“Operation Margarine”

Barthes’ mythologies are images of popular culture as emblematic of underlying cultural ideas. I have already looked at two of these “mythologies,” “The World of Wrestling” and “Romans in Film.” In another such short essay, “Operation Margarine,” Barthes likens the formation of societal constructs such as the military and the church to pop culture ideas of plasticity as shown by common household items such as margarine. “Astra” was the name of a popular brand of margarine in Barthes’ France that he uses in his commentary on society. Barthes’ short piece on margarine is further evidence of his preoccupation with gleaning symbols of social meaning, especially that of plasticity, from everyday items. Barthes termed these societal symbols “Mythologies.” Written for popular magazines, these short pieces appear in his 1957 collection appropriately entitled Mythologies . In many “Mythologies,” theatricality comes through as the predominant means of symbology. “The World of Wrestling” shows the live immediacy of theater in the pro-wrestling ring and “Romans in Film” shows the plasticity of the presentation of actors in films. But here, in “Astra,” the symbol is the plasticity of the item, the fact that margarine is a fake, a substitute for the real thing -- butter.

The imagery is significant for understanding the way we use signs and symbols today. These signs and symbols are reflective of the particular brand of postmodernism created by early postmodernists such as Barthes. In the modernism that preceded Barthes, the concerns of modern philosophy attempt to establish a proper canon of artistry. This canon lauds works it determines as artistic based on a largely structural approach. The modernist artist, the “great” artist, achieves her/his greatness through a strategic used of predisposed forms. The postmodernist, however, wants to incorporate the ideas of the common everyday culture into the philosophy of art and life. Thus Barthes, and his American champions such as Susan Sontag, abandon the restrictions of form and use the familiar literary device of the symbol. Something stands for something else. But Barthes and Sontag push the idea of symbol and signifier into a new light wherein the familiar image becomes a signifier of deeper cultural values. These are the “Mythologies.” Barthes creates this is the type of signification in “Operation Margarine” wherein the plasticity of margarine reflects the plasticity of religion and politics in contemporary society. Margarine helps us to understand Sontag’s battle cry: “The world, our world, is depleted, impoverished enough. Away with all duplicates of it, until we again experience more immediately what we have” (99). Until we consumers know that we have accepted something as a substantive substitute, we cannot fully shake off the cloud of knowledge which our current sense of Order gives to us and our capacity for immediate reaction lessens.

The basic conceit of margarine as a symbol concerns its substitution for something else, the real thing that is butter. By plasticizing butter, margarine is not quite the same thing as butter. But Barthes emphasizes that margarine is not necessarily bad. As a symbol, it still has merits, not as flavorful as the merits of butter, but nonetheless having a decent taste. Though at first decried as something horrific (“…margarine? Unthinkable!”), the consumer becomes aware of the value of the product: “…margarine is a delicious food, tasty, digestible, economical, useful in all circumstances. The moral at the end is well known: ‘Here you are, rid of a prejudice which cost you dearly!” (Mythologies, 42).

The symbol of societal attitude toward margarine becomes an insight into societal attitudes toward an ever-increasing critical view of politics and religion. The increasing awareness of the unthinkable things about politicians and religious figures that define our use of these societal constructs in the contemporary world becomes less odious with the salve of that which alleviates our prejudice against something at one time we may have thought unethical. “A little ‘confessed’ evil saves one from acknowledging a lot of hidden evil.” Furthermore, “What does it matter, after all, if Order is a little brutal or a little blind, when it allows us to live cheaply?” (Mythologies, 42). The margarine of the small confessions, the little brutalities, keeps the consumers satisfied, even though this margarine is not the real thing.

 

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Barthes, Roland. Mythologies. (1957) translated by Annette Lavers, New York: Hill and Wang, 1972.

Sontag, Susan. “Against Interpretation,” The Susan Sontag Reader. New York: Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 1982. 95-104.

                                                                                                                        Nick Harris, April 19, 2024