Bleach - Depth Symbology: The Phallus Fallacy
Thoughts On: Bleach (2018)
A boy who can see ghosts is pulled into a world of soul-consuming spirits.
Recently, we spoke about semantic and semiotic readings of film; in essence, about the difference between a symbol and a sign. The central question in this previous post was: When are we right to consider an image knowable? To perceive something as symbolic, to read and analyse a symbol through a Jungian definition, is to assign to it an illusive quality and a depth not entirely accessible. The manifestation of a symbol is then an act of, so to speak, wielding a weapon of unimaginable power. The symbol is autonomous. The sign on the other hand is less a weapon and more a tool; furthermore, less a screw or hammer, more a nail. That is to say that the sign must be considered a known entity, reducible to something tangle or a fact. The sign in this respect has no autonomy and its power is limited. In addition, a sign is often used, like a nail not a hammer, to crystallise, finalise and hold in place meaning; it does not necessarily input meaning by channelling material from an unknown place.
If we were to think about this practically, we would require three exemplar perspectives of one object; we shall use a chess board and its pieces. Perceived as a set of signs most simply, the black and white pieces and squares on a chess board simply indicate what is one player's and not another's. Seen as a more complex set of signs, the chess pieces may reflect hierarchy in society, the act of war and the process of sacrificing what is most expendable to save what is least expendable. Perceived symbolically, however, chess pieces may be seen to reflect the movement between black and white, positive and negative; a great shifting as archetypes of human autonomy strategically map their way through stratified, regulated existence. In our first example, the chess board is merely an object that uses shades as unambiguous rules. The second example sees the chess board become a mimetic expression of a real and tangible world. Finally, the chess board is seen to become a mimetic expression of abstract rules and movements in a supra-real realm. What reading is correct and which is most functional?
In my estimation, all three readings are to some degree 'correct'. Analysis of this sort is not at all scientific. As opposed to parsing out objective fact, this analysis often seeks to speak of lyrospophy - a feeling of fact and knowledge. Important here is then the manifestation of a resonant description (one that, in short, speaks to a reader/audience) based upon the broadest and most detailed analysis of the object in question. Correct artistic analysis, the act of literary, visual or cinematic critique for example, is then best judged by the scope and detail of what is described and how deeply this resonates with a sense of fact. In our above examples, we could call into question the veracity of our conclusions due to their limited description of what a chess board actually is and how the game of chess works. If this was described in sufficient depth before a semantic or symbolic reading is made (one that logically engages all of the described attributes of the game and board), then the description could be considered far more valid and possibly 'correct'. 'Correct' filmic analysis would then be able to engage every significant element of the narrative content (characters, plot, themes, etc) and form (cinematic language, set design, cinematography, etc). In addition to this, context (the film's place in time, culture and art) may also be perceived as imperative. Such begins to answer the first part of our question; a semantic or semiotic reading may be correct if performed well. After all, a well-executed piece of analysis would be logically concrete.
Because this practise is not scientific, there remains an issue that will always problematise an analysis' 'correctness'. The conflict being alluded to here concerns, so often, a definition of not just an object, but the realm in which it exists. Let us return now to the chess game. If one wants to learn the game of chess and win, it may not be necessary to analyse the game as more than black and white pieces that are yours and mine. A complete description of what each piece on the board is, what its abilities are and how they interplay with the general rules of the game are, is then most functional and optimal for a player. However, what if we put the chess board in a narrative or a film? It is now that the other two readings become slightly more relevant. Our second kind of reading, the semantic analysis of chess pieces as representations of hierarchy, may be considered most functional if our perception of what cinema is based in certain mimetic presuppositions. That is to say, if we believe cinema relates directly to the real world, then so must our analysis of the chess game. We can see such analysis put on display here:
In this analysis of chess in film, chess is so often analysed as a simile, as like something else; like a boxing match or fight, a battle of wits or drug trade. When perceived metaphorically chess pieces are perceived as representing something; mutants or a robots' superiority or a drug dealer's inferiority. Each of these analytical approaches are based upon the presupposition that film is a mimetic expression of tangible, known entities. Whether or not the critic at hand believes this or not is slightly irrelevant as his analysis unambiguously projects this assumption. This means that there is no symbolic reading available here; no consideration of chess as an expression of something unknown and unknowable.
