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In the context of the theoretical debates of the 1960s and 70s, the notion of
ideology was confined to the sphere of politics and associated with the idea of
domination and alienation. Assuming a negative meaning, the term was often used
as an accusation: ideology was seen as a pathology that must be cured (Francfort
School, Aron, Arendt). Against this background, the Greimasian semiotic approach
implies that ideology is less of an evil or a deviation than a normal and inevitable
social phenomenon – even more, a basis for any purposeful and value-invested
human action. Although Greimas’s narrative semiotics uses the term in a strictly
metalinguistic sense, its significance transcends grammatical technicalities. It offers what Geertz was looking for – a nonevaluative approach. Leaving aside all
moral, accusatory or pejorative connotations of the term, it makes ideology an
analytical tool.