Roland Gérard Barthes (/bɑːrt/;[3] French: [ʁɔlɑ̃ baʁt]; 12 November 1915 – 26 March 1980[4]) was a French literary theorist, philosopher, critic, and semiotician. Barthes' ideas explored a diverse range of fields and he influenced the development of many schools of theory, including structuralism, semiotics, social theory, design theory, anthropology, and post-structuralism. He was particularly known for developing and extending the field of semiotics through the analysis of a variety of sign systems mainly derived from middle to upper class, occidental popular culture.[5]