We can zoom in here on the representation of chess in Harry Potter. The above analysis suggests that chess is used to represent sacrifice. This semantic reading may give way to a semiotic one if sacrifice itself is brought into question. What exactly is the function of sacrifice in this scene; in the Harry Potter films more generally? The key motivation for this scene is Harry's belief that Snape is evil and is trying to revive Voldemort. The game requires Ron to sacrifice his pawn (put himself in grave danger) both for Harry and society more generally. This sacrifice is then one of friendship and the greater good. Alas, as the final films of the series indicate, Snape is not evil and would not have been trying to revive Voldemort. This drastically changes what this scene is about. This sees three friends unknowingly risk their lives, in essence, for one another; for Harry. This is less about a literal greater good and more an expression of good-hearted naivety. The black horse that Ron rides may be symbolic of just this; it is black as to represent his unknowing movement against what he thinks is the truth (light; white); the horse also represents a mastery of fear, his mounting the creature symbolising heroism and his position as a knight to Harry as king. The game of chess more generally here is used to reveal something abstract about positions of knowledge and ignorance being undermined by fate of some sort; the hero's destiny being fortified by self-sacrifice, the accumulation of friends and the process of individuation. It would take thousands more words to accurately and 'correctly' present such analysis, but here we have alluded to a symbolic reading that is not present in the above semantic reading. This symbolic reading is attached not to the assumption that film is a memetic expression of tangible things - such as an act of self-sacrifice. This analysis requires a movement beyond the tangible and knowable, into the purpose and place of fate and heroism.
We arrive at a conundrum when we again ask what is most functional. We have suggested that functionality is dependent on a definition of context - for example, one's philosophy of cinematic representation. However, contextual judgements may also be debated. Our debate between cinema as an expression of known or unknown mimesis is a difficult one. Because cinema is of most interest to us here, we shall then stick with this.
I came upon this subject when watching this year's Bleach. This live action adaptation of an anime is about a boy who can see ghosts one day being confronted by a soul eating monster. To defeat this monster, the boy is transformed into a Soul Reaper and in the process is ordained a sword. This sword is unusually huge, but such is explained through some rather awful exposition rather quickly: the sword is so big because his soul density (or something to that effect - forgive me for not remembering accurately) is so high. I snickered somewhat involuntarily after hearing this, immediately perceiving the sword to be a sign representing a phallus.
Upon reflection and in paying attention to the film, I grew rather suspicious of this reactionary reading. The analysis of sword as phallus is all too common, and seems descendent from a few different sources. The colloquial idea of a 'pissing' or 'dick measuring' contest is clearly an allusion to confrontations of masculine egos. Freud formalised this idea with his theory of repressed sexuality, which seemingly provides the foundations for post-structural theories - such as Derrida's phallogocentrism - and their often Feminist applications in film theory through key figures such as Laura Mulvey. From Freud to Derrida to Mulvey, we see the idea of masculine posturing transformed into a social theory that comes to reduce alleged signs of the phallus to signifiers of patriarchal oppression, the unjustified assignment of meaning to the masculine and its power as well as unconscious repression. This view of the world, popular as it seems to be in film criticism, is pretty dismal. If we map this reading onto Bleach, the sword is a sign that emphasises the emergence of a masculine hero that will overcome and dictate what was previously a female heroine (a female soul reaper gives him her powers); its size an unabashed glorification of the oppressive order that logos dictates. Such is all presided over by the loss of the boy's mother; he believed he could protect her from the evils of the world, but failed and so seeks to destroy reflections of the masculine self as to secure repressed sexual relations with the female soul reaper as a surrogate mother; a basic Oedipal complex emerges. This semantic reading is rather dizzying.
