levi strauss, myth
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The Structural Study of MythAuthor(s): Claude Lévi-StraussSource: The Journal of American Folklore, Vol. 68, No. 270, Myth: A Symposium (Oct. - Dec.,1955), pp. 428-444Published by: American Folklore SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/536768 .
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THE STRUCTURAL STUDY OF MYTH
BY CLAUDELEVI-STRAUSS
"It would seem that mythologicalworlds have been built up only to be shatteredagain, and
that new worlds were built from the fragments."Franz Boas, in Introduction to James Teit,Traditionsof the Thompson River Indians ofBritish Columbia, Memoirs of the American
Folklore Society,VI (I898), i8.
I.o. Despite some recent attempts to renew them, it would seem that during the
past twenty years anthropology has more and more turned away from studies in thefield of religion. At the same time, and preciselybecauseprofessionalanthropologists'interest has withdrawn from primitive religion, all kinds of amateurswho claim to
belong to other disciplines have seized this opportunity to move in, thereby turninginto their private playground what we had left as a wasteland. Thus, the prospectsfor the scientific study of religion have been undermined in two ways.
I.I. The explanation for that situation lies to some extent in the fact that the
anthropological study of religion was started by men like Tylor, Frazer, and Durk-
heim who were psychologicallyoriented, although not in a position to keep up with
the progress of psychological research and theory. Therefore, their interpretationssoon became vitiated by the outmoded psychological approach which they used astheir backing. Although they were undoubtedly right in giving their attention to
intellectual processes,the way they handled them remained so coarse as to discredit
them altogether.This is much to be regrettedsince, as Hocart so profoundly noticed
in his introduction to a posthumous book recently published,' psychological inter-
pretations were withdrawn from the intellectual field only to be introduced again in
the field of affectivity, thus adding to "the inherent defects of the psychologicalschool . . . the mistake of deriving clear-cutideas . . . from vague emotions." Instead
of trying to enlarge the framework of our logic to include processeswhich, whatever
their apparentdifferences,belong to the same kind of intellectual operations,a naiveattempt was made to reduce them to inarticulate emotional drives which resulted
only in withering our studies.
I.2. Of all the chaptersof religious anthropologyprobablynone has tarriedto the
same extent as studies in the field of mythology. From a theoreticalpoint of view the
situation remains very much the same as it was fifty years ago, namely, a picture of
chaos. Myths are still widely interpreted in conflicting ways: collective dreams, the
outcome of a kind of esthetic play, the foundation of ritual.... Mythological figuresare consideredas personifiedabstractions,divinized heroes or decayedgods. Whatever
the hypothesis, the choice amounts to reducing mythology either to an idle play or
to a coarsekind of speculation.I.3. In order to understand what a myth really is, are we compelled to choose
between platitude and sophism? Some claim that human societies merely express,
1A. M. Hocart,SocialOrigins(London, 1954), p. 7.
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throughtheirmythology, undamentaleelingscommonto the whole of mankind,such as love,hate,revenge;or thatthey tryto provide omekind of explanationsor
phenomenawhich they cannot understand therwise:astronomical,meteorological,
andthe like.But why should hesesocietiesdo it in such elaborate nddeviousways,since all of them arealsoacquaintedwith positiveexplanations?On the otherhand,
psychoanalystsnd manyanthropologistsave shifted the problems o be explainedaway from the naturalor cosmological owardsthe sociologicaland psychologicalfields. But then the interpretation ecomes oo easy: if a given mythologyconfers
prominenceo a certaincharacter,et us sayan evil grandmother,t will be claimedthat in such a societygrandmothersreactually vil and thatmythologyreflectshesocialstructure nd the socialrelations;but should the actualdatabe conflicting,twould be readilyclaimedthat the purposeof mythology s to providean outletfor
repressedeelings.Whatever he situation
maybe, a cleverdialecticwill
alwaysind
a waytopretendhata meaninghasbeenunravelled.2.0. Mythologyconfronts he student with a situationwhich at firstsight could
be lookeduponas contradictory. n the one hand,it wouldseemthatin the courseof a mythanything s likelyto happen.There is no logic,no continuity.Any charac-teristiccan be attributedo any subject; veryconceivable elationcanbe met. With
myth, everythingbecomespossible.But on the otherhand, this apparentarbitrari-ness is beliedbytheastounding imilarity etweenmythscollected n widelydifferent
regions.Therefore he problem: f the contentof a myth is contingent,how are we
goingto explain hatthroughouthe worldmythsdo resemble ne another o much?
