Encyclopedia of Social and Cultural Anthropology
Few anthropologists have acquired in their life-time the international fame and audience of Claude Lévi-Strauss. Since the end of World War II his ideas have taken hold throughout the human sciences. Although his work is not easily accessible to the uninitiated (Leach 1970), nor have all been convinced by his propositions—far from it—he has radically transformed the way anthropologists pose questions and define their object in central areas like *kinship, *classification and *mythology.
In advocating an approach inspired by structural linguistics, his work has brought about an epistemological break with previous methods of analysis. We can thus refer to a period ‘before Lévi-Strauss’ and one ‘after Lévi-Strauss’.
This is all the more remarkable since, like most of his French contemporaries, he was self-taught as an anthropologist, having received his academic training in philosophy and law (at a time when only a few of the major British and American universities were offering programmes in anthropology). Nevertheless, we must not overlook the fact that he has always paid homage to his predecessors (†Mauss, *Boas, †Lowie, and *Radcliffe-Brown, among others) whether or not he agreed with them. On the other hand, he has not hesitated to engage in controversy with philosophers, who have taken him to task on a number of occasions. No one who reads his work is left indifferent and he has contributed much to anthropology’s reputation in the human sciences.
This is the complete article, containing 230 words
(approx. 1 page at 300 words per page).
View More Summaries on Claude Lévi-Strauss