The essential issue I have with this kind of reading is the manner in which it perceives film to be a mimetic expression. Not only is this supposed to be an expression of a known world, of real figures, culture and history, but this is a reflection of the world as socially constructed and dictated by forces in the masculine unconscious mind. It is not very necessary that we delve deeply into a debate on social construction. With the presupposition that knowledge and fact are not born of the human mind, that reality is not contrived or rendered unintelligible by perception and subjectivity, I believe in both known and unknown mimesis functioning in parallel with one another. We have discussed this with a theory of how cinema works...
Central in this conception of how cinema manifests is the relationship between consciousness, unconsciousness and what may be called Tao. Film is not singularly a manifestation of either consciousness or unconsciousness in my conception; one does not choose a selection of signs with which to code a coherent narrative, nor do signs only arise out of the personal unconscious and repressed desires. Narrative arises from some essential nature transcendent of the individual. Vesicles of this unknown essence, symbols, rise through unconsciousness like vapour that is sculpted into spacetime structures by consciousness. In this sense, the symbol has a key relationship with the sign; a sign is a product of consciousness whereas symbols rise from below.
Without falling too far down this line of thought, we may come back to Bleach and the phallus. True it may be that the sign of the phallus is a key representation of masculinity, masculinity is not subservient to the phallus literally or by Freudian definitions. The deepest Freud delves into the unconscious mind is, in my belief, with his theory of Eros and Thanatos. This is the compulsion to survive and drive to die that seemingly sit at the very bottom of human nature. From these two entities emerges sexuality, violence, persona and self-consciousness; key elements of all Freudian theory. So, what Freud seems to suggest with this theory of death and survival is that all humans do is to survive optimally; his juxtaposition of life and death then circumscribe certain conditions for survival and suggest that the human desire to exist in pleasure (which can at times be sadomasochistic) is most imperative. I am in agreement with Freud on this point, but this such not the absolute basis for human existence. Perceiving pleasureful existence to be all we seek leads to a highly corruptible vision of humanity. Humans are indeed highly corruptible, but this is not all we are. There is resolve and solidarity beneath this. Such is what Jung introduces by digging deeper into the unconscious and revealing a universe below our feet. For Jung, a universal order emerges through the collective unconscious. The collective unconscious complexifies the idea that humans seek pleasureful existence; this may be a personally unconscious and conscious goal, but our fundamental motivations are unknown to us. An unknown - possibly benevolent and moral - nature dictates that we seek pleasureful existence in the ways we do. This characterises our actions as ambiguously meaningful, an expression of some benevolent, higher way.
Let us try to map this onto Bleach by seeing the sword as not a sign emergent from unconsciousness, but a symbol emergent from somewhere below. We must do this by stepping into the presupposed sign of the phallus. Indeed, the phallus is not just masculine corruption and patriarchal, sexual domination. The phallus is an expression of masculinity in the most abstract sense. Taoists would define masculinity via yang; it is penetrating light in darkness, a positive equal to an antithetical negative. If the large sword is symbolic of this ambiguous yang, then it does, indeed, represent the emergence of powerful masculinity, but this need not be coded with ideas of dominance, ego and corruption. We are told that Ichigo's sword is so big because of the quality that his soul possesses. Jung very loosely describes femininity as the anima, as the soul. And indeed, a key characteristic of Ichgo is his mother, an ideal image of femininity: the anima. It then makes sense that we characterise Ichigo's soul as feminine as a major element of his character is his mother. It is this that strengthens him and, as discussed, motivates his heroism; it is the strength of his anima that manifests a large sword - a non-sexual conception of the phallus. The sword is then a device that leads Ichigo on a path towards individuation, a process of integrating many varying archetypes into his Self.
