Roland Barthes Quotes about Language

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...language is never innocent.

Roland Barthes

Language, Innocent

Roland Barthes (1984). “Writing degree zero ; &, Elements of semiology”, Random House (UK)

Language is legislation, speech is its code. We do not see the power which is in speech because we forget that all speech is a classification, and that all classifications are oppressive.

Roland Barthes

Speech, Language, Forget

Man does not exist prior to language, either as a species or as an individual.

Roland Barthes

Men, Doe, Language

Roland Barthes, Richard Howard (1989). “Bruissement de la Langue”, p.13, Univ of California Press

I am interested in language because it wounds or seduces me.

Roland Barthes

Language, Seducing, Wounds

The text you write must prove to me that it desires me. This proof exists: it is writing. Writing is: the science of the various blisses of language, its Kama Sutra (this science has but one treatise: writing itself).

Roland Barthes

Writing, Desire, Language