Publisher's Synopsis
Robert Deliege's book provides a concise overview of the monumental work of one of the greatest and most prolific thinkers of the 20th century. Claude Levi-Strauss has had a profound and lasting impact on the course of contemporary anthropology. One could further argue that he has spawned a discipline in and of itself, so widespread has the influence of structuralism been, from linguistics to philosophy to psychology. Of all living anthropologists, he is without doubt the one most written about. Beyond anthropology, he has had a formative influence on such thinkers as Jean-Paul Sartre, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Ernest Gellner, Jean Piaget, Paul Ricur and Vladimir Propp, to name but a few. But from myth and totemism through to the savage mind, Levi-Strauss has perhaps most shaped modern anthropology. Levi-Strauss Today first gives a general overview of the major themes that have marked structural anthropology. Deliege then takes a critical look at how structuralism first developed some fifty years ago and argues that historical distance now enables us to view it with objectivity. Addressing the relevance of structuralism to contemporary anthropology as well as its deficiencies as a tool for understanding culture, Delige goes on to review Levi-Strauss body of work. He also looks at several figures who have been influenced by structuralism and situates their work within the context of contemporary anthropology. While Deliege notes that structuralisms binary oppositions are perhaps no longer fashionable, he argues that Levi-Strauss visionary work sparked the debate, criticism and fervour that revived social anthropology at a critical point in the development of the discipline. This reappraisal is essential reading for students and indeed anyone wishing to have a handy introduction to Levi-Strauss.
