Literary Theory
Sign-Signifier-Signified
Langue & Parole
Syntagmatic & Paradigmatic
Synchronic & Diachronic
Binary Opposition
Structuralism is a way of understanding culture and
meaning in the arts by relating the individual piece
of art (a novel, a painting, a symphony) to
something larger. In Structuralist theory, the
relationship between cultural phenomena is a web,
network, or structure, which exists underneath the
way we think and act, and produce art.
Structuralism is used in philosophy, history,
anthropology, and literary theory.
Structuralism comes from a branch of language
study called ‘structural linguistics’. This approach
was originally developed by a French linguist called
Ferdinand de Saussure.
Saussure developed an approach to the study of
language which saw the linguistic sign (a word) as
the relationship between a ‘sound image’ (a spoken
word or written word), which he called a ‘signifier’,
and the concept itself, which he called the
‘signified’. This differed from earlier ways of
understanding the relationship between words and
things. Until Saussure, words and the things they
denoted were thought to have a direct relationship.
Sign-Signifier-Signified
Signifier was more important
The word 'tree' denoted a physical tree in the real
world. So the word 'tree' meant 'an actual, physical
tree'. Saussure realised that this is not how
language works. Instead, the word/sound ‘tree’
represents a mental image (or concept) of a tree
rather than a real tree. This is because language
(and the concepts it uses) is a property of the mind.
As such, language allows us to understand and
interpret the world through a system of signs
(words+concept).
Because linguistics and literary theory are closely
related, the ideas proposed in linguistics by
Saussure were easily adapted to the study of
literature. When a literary text is studied using
Structuralism, the text is connected to a wider
‘structure’. This might include the kind of literature
the text is part of (its genre), or the universal ways
stories are told around the world.
In this case, the structuralist mines the text for
certain common themes or patterns. The idea here
is that human consciousness has universal
features, and it is the job of the literary critic to find
them and explain them. Any literary text can be
reduced to its basic parts. Once that is done, the
text can be compared to other stories with a similar
narrative structure.
For example, ‘Boy meets girl. Girl finds herself in
danger of some kind. Boy rescues girl’. This is a
common story in books and films. No matter what
style of writing this narrative structure is found in
(an epic poem, a novel, a play), the basic parts of
the story are the same. It’s a classic
hero+tension+resolution kind of story.
So a novel or a poem, or a painting, gives
information about something much deeper (the
underlying structure of consciousness).
Structuralists believe that the underlying structures
which organise rules and units into meaningful
systems are generated by the human mind itself
and not by sense perception.¹
This means that our minds manage information so
that it becomes meaningful. It is the mind itself
which makes meaning out of the world around us.
Structuralism uses some basic questions to
interpret literary texts:
1. Are there any patterns in text A which are similar
to patterns in text B? Structuralism is interested in
similarities between texts.
2. Are there any opposites in the text which are set
against each other? In Structuralism, opposites are
called ‘binary oppositions’, such as good/evil,
light/dark, tall/short etc.
The main characteristics of Structuralism in literary theory are
as follows:
1. A focus on the underlying structure of a literary text.
2. The meaning of a text is in the inter-relationship of its parts.
3. Binary oppositions are key to understanding a text.
4. The individuality and personality of the author are
unimportant. What matters are the deep structures.
5. Literary texts are constructs. Meaning does not come from
inside the text. Instead, meaning comes from the relationship
of each part of the text with other parts.