Handbook of Semiotics

Myth

Myth Myth is a basic phenomenon of human culture. Its fundamental relevance to the sciences of man has made it an object of study of interdisciplinary research. Modern interpretations of myth begin in 1725 with Vieo's New Science (cf. Hawkes 1977: 11-15). With Levi-Strauss, myth becomes a privileged object of text semiotics . Beginning with Barthes, myth has been interpreted as a semiotic phenomenon of everyday culture. For surveys of research in myths and mythology see Sebeok, ed. (1955), Maranda, ed. (1972), Dupre (1973), Bolle (1974), Calame (1982), Hendricks (1982), and Hubner (1985). 1. General Definition of Myth Myth (from Gr. J.lfh~ocr, 'word', 'speech', 'tale of Gods') "may be defined as a story or a complex of story elements taken as expressing, and therefore as implicitly symbolizing, certain deep-lying aspects of human and transhuman existence" (Wheelwright 1974: 538). 1.1 Myth as a Metaphorical Narrative The above definition characterizes myth as a metaphorical narrative, a text that is to be interpreted on two levels. One is a surface level, referring to actions of mythical agents. 374 • MYTH (Greimas & Courtes [1979] call this the practical level of myth.) The other is a deep level, referring to existential questions (cf. ] olles 1930) concerning man and cosmos. Examples from Greek and Christian mythology are the myths of the origin and end of man, cosmos , or natural elements (e.g., fire or water), myths of time and eternity, or myths of rebirth and renewal. 1.2 Myth, Science, and Truth The transcendental character of these questions has made mythology a topic in the study of religions. Its cosmological dimension brought mythology (like magic, q.v. 3.-4.) into conflict with science. The Greeks (cf. Nestle 1942) distinguished between mythos (possibly fictive discourse) and logos (rational discourse). In the ages of Enlightenment and Positivism, myth even became opposed to reality. Mythical was a synonym offalse. After having designated the "absolute truth" and "sacred history," myth was now an antonym of science and reality (cf. Eliade 1957: 23-24). Yet, modern theology (e.g., Eliade), psychoanalysis (Freud, C. G. jung), the philosophy of symbolic forms (E. Cassirer, S. Langer), literary criticism (N. Frye), and finally structural anthropology (Levi-Strauss) have contributed to the understanding of myth as a constant dimension of the human mind (cf. Hubner 1985). 3 tains four mythemes (1, 2, 3, 4) occurring in the textual sequence 1,3,2,4,2,4,3,4,1,2, 1, is then represented in the following chart: 1 2. Levi-Strauss's Structural Analysis of Myths Levi-Strauss developed a structural method of myth analysis which became paradigmatic for text semiotics, in particular Greimas's structural semantics and the semiotic theory of narrativity . For surveys and applications of this method see Greimas (1970: 117-34), Kangas Maranda &: Maranda (1971), Culler (1975), and Hawkes (1977). 2 2 2 3 4 4 4 2.1 Myth as a Sign System For Levi-Strauss, myths are messages based on a code with structures similar to those of a language (1958: 206-231). Methods of linguistic structuralism, such as segmentation, classification , and the search for binary oppositions, are therefore his tools of analysis. In his study of the Oedipus myth, Levi-Strauss begins by breaking down the text into basic units consisting of summarizing sentences. These express a relation in the form of a subject-predicate structure. "Bundles" of such relations within a myth and its variants form the "gross constituent units" of myth analysis, which Levi-Strauss calls mythemes (ibid.: 211). In myth, these constituents function like phonemes in language: They are "made up of all their variants" (ibid.: 212). In a two-dimensional notational system, which Levi-Strauss likens to an orchestra score (ibid.: 213), the mythemes are arranged on a syntagmatic and a paradigmatic axis. The former follows the narrative sequence of mythical events shown in the textual combination of the mythemes. The latter represents the semantic equivalences of the textual units in the form of columns. Especially with its paradigmatic dimension , this method of structural text analysis provided a new approach to the analysis of narratives. Propp, Levi-Strauss's predecessor in the history of text semiotics (see Narrative 2.2), had developed a model of analysis that was still predominantly syntagmatic. A myth, like the Oedipus myth, which conBy this analysis, a semantic reduction of the text from eleven to four content units becomes possible. With such procedures of textual reduction , Levi-Strauss arrives at specific deep structures in...