Far more detailed, indeed, more 'correct', analysis would strengthen this argument. Alas, the point I mean to make simply concerns the functionality of semantic and semiotic analysis. As we saw with the chess example, semantic and symbolic readings can be functional, can indeed coexist without much conflict. There are times when symbolic analysis in unnecessary and even damaging or dangerous - this is often the case when a piece of work is forcibly read, or is semiotically mundane and so does not strive to access profound meaning, or rather does mean to, but only manages to provide a conscious dissertation without cohesive links to something beyond the tangible, said and literal. Semiotic reading can then be curtailed by the depth of a work in question and the abilities of the analyst. Semantic readings on the other hand are usually rather accessible. The danger of semantic analysis, however, is its unwillingness to go down into imagery and its proclivity to, in essence, spread out; to draw conclusions from something identified as certain and then pull this meaning through multidisciplinary analysis. Semantic reading, in my estimation, functions best when it is treated almost scientifically. The goal of this kind of analysis is not to speak directly on lyrosophy, but primarily to contextualise and historicise. However, whilst all works may be read in such a way, the analyst takes on some of the greatest responsibility here for it is not only their textual analysis and understanding of their own experience that is called into question, but the veracity of their facts, contextualisation and their application/association.
Ideally, the most correct and functional analysis can be altogether semantic and symbolic. What is important to recognise, however, is that the symbolic goes deeper than the semantic. If truth is found at a deeper level than human consciousness or personal unconsciousness, there is an implication that semiotic readings should dictate the shape of semantic analysis to some degree - that the latter should agree with the former. If narrative is not, in effect, a social construct, but a subjective lens towards objective, illusive truth, then the symbolic must be primary; for any analysis to be fully detailed, it requires not just scope, but depth, a grounding of signs in more complex symbology. We see the necessity of this with the all too common phallus fallacy; anything shaped like a penis and/or connected to masculinity being reduced to political, Freudian readings with foundations in consciousness and repressed unconsciousness.
With this, outlined, I leave things with you. What are your thoughts on all we've covered today?
Previous post:
End Of The Week Shorts #86
Next post:
Headshot - Mixed
More from me:
amazon.com/author/danielslack
A boy who can see ghosts is pulled into a world of soul-consuming spirits.
Recently, we spoke about semantic and semiotic readings of film; in essence, about the difference between a symbol and a sign. The central question in this previous post was: When are we right to consider an image knowable? To perceive something as symbolic, to read and analyse a symbol through a Jungian definition, is to assign to it an illusive quality and a depth not entirely accessible. The manifestation of a symbol is then an act of, so to speak, wielding a weapon of unimaginable power. The symbol is autonomous. The sign on the other hand is less a weapon and more a tool; furthermore, less a screw or hammer, more a nail. That is to say that the sign must be considered a known entity, reducible to something tangle or a fact. The sign in this respect has no autonomy and its power is limited. In addition, a sign is often used, like a nail not a hammer, to crystallise, finalise and hold in place meaning; it does not necessarily input meaning by channelling material from an unknown place.
If we were to think about this practically, we would require three exemplar perspectives of one object; we shall use a chess board and its pieces. Perceived as a set of signs most simply, the black and white pieces and squares on a chess board simply indicate what is one player's and not another's. Seen as a more complex set of signs, the chess pieces may reflect hierarchy in society, the act of war and the process of sacrificing what is most expendable to save what is least expendable. Perceived symbolically, however, chess pieces may be seen to reflect the movement between black and white, positive and negative; a great shifting as archetypes of human autonomy strategically map their way through stratified, regulated existence. In our first example, the chess board is merely an object that uses shades as unambiguous rules. The second example sees the chess board become a mimetic expression of a real and tangible world. Finally, the chess board is seen to become a mimetic expression of abstract rules and movements in a supra-real realm. What reading is correct and which is most functional?