2.I. It is precisely his awareness f a basicantinomypertaining o the natureofmyth that may lead us towards ts solution.For the contradictionwhich we face is
very similar to that which in earlier imes broughtconsiderableworryto the first
philosophers oncernedwith linguisticproblems; inguisticscould only begin toevolve as a scienceafter this contradictionad beenovercome.Ancientphilosopherswerereasoningabout anguage he way we areaboutmythology.On the one hand,they did noticethat in a given languagecertain equences f soundswereassociatedwith definitemeanings,and they earnestlyaimed at discoveringa reasonfor the
linkage between those sounds and that meaning. Their attempt,however, wasthwarted rom the very beginningby the fact that the same soundswere equallypresent n other anguages houghthe meaning heyconveyedwas entirelydifferent.The contradictionwas surmounted nly by the discovery hat it is the combinationof sounds,not the sounds n themselves,whichprovides he significantdata.
2.2. Now, it is easy to see that some of the more recent interpretationsof mytho-
logical thought originated from the same kind of misconception under which those
early linguists were laboring. Let us consider, for instance, Jung's idea that a given
mythological pattern-the so-called archetype-possesses a certain signification. Thisis comparableto the long supportederrorthat a sound may possess a certain affinitywith a meaning: for instance, the "liquid"semi-vowels with water, the open vowels
with things that are big, large, loud, or heavy, etc., a kind of theory which stillhas its supporters.2Whatever emendations the original formulation may now call for,
everybody will agree that the Saussureanprinciple of the arbitrarycharacterof the
linguistic signs was a prerequisitefor the acceding of linguistics to the scientific level.2 See, for instance,Sir R. A. Paget, "The Origin of Language. .. ," Journalof WorldHistory,
I, No. 2 (UNESCO, 1953).
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2.3. To invite the mythologist to comparehis precarioussituation with that of the
linguist in the prescientificstage is not enough. As a matter of fact we may thus beled only from one difficultyto another. There is a very good reasonwhy myth cannot
simply be treated as language if its specific problems are to be solved; myth is lan-
guage: to be known, myth has to be told; it is a part of human speech. In order to
preserve its specificity we should thus put ourselves in a position to show that it isboth the same thing as language, and also something differentfrom it. Here, too, the
past experience of linguists may help us. For language itself can be analyzed into
things which are at the same time similar and different. This is precisely what is
expressedin Saussure'sdistinctionbetween langue and parole,one being the structural
side of language, the other the statisticalaspectof it, langue belonging to a revertible
time, whereas parole is non-revertible.If those two levels already exist in language,then a third one can
conceivablybe isolated.2.4. We have just distinguished langue and parole by the different time referents
which they use. Keeping this in mind, we may notice that myth uses a third
referent which combines the properties of the first two. On the one hand, a myth
always refers to events alleged to have taken place in time: before the world was
created, or during its first stages-anyway, long ago. But what gives the myth an
operative value is that the specific pattern described is everlasting; it explains the
present and the past as well as the future. This can be made clearthrough a compari-son between myth and what appearsto have largely replaced it in modern societies,
namely, politics. When the historian refers to the French Revolution it is always as a
sequence of past happenings, a non-revertible series of events the remote conse-quences of which may still be felt at present. But to the French politician, as well
as to his followers, the French Revolution is both a sequence belonging to the past-as to the historian-and an everlasting pattern which can be detected in the presentFrench social structure and which provides a clue for its interpretation,a lead from
which to infer the future developments.See, for instance,Michelet who was a politi-
cally-minded historian. He describes the French Revolution thus: "This day . . .
everything was possible. . . . Future became present . . . that is, no more time, a
glimpse of eternity."It is that double structure,altogether historicaland anhistorical,which explains that myth, while pertaining to the realm of the parole and callingfor an explanation as such, as well as to that of the langue in which it is expressed,can also be an absolute object on a third level which, though it remains linguistic by
nature,is neverthelessdistinct from the other two.
