PATRICIA ANNE ROSS

THE SEMANTICS OF « WILDERNESS »

Myths, according to Roland Barthes, are constructed to appear natural and necessary to the culture that creates them. They appear this way, he argues, to hide aIl of the ugly « isms »-racism, elitism, nativism-that are part of a bourgeoisie capitalistic culture. Put more simply, myth is a reality that we aIl agree to be true so that we can order our chaotic world. However, one cannot ever forget that myths are an agreed upon reality. There is no truth with a « T, » no universality anywhere in myth, and no one recognized this more clearly than Barthes. His seminal work « Myth Today, » while it was written 45 years ago, offers a methodology of reading that carefully delineates how myths are constructed rhetorically. He taught us how to read text as myth and myth as text. Through Barthes’ work, we can apprehend the « cultural symbology » as a rhetorical construct without entirely denigrating its power.

The Barthian system of mythic speech, because it is so precise, needs to be defined carefully. Barthes argues first and foremost that « myth is a system of communication, » and anything can be co-opted into this special form of speech. It is not an object. Ir certainly is never « sacred » no matter how hard its speaker would like it to be that way. It is a « mode of signification, a form, » and this form can be anything ranging from a literary figure to an advertisement . As a form, myth is « not defined by the object of its message, but by the way in which it utters this message »; the actual semantics are far more informative than the object itself because it is at the level of the actual text that myth shows itself to be an act of language.

Language. of course, is a mode of signification. Barthes, with the help of Ferdinand Sausseure, taught us that language contains signifiers and signifieds, and the two, being always in play together, form signs. Myth, however, is not exactly like spoken language; it is what Barthes calls a « second order semilogical system ». Myth is a kind of spider’s web in that it entraps the first order of signification. It is a « peculiar system, » Barthes says, because it cornes out of the prior semiological chain of language. Whereas the first chain of signifier/signified/sign is completely arbitrary in the meaning that is formed, the second order system of myth is not. It is motivated and appropriative, and by that Barthes means that mythic speech appropriates the contingent meaning of the first order sign but then immediately hides this fact so that meaning is made to appear « natural » or universal.

To use Barthes’ example: there is a French soldier who happens to be black who appears on the front of Paris-Match. He is saluting; eye’s uplifted, possibly toward the French Flag. The « natural » meaning of this black soldier, according to the rules of mythic signification, is that the France has all her sons faithfully serving the « Great Empire. » But the black soldier also illustrates how myth is motivated because it is clearly set up as a way to show those opposed to colonialism that the zeal of this one black soldier in serving his « so-called oppressors » proves them wrong. Forms are appropriated by myth; in this case the form of the black French soldier is co-opted by the myth of French imperialist superiority to make that superiority seem completely natura!.
Translating this to the wilderness myth, a Toyota SUV is parked on top of a mesa that it could not have possibly climbed. The message is motivated by the myth’s insistence that wilderness is meant to be both a place of escape and a space to be conquered, and so the ridiculously perched SUV seems completely in its element. Ir has a right to be there, naturally. Or, to use an even more insidious form, take the seemingly endless documentaries on Yellowstone and Yosemite. Inevitably, the National Parks are made to seem glorious, endless, wild, magnificent, sublime. They are the garden of plenty, the rugged frightening wilderness on which our great country is founded. The mythic formation of the National Parks is also highly motivated to hide the bloodshed and cultural destruction that took place in order ta main tain mat grandness. And when the Native Americans to whom I refer are actually spoken of, they become co-opted by the wilderness myth. Instead of their own entity with their own specific histories, all Native Americans become the « noble savage » who are noble because they have a sacred relationship to the land that we can then emulate in our own mythic formulations of wilderness.

Barthes describes the way in which myth does this in what he calls the « spatialization of the pattern ». For clarity, I will reproduce his diagram:







As the diagram indicates, the sign in the first (language) system becomes the signifier in the second. The mythic signifiers are the language itself, advertisements, photography, rituals, anything that is a sign in the first system that can be taken over by the second.
For clarity, Barthes then renames the terms of the second order system to illustrate primarily the important ambiguity of which the mythic signifier partakes. The sign, the final term in the first system, he renames meaning so that it can be differentiated from the mythic form. ln the second order system, the sign becomes the form. Once meaning and form are clarified, the other terms are rather easily renamed. The signified in the second system, because it lacks any ambiguity, is renamed the concept. He then designates the third term, the mythic sign, signification because to keep it as sign, the third term of the linguistic system, enters in the ambiguity of the linguistic sign and the mythic signifier. Barthes further notes that signification is the apt term since « myth has a double function: it points out and it notifies, it makes us understand something and it imposes it on us ». ln other words, it signifies. To revisit the above example: National Parks contain the concept of the American wilderness, filled with the artifacts, or forms, of wilderness, (nature devoid of the marks of civilization-houses, lawns, mailboxes) and all the forms, filled with the concept of wilderness, are then made to signify « wilderness » which is not the material but the myth of wilderness.

