The New Author

The relevance of authorship is the subject of both the works of Barthes and Foucault. In these essays, Barthes and Foucault aim to analyze the preconceived notions of what an author is and how that shapes an experience. The association with the modern author’s importance in society is something that both Barthes and Foucault find irrelevant. To them, it is the subject matter and framing that should hold the utmost importance in a text. Through their arguments, it is easy to see exactly how important the discussion of authorship is to the subject of agency.

Agency is the idea that we find encouragement from different sources. It is the ability to act- to draw inspiration from the world, people, and events around you. When we act upon agency, we become agents. Agency is the source from which we further our own abilities and add to discussion at large. I believe that there is a strong connection between agency and authorship as outlined by Barthes and Foucault.

In Barthes essay, “The Death of the Author,” Barthes makes the argument that our fascination with authorship is irrelevant. To Barthes, giving a specific text an author takes away from our own ability to draw conclusions and form unbiased opinions (Barthes 877). Barthes symbolically paints out the death of the author, hoping that a shift away from authorship will bring about new thought and critical thinking (Barthes 875). Why does Barthes find authorship so detrimental? When analyzing agency, authorship seems like it would be a positive thing. It is someone acting upon his or her own inspiration. I believe that Barthes would argue that, in this sense, the relationship between authorship, agency, and the agent is positive. It is more the obsession with authorship that Barthes looks to discredit.

Similar to Barthes, Foucault believes that the author has become an almost toxic being. Where Barthes seeks to disenchant, Foucault looks to dissect. In, “What is an Author,” Foucault places an emphasis on individualization (Foucault 904). He explains that, while reading a singular work, it is easy for the audience to view the author as the sole proprietor (Foucault 905). He argues that authors bring their own individual styling and arrangement to a piece. This, to Foucault, is actually more important than the content. It can be argue that this argument by Foucault is where agency really shines through authorship. An agent is an individual with an idea. Agency varies from individual to individual. It is through this variation that whole genres of idea have arisen and taken their place in society. Agency through the example of authorship, as outlined by Foucault, is an important process.

Foucault still agrees with Barthes idea that authorship is both a complex and overly fixated part of a reading experience. Many works, especially in the modern digital medium, have multiple authors that work together and layer over each other. Foucault explains that modern authorship has a false relation to ownership- the idea that the work belongs to the author (Foucault 911). Agency makes no claim for ownership. It is more a perspective of creation rather than a guideline for future operation as outlined by the author. The author loses control of their work once it is finished because they no longer own it. Barthes makes a push towards true agency when he explains interpretation of text. Barthes makes the claim that public interpretation of a text is more important than that of an author (Barthes 877). Truth is derived from how the masses interpret rather than what the agent intended.

For Foucault and Barthes, the idea of individualism in agency is key. I don’t think that either Foucault or Barthes is arguing that authorship should stop necessarily. In essence, they are petitioning for a shift back to a pure form of agency- one where there isn’t such an obsession with the ideals and the opinions of the creator. There needs to be a form of agency where the author isn’t the supreme being who decides what is truth and what is to be interpreted from their work.

Overall, the idea of agency and authorship is important to our study of Rhetorical theory and practice. If one is able to keep in mind the ideals of Barthes and Foucault when interpreting future texts, one will be able to formulate new ideas and increase their ability to think critically. There needs to be a shift away from a concern with being “right” and rather, a concentration on being engaged with a text. This is exactly why true authorship is so important. It should be a guide rather than a force to be reckoned with.

-Kiernan Doyle