2.5. A remark can be introduced at this point which will help to show the singu-
larity of myth among other linguistic phenomena. Myth is the part of languagewhere the formula traduttore,tradittorereaches ts lowest truth-value.From that pointof view it should be put in the whole gamut of linguistic expressionsat the end oppo-site to that of poetry, in spite of all the claims which have been made to prove the
contrary.Poetry is a kind of speech which cannot be translatedexcept at the cost of
serious distortions; whereas the mythical value of the myth remains preserved,eventhrough the worst translation.Whatever our ignoranceof the language and the culture
of the people where it originated,a myth is still felt as a myth by any readerthrough-out the world. Its substance does not lie in its style, its original music, or its syntax,but in the story which it tells. It is language, functioning on an especiallyhigh level
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where meaning succeeds practically at "taking off" from the linguistic ground on
which it keeps on rolling.2.6. To sum up the discussion at this point, we have so far made the following
claims: i. If there is a meaning to be found in mythology, this cannot reside in theisolated elements which enter into the composition of a myth, but only in the waythose elements are combined. 2. Although myth belongs to the same category as
language, being, as a matter of fact, only part of it, language in myth unveils specific
properties. 3. Those properties are only to be found above the ordinary linguisticlevel; that is, they exhibit more complex features beside those which are to be found
in any kind of linguistic expression.3.o. If the above three points are granted, at least as a working hypothesis, two
consequences will follow: i. Myth, like the rest of language, is made up of constitu-
ent units. 2. These constituent unitspresuppose
the constituent unitspresent
in lan-
guage when analyzed on other levels, namely, phonemes, morphemes, and seman-
temes, but they, nevertheless, differ from the latter in the same way as they them-
selves differ from morphemes, and these from phonemes; they belong to a higherorder, a more complex one. For this reason,we will call them gross constituent units.
3.1. How shall we proceed in order to identify and isolate these gross constituent
units? We know that they cannot be found among phonemes, morphemes,or seman-
temes, but only on a higher level; otherwise myth would become confused with anyother kind of speech. Therefore, we should look for them on the sentence level. The
only method we can suggest at this stage is to proceed tentatively,by trial and error,
using as a check the principleswhich serve as a basisfor any kind of structuralanalysis:economy of explanation; unity of solution; and ability to reconstruct the whole
from a fragment, as well as furtherstagesfrom previousones.
3.2. The technique which has been applied so far by this writer consists in analyz-
ing each myth individually, breaking down its story into the shortest possible sen-
tences, and writing each such sentence on an index card bearing a number corre-
sponding to the unfolding of the story.
3.3. Practicallyeach card will thus show that a certainfunction is, at a given time,
predicatedto a given subject.Or, to put it otherwise, each gross constituent unit will
consist in a relation.
3.4. However, the above definition remains highly unsatisfactory or two different
reasons. In the first place, it is well known to structural linguists that constituent
units on all levels are made up of relations and the true differencebetween our grossunits and the others stays unexplained; moreover,we still find ourselvesin the realm
of a non-revertibletime since the numbers of the cards correspondto the unfoldingof the informant's speech. Thus, the specific characterof mythological time, which
as we have seen is both revertible and non-revertible, synchronic and diachronic,remains unaccounted for. Therefrom comes a new hypothesis which constitutes the
very core of our argument: the true constituent units of a myth are not the isolated
relations but bundles of such relations and it is only as bundles that these relationscan be put to use and combined so as to produce a meaning. Relations pertaining tothe same bundle may appear diachronically at remote intervals, but when we havesucceeded in grouping them together, we have reorganized our myth according to atime referentof a new nature correspondingto the prerequisiteof the initial hypothe-
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sis, namely,a two-dimensionalime referentwhich is simultaneously iachronic nd
synchronic nd whichaccordinglyntegrateshe characteristicsf the langueon one
hand,and thoseof theparoleon theother.To putit in evenmore inguistic erms, t
is asthoughaphonemewerealwaysmadeupof allitsvariants.4.0.Two comparisonsmayhelpto explainwhatwe have n mind.
4.1. Let us first suppose hat archaeologistsf the futurecomingfrom another
planetwould one day,whenall human ife haddisappearedromtheearth,excavate
one of our libraries.Even if they were at firstignorantof our writing,they mightsucceed n decipheringt-an undertakingwhichwouldrequire,at someearlystage,the discovery hatthe alphabet, s we arein the habitof printing t, shouldbe read
fromleft to rightand fromtop to bottom.However, heywouldsoonfind out that
a wholecategoryof booksdid not fit the usualpattern: hesewouldbe the orchestra
scoreson the shelvesof the music division.But after trying,without success, o
decipher taffsone after the other,from the upperdown to the lower,they would
probablynoticethatthe samepatterns f notesrecurred t intervals, ither n full or
in part,or that some patternswere stronglyreminiscent f earlierones. Hence the
hypothesis:what if patterns howingaffinity,nsteadof beingconsideredn succes-
sion,were to be treatedasonecomplexpatternandreadglobally?By gettingat what
we callharmony,heywould thenfind outthatanorchestracore,n order o become
meaningful,has to bereaddiachronicallylongone axis-that is,pageafterpage,and
from left to right-and alsosynchronicallylongthe otheraxis,all the noteswhich
arewrittenverticallymakinguponegrossconstituent nit, .e.onebundleof relations.