Barthes also carefully defines the way in which these terms work together. The two terms that comprise the mythic signifier, meaning and form are first and foremost ambiguous because it is « full on one side and empty on the other ». As meaning, the « sign » of the linguistic system, is « full » because it has a « richness in it, » it has retained its own value. It « belongs to a history, » the black soldier for example, which contains all the messy contingencies of lived history. Barthes explains that the « meaning is already complete, it postulates a kind of knowledge, a past, a memory, a comparative order of facts, ideas, decisions ». As form, the mythic signifier is a parasitic entity that has put meaning at a distance; the history that is present in all its fullness in meaning has been drained out of the form. So when meaning leaves all the contingencies of its own specific and rich history behind, it becomes a mythic form. As such, all the specificity of the one image, trope, etc., present in the meaning is not attendant in the form. By emptying the mythic sign of its meaning, myth succeeds in making itself appear to be universal. ln order to free the picture of the black soldier so that he can partake in a mythic idea of French imperialism, one has to make the biography of the individual who is posing for that picture unimportant. ln order to make the SUV partake of the universality of modern American « wilderness, » the manufacturing details or the specific purpose of that particular vehicle is forgotten.

The form empties itself of all contingencies and histories for a specific reason: « this history which drains out of the form will be wholly absorbed by the concept ». The form, void of specificity, is now impoverished, waiting to be filled with a mythic kind of history that meaning is no longer able to provide. The mythic signified, the concept, absorbs all the history, the meaning, that drained from the form. ln terms of the black French soldier, the image as form is isolated and impoverished. The image as concept, however, is full of French imperialism, or even, as Barthes says, full of the whole of French history: its general history, to the colonial adventures, to the present difficulties. Barthes clarifies the concept this way: « what is invested in the çgncept is less reality than a certain knowledge of reality » meaning we have . a knowingness that this construction is »true, » even though we often forget that it is we who, by consensus, make it « true. » But the mythic concept does not contain the rich exigencies of history. Barthes explains that the mythical concept is in fact confused knowledge, a perplexed kind of history. For it is not the history contained in the meaning; rather, it is made of yielding, shapeless associations so that it can be « appropriated » by any given audience to form the « truth » that audience wants to create in that particular moment. As Barthes explains: « French imperiality must appeal to such and such group of readers and not another ». The sacredness of wilderness exemplified by the National Parks appeals to environmentally minded Americans and not to those whose livelihood depends on cutting down its trees. But conversely, wilderness as a mythic concept can also be co-opted by those same lumber companies by intoning a different association of wilderness, the one that conjures images of gardens of plenty that are there for the taking.

Of course, a signified has an unlimited supply of signifiers, both in linguistics and in myth. A mythical concept, because it is not a specific history, has an endless mass of forms with which to use. Barthes states the equation this way: while the form is qualitatively empty, the concept is qualitatively full; conversely, while the form is quantitatively full, the concept is quantitatively empty. ln other words, the form, while it can supply endless numbers to the signification, it is a « repository of rarefled meaning » which makes it empty. ln terms of the concept, there is only a small number of them but these concepts are « open to the whole of History », meaning that the concept can take any form, anywhere and at anytime, and imbue that form with the idea the concept is imparting.

Because mythic concepts are so pervasive, Barthes insists that only a neologism can adequately name a mythic concept. ln this case, the signification of our myth in question is « wilderness, » but to use Barthes’ construction, the concept is more aptly named something like « wildernessity’ which, literally translated, is the conception of wilderness. There is a myriad of forms associated with « wilderness »: the garden of plenty, wild open spaces, the frontiersman, the pioneer, its feel of wild wickedness and evil, its sacredness. Without the concept to flll them, each of these forms does not necessarily constitute the mythic wilderness. But. when the form is taken over and fllled by « wildernessity, » the two together form the signification « wilderness. »

It is the way in which the form plays against the concept in a narrative that allows a text to reveal its semantic secrets. Barthes’ methodology opens up the various ways in which the American writer of the 1920’s and 1930’s looks at the wilderness. It allows us to unlock the complexities of « wilderness » that arise as these writers grapple with this long standing and favorite myth as their culture is looking both to the past for solace and to the frightening and unknown future of technology. Barthes makes it very dear that while we have these tools to unlock the mysteries of myth, not all purveyors of myth look on the function of myth in the same way. Sorne writers simply refuse to be forward looking; they look at myth as a panacea for the ills facing the 20th century. Sorne writers see the future with technology as rather bleak, but instead of flnding solace in myths, as does the flrst writer, this second type sees myth as an impostor. To these writers, myth is the exact opposite of a cure-all; myth is rather a part of the poison that has helped create the bleak state in which they flnd themselves. Thus these second type of writers code into their texts the way to deconstruct the difference between the form and the meaning, a way to decode the cultural insistence on the concept. Finally, there are those who rather than destroy myth by making it too literal or by deconstructing it utterly, understand the complex relationship myth holds in our culture and seek to find a compromise. These writers understand that the myths are not real, but they flnd a way to use myth productively.

Barthes gives dear directions in « Myth Today » on what is occurring with these different types of writers, what he calls focusing. He tells us that when reading and deciphering myth, there are three different types of reading produced by the way in which one focuses on the duplicity of the mythic signifier. The flrst type of focusing insists that the mythic signifier exist only as form; it refuses to acknowledge any of the « hide and seek » that Barthes sars plays between meaning and form. Those who focus on myth this way. because they so steadfastly insist that « wilderness » is not mythic but real, flll the various forms of wilderness with the concept « wildernessity » without ambiguity, and thus the signification of « wilderness » is literal to them.