sh.sePublications
System disruptions
We are currently experiencing disruptions on the search portals due to high traffic. We are working to resolve the issue, you may temporarily encounter an error message.
Change search
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • harvard-anglia-ruskin-university
  • apa-old-doi-prefix.csl
  • sodertorns-hogskola-harvard.csl
  • sodertorns-hogskola-oxford.csl
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf
Tick-Tock or Not: Don DeLillo’s Point Omega and the Unreliability of Postmodern Time: A Barthesian analysis investigating the shifting meanings of ’writerly’ temporality
Södertörn University, School of Culture and Education, English language.
2018 (English)Independent thesis Basic level (degree of Bachelor), 10 credits / 15 HE creditsStudent thesis
Abstract [en]

Born out of an interest in the subjective perception of time, and a desire to test the possibilities of applying the structuralist/poststructuralist analytical framework laid out by Roland Barthes in his S/Z on a contemporary work of fiction, this essay is first and foremost a foray into the shifting meanings of time in Don DeLillo’s 2010 novel Point Omega, and by extension the post-millennial era as a whole. Against a complex backdrop concerning the nature of time in postmodernity, gleaned from a review of articles by Mitchum Huehls, Frederic Jameson and Ursula K. Heise, the analysis in this essay investigates how, together, the different characters experiences of temporality in Point Omega suggest that time is an unreliable measurement of human experience.This essay identifies and explains the key concepts of Barthes’ analysis in S/Z, and describes the structure of his analysis. The description of readerly and writerly texts, the breaking apart of a text into lexias, as well as the definitions of Barthes’ five codes of meaning, are supplemented by a brief consideration of his final work, Camera Lucida, which is also relevant to this investigation of temporality in DeLillo. Though in the short time allotted for the writing of this essay it was only possible to emulate a fraction of the extensive detail achieved by Barthes in S/Z, the application of his codes to thirty excerpts selected from Point Omega within, coupled with an analysis of these excerpts, together produces a comprehensive image of time’s potential for having multiple meanings in the modern world. Though this essay is a work of some hybridity, its works to highlight some of the lasting possibilities, advantages and limitations of applying Barthes’ theory in a specialized reading of contemporary American literature. The conclusion that emerges from my analysis is that time is an often-changing, arbitrary concept.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
2018. , p. 42
National Category
Languages and Literature
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:sh:diva-52067OAI: oai:DiVA.org:sh-52067DiVA, id: diva2:1789145
Subject / course
English
Supervisors
Available from: 2023-08-18 Created: 2023-08-18 Last updated: 2023-08-18Bibliographically approved

Open Access in DiVA

fulltext(526 kB)223 downloads
File information
File name FULLTEXT01.pdfFile size 526 kBChecksum SHA-512
f8ea0f5c8cf590c98af938f47b6d7b9cc5fe52694d4198b98b08721a4d8644962abb788ee0739ab761075a1cd3cd04927587170a6d860812c3e7c301c11b439d
Type fulltextMimetype application/pdf

By organisation
English language
Languages and Literature

Search outside of DiVA

GoogleGoogle Scholar
Total: 227 downloads
The number of downloads is the sum of all downloads of full texts. It may include eg previous versions that are now no longer available

urn-nbn

Altmetric score

urn-nbn
Total: 135 hits
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • harvard-anglia-ruskin-university
  • apa-old-doi-prefix.csl
  • sodertorns-hogskola-harvard.csl
  • sodertorns-hogskola-oxford.csl
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf