1. Introduction to Semiotics of Cultures, 2010 Claude Lévi-Strauss Savage Mind, Mythologies Vesa Matteo Piludu University of Helsinki

2. Myths and Science Mythical thought and scientific thought are living on the same historical reality, not in different steps Even today there are many mythological systems working in native cultures and in modern ones (nationalist propaganda and commercials – Barthes) Remember the “magic powers” of Mr. Clean and their physical and psychological effects

3. Myths acooding to L-V Traditional sense: Archaic narratives related to gods, heroes, animals, fantastic beings that have a deep meaning, subject to speculation Barthes use myth in another, negative, way: simple modern narratives that considers natural and obvious what is historical and bourgeoisie

4. Myths and Science Myths and science are only two different way to organize the dates of experience They are parallel axes, similar at the formal level, different in their presupposes about the essence of the natural world The natives domesticated a great number of plants also for the pleasure to know new things, not only for their practical use The native world is more close to the sensible qualities and it have a more immediate connection with nature

5. Marcel Griaule Demonstrated how sophisticate are the systems of thought of West Africa

6. The mythological thought: savage Science of concrete Actor: bricoleur, someone that have many objects to create many results, that are more casual It is possible to built, break and built again Many variations of the same mythological theme The natural object acquire a cultural meaning, that is clearly not natural The thought is savage in the sense that is more casual, more free The mythological thought is alive in modern art

7. Scientific thought: domesticated Science of projects Actor: engineer the scientist has a clear project from the beginning, rigorous methods The possible results are limited, not so various as myths The though is domesticated in the sense that is less free, more rational, less subject to fly of fantasy

8. Magic thought Also magic is a way to think, a way to organize reality based on its own rigorous logic, it’s an independent system If we understand the logic of the mythological or magical thought, we are able to understand their meaning Different systems could be transformed into other ones reversing the importance of single elements

9. Australian totemistic system and Indian caste system Exogamic: each group should marry another clan Social group divided on the base of natural species: the natural world is considered social and cultural Endogamic: members of caste couldn’t marry a member of another caste Social order considered as natural The two system are logically opposed, based on the opposition of the same elements: variant of a combinatory system The human mind is working using the same logic, but with reversal meaning A system is in theory transformable in another one if their elements are put in opposition That happens often in politics: a party give a different interpretation of the symbols of the other party

10. Myths in Structural Anthropology 1 The Boas’ school collected a large amount of myths, but the result of the research were deluding The myths seemed extremely chaotic: disorder and disorganization in their analysis Simple speculations Evil Grandma in myth = in this society there were evil grandmothers Evil Grandma in myth = in this society the Grandmother is a symbol for some feeling lost in the unconscious

11. The Structural Study of Myth: Chapter XI in Structural Anthropology 1 Linguistic: connects a groups of sounds (phonemes) to certain meanings The meaning in in the system, not in the single souns Mythology: is not useful to analyze the “best version of the myths” (single myth), it is necessary to analyze all the versions of the myths to find out analogies and differences (system of myths) The meaning is the relations: there are relations between different version of the myths

12. Myth and language The myth is inside and over the language Is in the language, because is based on a set of linguistic enunciates (it’s a narrative) Is over the language, because what is important in the myth isn’t the style or syntaxes, but the story or narrative itself

13. Mytheme It’s the myth reduced to short, essential sentence or even to a group of symbols: a simplification of the whole plot Different mythemes should be connected in pairs of mutual or opposite elements If the meaning of a mytheme is different in a different version, we have a transformation of the myth itself The mythemes are element of variation

14. Vladimir Yakovlevich Propp (Владимир Яковлевич Пропп) 1895 - 1970 Formalism Considered possible the variation of contents in fables, but it considered the changes as purely arbitrary For L-S there is a logic in the transformation of myths

15. Propp

16. Methods Should be considered different explications for a single myth A myth shouldn’t considered as an isolated element, but in its relation with other myths It’s important to connect the myth to all the other relevant ethnographic information about the societies in which the myths was born and told