4.2. The othercomparisons somewhatdifferent.Let us takean observergnorantof our playingcards,sittingfor a long time with a fortune-teller. e wouldknow
somethingof the visitors: ex, age, look, socialsituation, tc. in the sameway as we
know somethingof the differentcultureswhosemythswe try to study.He would
also listento the seancesandkeepthemrecordedo asto be ableto go overthemand
makecomparisons-aswe do when we listen to mythtellingand record t. Mathe-
maticianso whom I haveput the problemagree hatif the manis brightandif the
materialavailableo him is sufficient, e maybe able to reconstructhenatureof the
deckof cardsbeingused,thatis: fifty-twoor thirty-two ardsaccordingo case,made
up of fourhomologous eriesconsistingof the sameunits(the individual ards)with
onlyonevarying eature,hesuit.
4.3.The timehascome to give a concrete xampleof themethodwe propose.We
will use the Oedipusmyth which has the advantage f beingwell-known o every-
body and for which no preliminaryxplanations thereforeneeded.By doing so, I
am well awarethat the Oedipusmyth has only reachedus underlate formsand
throughliterary ransfigurationsoncernedmore with estheticand moralpreoccu-
pations hanwith religiousor ritualones,whatever hesemayhave been.But as will
be shown later,this apparently nsatisfactoryituationwill strengthenour demon-
stration atherhan weaken t.
4-4.The
mythwill be treatedas wouldbe an orchestra core
perversely resentedas a unilinear eriesandwhereour task is to re-establishhe correctdisposition.As if,for instance, we were confronted with a sequence of the type: I,2,4,7,8,2,3,4,6,8,1,4,5,7,
8,I,2,5,7,3,4,5,6,8.., the assignmentbeing to put all the I's together,all the 2's, the 3's,
etc.;theresult s a chart:
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12 4 78234 6 8
1 45 78
12 5 73456 8
4.5- We will attempt to perform the same kind of operation on the Oedipus myth,
trying out several dispositions until we find one which is in harmony with the prin-
ciples enumerated under 3.1. Let us suppose, for the sake of argument, that the best
arrangement is the following (although it might certainly be improved by the helpof a specialist n Greek mythology):
Kadmos seeks his sister
EuroparavishedbyZeus Kadmoskills the
dragon
The Spartoikilleach other Labdacos(Laios' fa-
ther) = lame (?)
Oedipuskills his Laios (Oedipus' fa-father Laios
ther) = left-sided ?)
Oedipuskills the
Sphinx
Oedipus marrieshismother Jocasta Eteocles kills his Oedipus = swollen
brotherPolynices foot (?
AntigoneburiesherbrotherPolynicesdespiteprohibition
4.6. Thus, we find ourselves confronted with four vertical columns each of which
include several relations belonging to the same bundle. Were we to tell the myth,we would disregardthe columns and read the rows from left to right and from topto bottom. But if we want to understand the myth, then we will have to disregardone half of the diachronic dimension (top to bottom) and read from left to right,column aftercolumn, eachone being considered as a unit.
4.7. All the relations belonging to the same column exhibit one common featurewhich it is our task to unravel.For instance,all the events grouped in the firstcolumn
on the left have something to do with blood relationswhich are over-emphasized, .e.are subjectto a more intimate treatment than they should be. Let us say, then, that thefirst column has as its common feature the overratingof blood relations. It is obviousthat the second column expressesthe same thing, but inverted: underratingof bloodrelations. The third column refers to monsters being slain. As to the fourth, a wordof clarificationis needed. The remarkableconnotation of the surnames in Oedipus'
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father-line has often been noticed. However, linguists usually disregard it, since to
them the only way to define the meaning of a term.is to investigate all the contexts
in which it appears,and personal names, preciselybecausethey are used as such, are
not accompaniedby any context. With the method we proposeto follow the objectiondisappearssince the myth itself provides its own context. The meaningful fact is no
longer to be looked for in the eventual sense of each name, but in the fact that all the
names have a common feature: i.e. that they may eventually mean something and
that all these hypotheticalmeanings (which may well remain hypothetical) exhibit a
common feature, namely they refer to difficulties to walk and to behave straight.
4.8. What is then the relationshipbetween the two columns on the right? Column
three refers to monsters. The dragon is a chthonian being which has to be killed in
order that mankind be born from the earth; the Sphinx is a monster unwilling to
permitmen to live. The last unit
reproducesthe first one which has to do with the
autochthonous origin of mankind. Since the monsters are overcome by men, we maythus say that the common feature of the third column is the denial of the autochthon-
ousorigin of man.
