Social Myths in Literary and Political Texts

This article discusses the common ways in which the concept of myth is perceived and shows that the nature and structure of a myth are functions of the system in which it operates. In Mythologies, Barthes defines myth as a three-dimensional pattern (the signifier, the signified, the sign) built on a second-level semiological method. The element that was a sign in the first method is transformed here into a mere signifier by means of which the myth constructs a new system of its own. Barthes calls this system a stolen because it turns the meaning of the first language into a mere form and lends it a new meaning which now appears as absolute and neutral. Barthes considers such a language typical of bourgeois society, enabling it to depict its situation and historical conditions as universal and ahistorical.