In my estimation, all three readings are to some degree 'correct'. Analysis of this sort is not at all scientific. As opposed to parsing out objective fact, this analysis often seeks to speak of lyrospophy - a feeling of fact and knowledge. Important here is then the manifestation of a resonant description (one that, in short, speaks to a reader/audience) based upon the broadest and most detailed analysis of the object in question. Correct artistic analysis, the act of literary, visual or cinematic critique for example, is then best judged by the scope and detail of what is described and how deeply this resonates with a sense of fact. In our above examples, we could call into question the veracity of our conclusions due to their limited description of what a chess board actually is and how the game of chess works. If this was described in sufficient depth before a semantic or symbolic reading is made (one that logically engages all of the described attributes of the game and board), then the description could be considered far more valid and possibly 'correct'. 'Correct' filmic analysis would then be able to engage every significant element of the narrative content (characters, plot, themes, etc) and form (cinematic language, set design, cinematography, etc). In addition to this, context (the film's place in time, culture and art) may also be perceived as imperative. Such begins to answer the first part of our question; a semantic or semiotic reading may be correct if performed well. After all, a well-executed piece of analysis would be logically concrete.
Because this practise is not scientific, there remains an issue that will always problematise an analysis' 'correctness'. The conflict being alluded to here concerns, so often, a definition of not just an object, but the realm in which it exists. Let us return now to the chess game. If one wants to learn the game of chess and win, it may not be necessary to analyse the game as more than black and white pieces that are yours and mine. A complete description of what each piece on the board is, what its abilities are and how they interplay with the general rules of the game are, is then most functional and optimal for a player. However, what if we put the chess board in a narrative or a film? It is now that the other two readings become slightly more relevant. Our second kind of reading, the semantic analysis of chess pieces as representations of hierarchy, may be considered most functional if our perception of what cinema is based in certain mimetic presuppositions. That is to say, if we believe cinema relates directly to the real world, then so must our analysis of the chess game. We can see such analysis put on display here:
In this analysis of chess in film, chess is so often analysed as a simile, as like something else; like a boxing match or fight, a battle of wits or drug trade. When perceived metaphorically chess pieces are perceived as representing something; mutants or a robots' superiority or a drug dealer's inferiority. Each of these analytical approaches are based upon the presupposition that film is a mimetic expression of tangible, known entities. Whether or not the critic at hand believes this or not is slightly irrelevant as his analysis unambiguously projects this assumption. This means that there is no symbolic reading available here; no consideration of chess as an expression of something unknown and unknowable.
We can zoom in here on the representation of chess in Harry Potter. The above analysis suggests that chess is used to represent sacrifice. This semantic reading may give way to a semiotic one if sacrifice itself is brought into question. What exactly is the function of sacrifice in this scene; in the Harry Potter films more generally? The key motivation for this scene is Harry's belief that Snape is evil and is trying to revive Voldemort. The game requires Ron to sacrifice his pawn (put himself in grave danger) both for Harry and society more generally. This sacrifice is then one of friendship and the greater good. Alas, as the final films of the series indicate, Snape is not evil and would not have been trying to revive Voldemort. This drastically changes what this scene is about. This sees three friends unknowingly risk their lives, in essence, for one another; for Harry. This is less about a literal greater good and more an expression of good-hearted naivety. The black horse that Ron rides may be symbolic of just this; it is black as to represent his unknowing movement against what he thinks is the truth (light; white); the horse also represents a mastery of fear, his mounting the creature symbolising heroism and his position as a knight to Harry as king. The game of chess more generally here is used to reveal something abstract about positions of knowledge and ignorance being undermined by fate of some sort; the hero's destiny being fortified by self-sacrifice, the accumulation of friends and the process of individuation. It would take thousands more words to accurately and 'correctly' present such analysis, but here we have alluded to a symbolic reading that is not present in the above semantic reading. This symbolic reading is attached not to the assumption that film is a memetic expression of tangible things - such as an act of self-sacrifice. This analysis requires a movement beyond the tangible and knowable, into the purpose and place of fate and heroism.
