STRUCTURALIST POETICS
Jonathan Culler, 1975
By Peter Grieco
“Social & cultural phenomena are not simply
material objects or events but objects
or events with meaning.”
“Meaning” for Culler
& the Structuralists he consulted, is symbolic.
Natural events (whether they occur
around us, to us, or within us) may
& often do, carry implicit meaning. Some
would locate the “natural” within culture. Others
see culture as an extension of & undivorceable
from, material nature. Culler’s study often
rehearses this debate. “If human actions
or productions have a meaning there must be
an underlying system of distinctions & conventions
which makes this possible.” Again
the reference is to symbolic meaning.
Consider the action called homicide.
Although conventions make distinctions
among murder, manslaughter, accident
& execution, a meaningful fact remains
that one human being has killed another