Barthes y la epanortosis

Abstract

In academic research, we normally work with two distinct kinds of language: the object-language and the metalanguage of the researcher. Roland Barthes, who reflected intensely about this question, uses certain procedures on his writing that subvert this division. One of them is the epanorthosis. Epanorthosis is seen, by Pierre Fontanier, as a figure of speech. It is described by classical rhetoric as a movement of retroaction, in which a statement, deemed incorrect or not appropriated, is corrected in a subsequent sentence. However, to Fontanier, epanorthosis has a limited scope: in his examples, we clearly see when the figure begins and when it ends. Nevertheless, the systematic use of this figure by Barthes changes its function: it creates an instability that dissolves the limits that separated writing from the methodical description of objects.