Understanding Barthes, Understanding Modernism is a general assessment of the modern literary and philosophical contributions of Roland Barthes.

The first part of the volume focuses on work published prior to Barthes's death in 1980 covering the major periods of his development from Writing Degree Zero (1953) to Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography (1980). The second part focuses both on the posthumously published material and the legacies of his work after his death in 1980. This later work has attracted attention, for example, in conjunction with notions of the neutral, gay writing, and critiques of everyday life.

The third part is devoted to some of the critical vocabulary of Barthes in both the work he published during his lifetime, and that which was published posthumously.