17. Mythologiques I–IV (1964-71) Mythologiques I–IV (trans. John Weightman and Doreen Weightman) Le Cru et le cuit (1964, The Raw and the Cooked, 1969) Du miel aux cendres (1966, From Honey to Ashes, 1973) L'Origine des manières de table (1968, The Origin of Table Manners, 1978) L'Homme nu (1971, The Naked Man, 1981)

18. Myths No evident practical function Cultural function: when it is possible, to reduce the contrasts present in the existence and social life Contrast life and death

19. Tricksters Sacred fool Creator of disorders and order He is smart, but often is punished by his own tricks

20. Trickster: Coyote

21. Raven

22. Raven and Coyote Eaters of dead corpses Middle position between predators (killers of other animals), and herbivorous (animals that don’t kills other animals) Mediator between oppositions Life coming from death Similar situation: war (destruction) and agriculture (creation) Middle position: hunt (nutrition and life given by killing) Life and death mutually connected: unthinkable without each other The myth doesn’t resolve completely the contradiction (life-death), but give an interpretation about their connections

23. Myths: many answers No religious dogmas There isn’t an answer, but many possible answers: variation of myths Possibilities in the past, in the present, in different societies The mythological thought is creative: The same concepts in a similar myths are revolted and in contradiction with each other

24. Influence of Dumézil Importance to work comparing myths of people that are historically connected Lévi-Strauss analyzed myths of Amazion indios or Pueblo natives searching for all the possible variants of the same myth, including the ones that are opposite

25. La Potière jalouse (1985, The Jealous Potter, trans. Bénédicte Chorier, 1988) Variation 1: A thirsty man asked his son water to drink, the son refused Variation 2: A thirsty man asked his wife water to drink, the wife refused Variation 3: Opposed variation 3: A mother want to wash her son, the son refused Situation 1: water inside the body Situation 3: body inside the water Inversion: woman that refused, woman that impose

26. Lévi-Strauss ”mysticism” The humans doesn’t think myths, but the myths are thinking each others in humans The myths are thinking in us, and we don’t think about that Mythical though as a cultural imposition to subjects (similarity between Lévi-Strauss and Barthes) The narrator loose importance

27. Comparition If the comparison is extended to other people, there are more similarities, but many of them aren’t of great significance If the comparison is more restricted to a certain group of peoples, it is possible to find out differences in the variations The differences are significative

28. Myths: nature and culture In myths there are fenomena of centralization, fragmentation and oppositions of variants … but all in a common vision of the world Problems: Division between the nature and culture: Raw – cooked naked – clothed Refuse or acceptation of exchanges: food, cultural products, marriages, importance of gifts

29. Lévi-Strauss: lost in myths Myths are superb stories, literary texts I’ve lived in another world, I lived with myths The mythologist is like a crazy artists, working continuously with his materials

30. Myths and music Wagner has done structural mythology in music Affinity between music and myths: variation on same themes Myths and melodies use the time to annul the time and to throw us in a dimension outside the time Creator of music similar to a demiurge Music and myths are impossible to translate in other languages (written ones) A melody could only change into another melody and a myth into another myth Myths and music are able to express something that couldn’t be expressed in other ways: both are emotional, full of pathos

31. Analysis The analysis impoverish the myth, we can’t enjoy completely the myths analyzing them, because we are operating simplifications and schemes The goal of the analysis isn’t esthetical: is to find sense and what are the fundamental questions in the myths

32. Myth and ritual The ritual is a set of action based on myths Ritual is fragmented in gestures and procedures, that are continuously repeated: less information that in myths Myths distinguish, separate the elements of reality to transform them in instrument of thought The ritual is always connected to a myth, not to natural reality Rituals are connected to the world view present in myths Ritual is a “bastard” son of myth: thought connected to the necessity of life This negative interpretation of ritual has been criticized