesses at the pleasure of my whim
The grand finale would be the performance of a full
hysterical seizure. among the first to use visual aids - pictures, graphs, and my caprice. But as for the truth, I am
statues, models, and illustrations that he drew on absolutely only the photographer; I register wh~t I
Furthermore, the representation of female hysteria the blackboard in colored chalk - as well as the see' (quoted in Didi-Huberman, 1982, p. 32). Like
was a central aspect of Charcot's work. His presence of the patients as models. Hugh Diamond at the Surrey Asylum, C~arc~t.and
hysterical women patients were surrounded by his followers had absolute faith in the scientific
images of female hysteria. In the lecture hall, as The specialty of the house at the Salpetriere was neutrality of the photographic image; Lande .
Freud noted, was Robert-Fleury's painting of Pinel grande hysterie, or 'hystero-epilepsy,' a prolonged boasted: 'La plaque photographique est la vraie
freeing the madwomen. On the opposite wall was a and elaborate convulsive seizure that occurred in retine du savant' ('The photographic plate is the
famous lithograph of Charcot, holding and women. A complete seizure involved three phases: true retina of the scientist') (ibid., P· 35).
lecturing about a swooning and half-undressed the epileptoid phase, in which the woman lost
consciousness and foamed at the mouth; the phase But Charcot's photographs were even more
young woman before a room of sober and attentive
of clownism, involving eccentric physical elaborately framed and staged than Diamond's
men, yet another representation that seemed to be
instructing the hysterical woman in her act contortions; and the phase of attitudes Victorian asylum pictures. Women were not .
[Figure 1.8]. passionnelles, a miming of incidents and emotions simply photographed once, but again and agam, so
from the patient's life. In the iconographies, that they became used to the camera and. to th~
Finally, Charcot's use of photography was the most photographs of this last phase were given subtitles special status they received as photogemc subiects.
extensive in nineteenth-century psychiatric Some made a sort of career out of modeling for the
that suggested Charcot's interpretation of hysterical
practice. As one of his admirers remarked, 'The iconographies. Among the most frequ.ently
gestures as linked to female sexuality, despite his
camera was as crucial to the study of hysteria as the disclaimers: 'amorous supplication', 'ecstasy', photographed was a fifteen-year-old gul named
microscope was to histology' (quoted in Goldstein, eroticism' [Figure 1.10]. This interpretation of FIGURE I. IO Two portraits of Augustine: Augustine, who had entered the hospital in 1875.
1982, p. 215). In 1875 one of his assistants, Paul hysterical gestures as sexual was reinforced by (top) Amorous supplication, (bottom) Ecstasy. Her hysterical attacks had begun at the age of
Regnard, had assembled an album of photographs Charcot's efforts to pinpoint areas of the body that thirteen when, according to her testimony, she had
of female nervous patients. The pictures of women might induce convulsions when pressed. The been raped by her employer, a man wh? was also
exhibiting various phases of hysterical attacks were her mother's lover. Intelligent, coquettish, and
ovarian region, he concluded, was a particularly
deemed so interesting that a photographic sensitive hysterogenic zone. eager to please, Augustine was an apt pupil of the
workshop or atelier was installed within the atelier. All of her poses suggest the exaggerated .
hospital. By the 1880s a professional photographer, Because the behavior of Charcot's hysterical stars gestures of the French classical acting style, or stills
was so theatrical, and because it was rarely
74 REPRESENTATION: CULTURAL REPRESENTATIONS AND SIGNIFYING PRACTICES 75
()
from silent movies. Some photographs of Augustine
with flowing locks and white hospital gown also
References
DIDI-HUBERMAN, G. (1982) Invention de l'Hysterie:
REPRESENTING THE SOCIAL: I
seem to imitate poses in nineteenth-century
paintings, as Stephen Heath points out: 'a young girl
Charcot et l'Iconographie Photographique de La
Salpetriere, Paris, Macula. FRANCE AND FRENCHNESS )>
-c
composed on her bed, something of the Pre-
Raphaelite Millais's painting Ophelia' (Heath, 1982, DRINKER, G. F. (1984) The Birth of Neurosis: myth,
IN POST-WAR HUMANIST -I
pp. 36-7). Among her gifts was her ability to time malady and the Victorians, New York, Simon and
Schuster.
m
and divide her hysterical performances into scenes, :::0
acts, tableaux, and intermissions, to perform on cue FREUD,s. (1948) 'Charcot' in Jones, E. (ed.) Collected
Papers, Vol. 1, London, Hogarth Press.
PHOTOGRAPHY -I
and on schedule with the click of the camera.
But Augustine's cheerful willingness to assume GOLDSTEIN, J. (1982) 'The hysteria diagnosis and the
politics of anticlericalism in late nineteenth-
Peter Hamilton
~
whatever poses her audience desired took its toll
on her psyche. During the period when she was century France', Journal of Modern History, No. 54. 0
being repeatedly photographed, she developed a HEATH, s. (1982) The Sexual Fix, London, Macmillan.
curious hysterical symptom: she began to see MUNTHE, A. (1930) The Story of San Michele, London,
everything in black and white. In 1880, she began John Murray.
to rebel against the hospital regime; she had
periods of violence in which she tore her clothes I. I Dominant paradigms in photography 78
and broke windows. During these angry outbreaks Source: Showalter, 1987, pp. 147-54.
she was anaesthetized with ether or chloroform. In M
June of that year, the doctors gave up their efforts
2.1 Documentary as objective representation 81
with her case, and she was put in a locked cell. But
Augustine was able to use in her own behalf the 2.2 Documentary as subjective interpretation 83
histrionic abilities that for a time had made her a
star of the asylum. Disguising herself as a man, she
managed to escape from the Salpetriere. Nothing
further was ever discovered about her whereabouts.
96
4.1 Elements of the paradigm
The themes and subject-matter of humanistic reportage 102
4.2
107
4.3 La rue - the street
115
4.4 Children and play
119
4.5 The family
124
4.6 Love and lovers
125
4.7 Paris and its sights
C/ochards - homeless and marginal characters 128
4.8
131
4.9 Fetes populaires - fairs and celebrations
135
4.10 Bistro ts
137
4.11 Habitations - housing and housing conditions
139
4.12 Work and craft