4.9. This immediately helps us to understand the meaning of the fourth column.
In mythology it is a universalcharacterof men born from the earththat at the moment
they emerge from the depth, they eithercannot walk or do it clumsily. This is the case
of the chthonian beings in the mythology of the Pueblo: Masauwu, who leads the
emergence, and the chthonian Shumaikoli are lame ("bleeding-foot,""sore-foot").The same happens to the Koskimo of the Kwakiutl after they have been swallowed
by the chthonian monster, Tsiakish: when they returned to the surface of the earth"they limped forward or tripped sideways."Then the common feature of the fourth
column is: the persistenceof the autochthonousorigin of man. It follows that column
four is to column three as column one is to column two. The inability to connect two
kinds of relationshipsis overcome (or ratherreplaced) by the positive statement that
contradictoryrelationshipsare identical inasmuch as they are both self-contradictoryin a similar way. Although this is still a provisional formulation of the structure of
mythical thought, it is sufficientat this stage.
4.10. Turning back to the Oedipus myth, we may now see what it means. The mythhas to do with the inability, for a culture which holds the belief that mankind is
autochthonous (see, for instance, Pausanias, VIII, xxix, 4: vegetals provide a model
for humans), to find a satisfactorytransitionbetween this theory and the knowledgethat human beings are actually born from the union of man and woman. Althoughthe problem obviously cannot be solved, the Oedipus myth provides a kind of logicaltool which, to phraseit coarsely,replacesthe original problem:born from one or born
from two? born from different or born from same? By a correlation of this type,the overratingof blood relations is to the underratingof blood relations as the attemptto escapeautochthonyis to the impossibilityto succeed in it. Although experiencecon-
tradicts theory, social life verifies the cosmology by its similarityof structure.Hence
cosmology is true.4.11.o. Two remarksshould be made at this stage.
4.11.1. In order to interpret the myth, we were able to leave aside a point which
has until now worried the specialists,namely, that in the earlier (Homeric) versions
of the Oedipus myth, some basic elements are lacking, such as Jocastakilling herself
and Oedipus piercing his own eyes. These events do not alter the substanceof the
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myth althoughthey can easilybe integrated,he first one as a new caseof auto-destruction columnthree) while the second s another aseof cripplednesscolumnfour). At the sametime thereis somethingsignificantn these additions ince the
shift fromfoot to headis to be correlatedwith the shiftfrom: autochthonousriginnegated o: self-destruction.
4.11.2. Thus, our methodeliminatesa problemwhich has been so far one of themainobstacles o the progress f mythologicaltudies,namely, he questfor the true
version,or the earlierone. On the contrary,we define hemythasconsisting f all its
versions; o put it otherwise:a mythremains he sameaslong as it is felt as such.A
strikingexample s offeredby the factthatourinterpretationmaytakeinto account,and is certainlyapplicableo, the Freudianuse of the Oedipusmyth.AlthoughtheFreudianproblemhas ceased o be thatof autochthony ersusbisexual eproduction,it is stillthe
problemof
understandingow one can be bornfromtwo: how is it that
we do not haveonly one procreator,uta motherplusa father?Therefore,not onlySophocles, utFreudhimself,shouldbe includedamongthe recorded ersionsof the
Oedipusmython a parwithearlieror seeminglymore"authentic"ersions.
5.0.An important onsequenceollows. If a mythis madeup of all its variants,structural nalysis houldtake all of theminto account.Thus,afteranalyzingall theknownvariantsof the Thebanversion,we shouldtreatthe others n the sameway:first,the tales aboutLabdacos'ollateral ine includingAgave,Pentheus,andJocastaherself; heThebanvariant boutLycoswithAmphionandZetosasthecityfounders;moreremotevariants oncerningDionysos (Oedipus'matrilateralcousin),andAthe-
nian legendswhere Cecrops akes the placeof Kadmos,etc. For each of them asimilarchartshouldbe drawn,and thencompared ndreorganized ccordingo the
findings:Cecropskillingthe serpentwith the parallel pisodeof Kadmos;abandon-ment of Dionysoswith abandonment f Oedipus;"SwollenFoot" with Dionysosloxias, i.e. walking obliquely;Europa'squest with Antiope's;the foundationofThebes by the Spartoior by the brothersAmphionand Zetos;Zeus kidnappingEuropaandAntiopeand the samewithSemele; he ThebanOedipusand theArgianPerseus,etc.We will then have several wo-dimensionalharts,eachdealingwith a
variant,obeorganizedn a three-dimensionalrder
Fig. 1.
