Study Guide for Culler’s book on Saussure

and Chapter 1 of Lévi-Strauss’s La Pensée Sauvage (translated as The Savage Mind)

Please note: your second reading for this week is the first chapter of Lévi-Strauss's book, The Savage Mind.  Or at least that is the English translation of the title.  The French is La Pensée Sauvage, which suggests a variety of English glosses, included "Wild Thinking" and "The Wild Pansy."  Click here, to see the cover of the original French edition.  We show you this image to suggest that as abstruse as Lévi-Strauss can be, it is also important to keep in mind that he is an author of great whimsy.

1. Prepare entries, as in a glossary, for the following terms, as they are used and explained in Culler's account of Saussure.  In your entries please provide helpful illustrations and examples to encourage readers to connect theoretical concepts to concrete cases.  (This should be done in the fashion of the key terms in “The World Since 1492”)

a. the arbitrariness of the sign

b. diachronic/synchronic

c. langue/parole

d. sign, signified, signifier

e. signification/value

2. Find a passage in which Culler uses the term “functional.”  Quote enough of the passage that it stands on its own and explain whether this use of "functional" is consistent with or diverges from the term as defined in R-B's article.  Your answer should be grounded in evidence from both texts.

3. BONUS QUESTION(S). Think about the relationship of Saussurian theory (or "semiotics") to each of the following three major paradigmatic traditions in anthropology we have studied to this point in the course (social evolutionary theory; Boasian cultural anthropology; structural-functionalism). Identify a specific theoretical claim within Saussurian theory (or "semiotics") that is either in conflict with or in agreement with a specific theoretical claim within any one of these three major paradigmatic traditions. Specify the agreement or conflict. If you can, do this exercise for all three of the paradigmatic traditions, but try to get at least one done well.

4. Explain what Levi-Strauss means by the following terms (and provide appropriate illustrative examples, as useful).

a. neolithic paradox

b. bricolage

c. science of the concrete

5. Find, quote, and unpack a passage in which Levi-Strauss speaks to functionalist theory.

6. Like Boas, Lévi-Strauss also presents a counter-argument to evolutionary theory, un Lévi-Strauss’s case through the contrast between a bricoleur and an engineer (scientist). Based on your reading of “The Science of the Concrete,” summarize and explain Levi-Strauss’s understanding of the differences between so-called “savages” and so-called “civilized societies.”

7a. BONUS QUESTION.  One of the easier to understand claims in the second half of this chapter is that “the game [e.g., a sports match or a chess game] produces events by means of structure.  Unpack this claim, providing an example or illustration.

7b.BONUS QUESTION.  One of the very hardest to understand and most abstract claims in the second half of this chapter is that what is distinctive about art is that it involves the “integration” of “the contingent” into “a structure” (27).  Pick a work of art that you cherish and discuss it in relation to this theory of art.