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The Open University Kenneth Thompson, Book 6 This book is part of the

Course Team Chair, Author Culture, Media and Identities

The Open University, Walton Hall, Milton Keynes MK7 6AA

SAGE Publications Ltd

Library of Congress catalog card number 96-071228

Edited, designed and typeset by The Open University.

Printed in Great Britain by BPC Digital Information Ltd, Exeter, Devon

The circuit of production

The embodying of concepts, ideas and emotions in a symbolic form which

2. I The social part of language 33

3.1 Myth today 39

4.2 Historicizing discourse: discursive practices 46

4.3 From discourse to power/knowledge 47

4.4 Summary: Foucault and representation SI

4.5 Charcot and the performance of hysteria 52

5.1 How to make sense of Velasquez' Las Meninas 56

We have come a long way in exploring the nature of representation. It is time

Representation is the production of meaning through language. In

writing CHAPTER I THE WORI< OF REPRESENTATION 37

Turn to the short extract from 'Myth today' (Re d. C h

For another example of this two-sta e r . . . .

2 What do they mean? What

d e The painting could be said to capture and represent, visually, a discursive

illnesses, like a:O~::i:d~~~ :~

This approach has radical implications for a theory of representation. For it

Las Meninas to make some gene f .

Producing meaning depends on the practice of interpretation, and .

MACKAY,~· (e~.) (1997) Consumption and Everyday Life, London S /Th

SHOWALTER, E. (1987) The Female Malady, Londo n, v·uago.

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