An analysis of Will Wright's text on the Western genre, variations of the Western, the use of binary oppositions and the social and political themes represented. This text is a literary review which looks critically at the text as well as summarising Wright's deconstruction of the Western genre and...
A Critical summary of Will Wright's 'six guns and
society: a structural study of the Western - Myth and
meaning'
Will Wright’s ‘Six Guns and Society: A Structural Study of the Western (Myth and Meaning)
provides an insight into both why the author thinks that the Western genre can be considered to
count as a ‘myth’ - usually a term attributed with much older and tribal stories - as well as being
in its own way a critical reading of Lévi-Strauss and other anthropologists who studied mythology
and the psychology around it.
He begins by arguing that the Western genre is a myth of contemporary American society, an
apparently unusual claim because most anthropologists believe that older societies have myths
“whereas modern societies have history and literature” (p.185). Wright goes on to claim that the
narrative structure of a myth changes alongside the institutions of the outside world. In this
context - the context of Westerns - I took this to mean that the narrative structure of a Western
changes depending on the societal issues of the time. Wright then confirms this by going on to
describe the different ‘variations’ of Western - “Classical”, “Vengeance”, “Transition” and
“Professional” (p.186-187). The values of each story shift depending on aspects such as the
economic state of the period and social values. I agreed with this point, in classifying the different
types of Western movie. I think there is a clear definition between the different protagonists and
story structures that can easily be linked to the issues of the period in which they were made.
However, I would argue that this is a trait that is found in many genres of film - that the stories
reflect the ideas of the time in which they were made. An example of this would be the clear
xenophobia in the British horror movies of the 1960s due to a contextual fear of globalisation and
‘the other’, and thus I thought this point was perhaps a little bit mute, or just ignoring other
genres for the sake of his particular argument.
Wright does in fact clarify what he thinks makes a Western a myth later on in the text - when he
begins to use the example of binary opposites between wilderness and civilisation. Binary
opposites, as suggested in the text, reconcile conflicts of society through their use. Like in many
myths, the protagonists of the Western take from the land, and it is the source of their strength -
a mythological link to America’s tradition of turning to the wilderness - whereas “the villainy of
the villains stem from their ignorance of the wilderness and (…) the trappings of
civilisation” (p189). From my own interpretations watching Western films, I agree with Wright on
this point - I do think there is a trend in villains coming from civilisation, especially in cases
where it is cowboy vs cowboy, but I do not think this accounts for films in which the Native
Americans - who undoubtably have a closer connection with the land than any white protagonist
- are portrayed as the villains.
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