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so thatthreedifferent eadingsbecomepossible:eft to right,top to bottom, rontto
back.All of thesechartscannotbe expectedo be identical;butexperiencehows hat
anydifferenceo beobservedmaybe correlated ith otherdifferences,othata logical
treatmentof the wholewill allow simplifications,he finaloutcomebeingthe struc-tural awof themyth.
5.1. One may objectat this pointthat the taskis impossibleo perform incewe
can onlywork with knownversions. s it not possible hata new versionmightalter
the picture?This is true enoughif only one or two versionsareavailable,but the
objectionbecomes heoretical s soonas a reasonablyargenumberhasbeenrecorded
(a numberwhichexperiencewill progressivelyell,at leastasan approximation). et
us make thispointclearby a comparison.f thefurniture f a roomand thewayit is
arrangedn the roomwere known to us only through ts reflectionn two mirrors
placedon
oppositewalls,we would
theoretically isposeof an almost nfinitenumber
of mirror-imageswhich would provideus with a completeknowledge.However,shouldthe two mirrorsbe obliquely et,the numberof mirror-images ould become
very small;nevertheless,our or five such imageswould very likely give us, if not
complete nformation, t least a sufficient overage o that we would feel surethat
no largepieceof furnitures missing n ourdescription.5.2. On the otherhand, it cannotbe too stronglyemphasized hat all available
variants houldbe taken ntoaccount. f Freudian omments n theOedipus omplexarea partof the Oedipusmyth,thenquestions uchas whetherCushing's ersionof
the Zuniorigin mythshouldbe retainedor discarded ecome rrelevant.There is no
one trueversionof whichall the othersarebut copiesor distortions.Everyversionbelongs o themyth.
5.3. Finally t canbe understoodwhyworkson generalmythologyhavegivendis-
couraging esults.This comes rom two reasons.First,comparativemythologists ave
picked up preferred ersions nsteadof usingthemall.Second,we haveseenthat the
structural nalysisof one variantof one mythbelonging o one tribe(in somecases,even one village) alreadyrequires wo dimensions.When we use severalvariants
of the samemythfor the sametribeor village, he frameof reference ecomes hree-
dimensional nd as soonas we try to enlarge he comparison,he numberof dimen-
sionsrequired ncreases o suchan extentthat it appearsquiteimpossibleo handle
them intuitively.The confusionsand platitudeswhich are the outcomeof compara-tive mythologycan be explainedby the fact thatmulti-dimensionalramesof refer-
encecannotbeignored,ornaivelyreplaced ytwo-orthree-dimensionalnes.Indeed,
progress n comparativemythologydepends argelyon the cooperation f mathe-
maticianswho would undertake o express n symbolsmulti-dimensionalelations
which cannotbehandledotherwise.
6.o. In orderto checkthis theory,3 n attemptwas madein I953-54 towardsan
exhaustive nalysisof alltheknownversionsof the Zunioriginandemergencemyth:
Cushing, I883 and I896; Stevenson,904; Parsons,923; Bunzel, I932; Benedict, I934.
Furthermore, a preliminary attempt was made at a comparison of the resultswith
similar myths in other Pueblo tribes, Western and Eastern. Finally, a test was
undertaken with Plains mythology. In all cases, it was found that the theory was
sound, and light was thrown, not only on North American mythology, but also on a
previously unnoticed kind of logical operation,or one known only so far in a wholly3 Thanks are due to an unsolicited,but deeply appreciated, rant from the Ford Foundation.
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The Structural tudy of Myth 437
different context. The bulk of material which needs to be handled almost at the
beginning of the work makes it impossible to enter into details, and we will have to
limit ourselveshere to a few illustrations.