We arrive at a conundrum when we again ask what is most functional. We have suggested that functionality is dependent on a definition of context - for example, one's philosophy of cinematic representation. However, contextual judgements may also be debated. Our debate between cinema as an expression of known or unknown mimesis is a difficult one. Because cinema is of most interest to us here, we shall then stick with this.
I came upon this subject when watching this year's Bleach. This live action adaptation of an anime is about a boy who can see ghosts one day being confronted by a soul eating monster. To defeat this monster, the boy is transformed into a Soul Reaper and in the process is ordained a sword. This sword is unusually huge, but such is explained through some rather awful exposition rather quickly: the sword is so big because his soul density (or something to that effect - forgive me for not remembering accurately) is so high. I snickered somewhat involuntarily after hearing this, immediately perceiving the sword to be a sign representing a phallus.
Upon reflection and in paying attention to the film, I grew rather suspicious of this reactionary reading. The analysis of sword as phallus is all too common, and seems descendent from a few different sources. The colloquial idea of a 'pissing' or 'dick measuring' contest is clearly an allusion to confrontations of masculine egos. Freud formalised this idea with his theory of repressed sexuality, which seemingly provides the foundations for post-structural theories - such as Derrida's phallogocentrism - and their often Feminist applications in film theory through key figures such as Laura Mulvey. From Freud to Derrida to Mulvey, we see the idea of masculine posturing transformed into a social theory that comes to reduce alleged signs of the phallus to signifiers of patriarchal oppression, the unjustified assignment of meaning to the masculine and its power as well as unconscious repression. This view of the world, popular as it seems to be in film criticism, is pretty dismal. If we map this reading onto Bleach, the sword is a sign that emphasises the emergence of a masculine hero that will overcome and dictate what was previously a female heroine (a female soul reaper gives him her powers); its size an unabashed glorification of the oppressive order that logos dictates. Such is all presided over by the loss of the boy's mother; he believed he could protect her from the evils of the world, but failed and so seeks to destroy reflections of the masculine self as to secure repressed sexual relations with the female soul reaper as a surrogate mother; a basic Oedipal complex emerges. This semantic reading is rather dizzying.
The essential issue I have with this kind of reading is the manner in which it perceives film to be a mimetic expression. Not only is this supposed to be an expression of a known world, of real figures, culture and history, but this is a reflection of the world as socially constructed and dictated by forces in the masculine unconscious mind. It is not very necessary that we delve deeply into a debate on social construction. With the presupposition that knowledge and fact are not born of the human mind, that reality is not contrived or rendered unintelligible by perception and subjectivity, I believe in both known and unknown mimesis functioning in parallel with one another. We have discussed this with a theory of how cinema works...
Central in this conception of how cinema manifests is the relationship between consciousness, unconsciousness and what may be called Tao. Film is not singularly a manifestation of either consciousness or unconsciousness in my conception; one does not choose a selection of signs with which to code a coherent narrative, nor do signs only arise out of the personal unconscious and repressed desires. Narrative arises from some essential nature transcendent of the individual. Vesicles of this unknown essence, symbols, rise through unconsciousness like vapour that is sculpted into spacetime structures by consciousness. In this sense, the symbol has a key relationship with the sign; a sign is a product of consciousness whereas symbols rise from below.
Without falling too far down this line of thought, we may come back to Bleach and the phallus. True it may be that the sign of the phallus is a key representation of masculinity, masculinity is not subservient to the phallus literally or by Freudian definitions. The deepest Freud delves into the unconscious mind is, in my belief, with his theory of Eros and Thanatos. This is the compulsion to survive and drive to die that seemingly sit at the very bottom of human nature. From these two entities emerges sexuality, violence, persona and self-consciousness; key elements of all Freudian theory. So, what Freud seems to suggest with this theory of death and survival is that all humans do is to survive optimally; his juxtaposition of life and death then circumscribe certain conditions for survival and suggest that the human desire to exist in pleasure (which can at times be sadomasochistic) is most imperative. I am in agreement with Freud on this point, but this such not the absolute basis for human existence. Perceiving pleasureful existence to be all we seek leads to a highly corruptible vision of humanity. Humans are indeed highly corruptible, but this is not all we are. There is resolve and solidarity beneath this. Such is what Jung introduces by digging deeper into the unconscious and revealing a universe below our feet. For Jung, a universal order emerges through the collective unconscious. The collective unconscious complexifies the idea that humans seek pleasureful existence; this may be a personally unconscious and conscious goal, but our fundamental motivations are unknown to us. An unknown - possibly benevolent and moral - nature dictates that we seek pleasureful existence in the ways we do. This characterises our actions as ambiguously meaningful, an expression of some benevolent, higher way.