6.i. An over-simplifiedchart of the Zuni emergence myth would read as follows:
INCREASE DEATH
mechanicalgrowth emergenceled byof vegetals BelovedTwins siblingincest gods kill children
(used as ladders)
food value of migration led by mgical contest
wild plants the two Newekwewith peopleof the
dew (collectingwild
sibling sacri- food versuscultiva-
ficed (to gain tion)
victory)
food value of
cultivatedplantssibling adopted(in exchangefor
corn)
periodicalcharacterof
agriculturalworkwar against
Kyanakwe (garden-ers versushunters)
hunting war led bytwo
war-godssalvationof thetribe (centerof
warfare the world found)sibling sacri-ficed (to avoid
flood)
DEATH PERMANENCY
6.2. As may be seen from a global inspection of the chart, the basic problem con-
sists in discovering a mediation between life and death. For the Pueblo, the problemis especially difficult since they understand the origin of human life on the model
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of vegetal life (emergence from the earth). They share that belief with the ancient
Greeks, and it is not without reason that we chose the Oedipus myth as our first
example. But in the American case, the highest form of vegetal life is to be found in
agriculturewhich is periodicalin nature, i.e. which consists in an alternation betweenlife and death. If this is disregarded,the contradictionsurges at another place: agri-culture provides food, thereforelife; but hunting providesfood and is similar to war-fare which means death. Hence there are three different ways of handling the prob-lem. In the Cushing version, the difficulty revolves around an opposition betweenactivities yielding an immediate result (collecting wild food) and activitiesyielding a
delayed result-death has to become integrated so that agriculturecan exist. Parsons'version goes from hunting to agriculture,while Stevenson'sversion operatesthe other
way around. It can be shown that all the differencesbetween these versions can be
rigorouslycorrelatedwith these basic structures.For instance:
CUSHING PARSONS STEVENSON
Gods allied,use fiber Kyanakwealone, use Gods allied, use fiberstringson their fiber string Men f stringbows (garden-
Kyanakwe ers)
VICTORIOUS OVER VICTORIOUS OVER VICTORIOUS OVER
Men alone, use sinew Godsl allied, use Kyanakwealone, use
(hunters) (untilMen f sinew string
sinew stringmen shift to fiber)
Since fiber strings (vegetal) are always superiorto sinew strings (animal) and since
(to a lesser extent) the gods' alliance is preferableto their antagonism, it follows that
in Cushing's version, men begin to be doubly underprivileged (hostile gods, sinew
string); in Stevenson, doubly privileged (friendly gods, fiber string); while Parsons'
version confronts us with an intermediarysituation (friendly gods, but sinew stringssince men begin by being hunters). Hence:
CUSHING PARSONS STEVENSON
gods/men - + +
fiber/sinew - - +
6.3. Bunzel's version is from a structural point of view of the same type as
Cushing's. However, it differs from both Cushing's and Stevenson's inasmuch as the
latter two explain the emergence as a result of man's need to evade his pitiful condi-
tion, while Bunzel's version makes it the consequenceof a call from the higher powers-hence the inverted sequences of the means resorted to for the emergence: in both
Cushing and Stevenson, they go from plants to animals; in Bunzel, from mammals
to insects and from insects to plants.6.4. Among the Western Pueblo the logical approach always remains the same;
the starting point and the point of arrival are the simplest ones and ambiguity is metwith halfway:
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life
mechanical growth of
plants
wild plant food
cultivated plant food
L animal food life destroyed
huntwar
death
Fig. 2.
The fact that contradictionappears
n the middleof the dialecticalrocess
hasas itsresultthe production f a doubleseriesof dioscuricpairsthe purposeof whichis to
operatea mediationbetweenconflictingerms:
I. 3 divine messengers 2 ceremonial clowns 2 war-gods
2. homogeneouspair: siblings (brother couple (hus- heterogeneouspair:dioscurs(2 brothers)and sister) band and wife) grandmother/grandchild
which consists in combinatoryvariants of the same function; (hence the warattribute f the clowns whichhasgivenrise to so many queries).
6.5. SomeCentralandEasternPueblosproceedheotherwayaround.Theybegin
by statingthe identityof hunting and cultivation(first corn obtainedby Game-Fathersowingdeer-dewclaws),ndtheytry to derivebothlife and deathfromthatcentralnotion.Then, insteadof extreme ermsbeingsimpleand intermediarynes
duplicated s amongthe Westerngroups, he extreme ermsbecomeduplicated i.e.,the two sistersof the EasternPueblo) while a simplemediating ermcomesto the
foreground for instance, he Poshaiyanne f the Zia), but endowedwith equivocalattributes.Hence the attributes f this "messiah" an be deduced rom the placeit
occupiesn the timesequence: oodwhenat thebeginning(Zuni,Cushing),equivo-cal in the middle (CentralPueblo), bad at the end (Zia), except n Bunzel wherethe
sequences reversed s hasbeenshown.
6.6. By using systematicallyhis kind of structuralanalysist becomespossible o
organizeall the knownvariants f a mythas a seriesforminga kindof permutationgroup, he twovariants lacedatthe far-endsbeing n a symmetrical,hough nverted,relationshipo eachother.