Let us try to map this onto Bleach by seeing the sword as not a sign emergent from unconsciousness, but a symbol emergent from somewhere below. We must do this by stepping into the presupposed sign of the phallus. Indeed, the phallus is not just masculine corruption and patriarchal, sexual domination. The phallus is an expression of masculinity in the most abstract sense. Taoists would define masculinity via yang; it is penetrating light in darkness, a positive equal to an antithetical negative. If the large sword is symbolic of this ambiguous yang, then it does, indeed, represent the emergence of powerful masculinity, but this need not be coded with ideas of dominance, ego and corruption. We are told that Ichigo's sword is so big because of the quality that his soul possesses. Jung very loosely describes femininity as the anima, as the soul. And indeed, a key characteristic of Ichgo is his mother, an ideal image of femininity: the anima. It then makes sense that we characterise Ichigo's soul as feminine as a major element of his character is his mother. It is this that strengthens him and, as discussed, motivates his heroism; it is the strength of his anima that manifests a large sword - a non-sexual conception of the phallus. The sword is then a device that leads Ichigo on a path towards individuation, a process of integrating many varying archetypes into his Self.
Far more detailed, indeed, more 'correct', analysis would strengthen this argument. Alas, the point I mean to make simply concerns the functionality of semantic and semiotic analysis. As we saw with the chess example, semantic and symbolic readings can be functional, can indeed coexist without much conflict. There are times when symbolic analysis in unnecessary and even damaging or dangerous - this is often the case when a piece of work is forcibly read, or is semiotically mundane and so does not strive to access profound meaning, or rather does mean to, but only manages to provide a conscious dissertation without cohesive links to something beyond the tangible, said and literal. Semiotic reading can then be curtailed by the depth of a work in question and the abilities of the analyst. Semantic readings on the other hand are usually rather accessible. The danger of semantic analysis, however, is its unwillingness to go down into imagery and its proclivity to, in essence, spread out; to draw conclusions from something identified as certain and then pull this meaning through multidisciplinary analysis. Semantic reading, in my estimation, functions best when it is treated almost scientifically. The goal of this kind of analysis is not to speak directly on lyrosophy, but primarily to contextualise and historicise. However, whilst all works may be read in such a way, the analyst takes on some of the greatest responsibility here for it is not only their textual analysis and understanding of their own experience that is called into question, but the veracity of their facts, contextualisation and their application/association.
Ideally, the most correct and functional analysis can be altogether semantic and symbolic. What is important to recognise, however, is that the symbolic goes deeper than the semantic. If truth is found at a deeper level than human consciousness or personal unconsciousness, there is an implication that semiotic readings should dictate the shape of semantic analysis to some degree - that the latter should agree with the former. If narrative is not, in effect, a social construct, but a subjective lens towards objective, illusive truth, then the symbolic must be primary; for any analysis to be fully detailed, it requires not just scope, but depth, a grounding of signs in more complex symbology. We see the necessity of this with the all too common phallus fallacy; anything shaped like a penis and/or connected to masculinity being reduced to political, Freudian readings with foundations in consciousness and repressed unconsciousness.
With this, outlined, I leave things with you. What are your thoughts on all we've covered today?
Previous post:
End Of The Week Shorts #86
Next post:
Headshot - Mixed
More from me:
amazon.com/author/danielslack