7.0.Our methodnot only has the advantageof bringingsome kind of orderto
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what was previously haos; t alsoenablesus to perceive ome basic ogicalprocesseswhich are at the root of mythicalthought.Three mainprocesses houldbe distin-
guished.7.I.0. The tricksterof Americanmythologyhas remainedso far a problematic
figure.Whyis it thatthroughoutNorth Americahispart sassignedpracticallyvery-where to eithercoyoteor raven? If we keep in mind that mythical houghtalwaysworks from the awarenessof oppositions owardstheir progressivemediation, he
reason or those choicesbecomes learer.We needonly to assume hat two oppositetermswith no intermediary lways endto bereplaced y twoequivalentermswhich
allow a thirdone asa mediator;henone of thepolar ermsand themediator ecomes
replaced ya new triadandso on. Thuswehave:
INITIAL PAIR FIRST TRIAD SECOND TRIAD
Life
Agriculture
Herbivorousnimals
Carrion-eatingnimals
(raven; oyote)
Hunt
PreyanimalsWar
Death
With the unformulatedrgument: arrion-eatingnimalsarelikepreyanimals theyeat animalfood), but they are also like food-plantproducers theydo not kill what
they eat). Or,to put it otherwise,Pueblostyle:ravensareto gardensas preyanimals
are to herbivorous nes. But it is also clear thatherbivorous nimalsmay be called
firstto act as mediators n the assumptionhattheyarelike collectors ndgatherers
(vegetal-food aters)while they can be used as animalfood thoughnot themselveshunters.Thus we mayhave mediators f the firstorder,of the secondorder,and so
on, whereeach termgivesbirth o the nextby a doubleprocess f opposition ndcor-
relation.
7.I.I. This kind of process an be followed n the mythologyof the Plainswhere
we mayorder hedataaccordingo thesequence:
Unsuccessful ediator etween arthandsky(Starhusband's ife)
Heterogeneousairof mediators
(grandmother/grandchild)
Semi-homogeneousairof mediators
(Lodge-BoyndThrown-away)
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The Structural tudyof Myth 44I
WhileamonghePueblowe have:
Successfulediatoretweenarthnd ky
(Poshaiyanki)Semi-homogeneousair fmediators
(UyuyewindMatsailema)
Homogeneousair fmediators(theAhaiyuta)
7.1.2. On theotherhand,correlationsayappearn a transversalxis;(thisistrueevenon thelinguisticevel;seethemanifold onnotationf therootpose nTewaaccordingoParsons:oyote,mist, calp, tc.).Coyotes intermediaryetweenherbivorousnd carnivorousn thesamewayasmistbetweenkyandearth; calpbetweenwarandhunt(scalps war-crop);orn mutbetweenwildplants ndculti-vatedplants;garments etween nature"nd"culture";efusebetween illageand
outside; shesbetweenoofandhearth chimney).Thisstringof mediators,f one
maycallthemso,notonlythrowsighton wholepiecesof NorthAmericanmyth-ology-whytheDew-Godmaybeat the same imetheGame-Masterndthegiverof raimentsndbepersonifieds an"Ash-Boy";rwhythescalps remistproduc-ing;orwhytheGame-Mothers associatedithcorn mut; tc.-butit alsoprobablycorrespondso a universal ayof organizingailyexperience.ee, orinstance,heFrenchorvegetalmut;nielle,romLatinnebula;he uck-bringingower ttributed
to refuseoldshoe)andasheskissinghimney-sweepers);ndcompareheAmericanAsh-Boy yclewiththe Indo-Europeaninderella: othphallic igures mediatorbetweenmaleandfemale);master f the dew andof thegame;ownersof fine
raiments;ndsocialbridgeslowclassmarryingntohighclass); hough mpossibleto interprethroughecent iffusion shasbeen ometimesontendedinceAsh-Boyand Cinderellaresymmetricalut invertedn everydetail(whilethe borrowedCinderellaale n America-Zuni urkey-Girl-is arallelo theprototype):
EUROPE AMERICA
Sex female male
Family tatus doubleamily nofamily
Appearance pretty irl uglyboy
Sentimentaltatus nobodyikesher inhopelessovewithgirl
Transformation luxuriouslylothed ith strippedfugliness ithsupernaturalelp supernaturalelp
etc.
7.2.0.Thus, hemediatingunction f thetricksterxplainshatsince tspositionis halfway etweenwopolarerms emustretainomethingf thatduality, amelyan ambiguousndequivocalharacter.ut the tricksterigures not theonlycon-ceivableorm of mediation;omemyths eem o devotehemselveso thetaskof
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exhaustingall the possible olutions o theproblemof bridging he gapbetween wo
and one. For instance,a comparison etweenall the variantsof the Zuniemergence
myth providesus with a seriesof mediatingdevices,each of whichcreates he next
onebya process f opposition nd correlation:
messiah>ioscurs>rickster> isexual>ibling married grandmother->4 terms> riadbeing pair couple grandchild group
In Cushing's ersion, hisdialectic s accompanied ya change romthespacedimen-
sion (mediatingbetweensky and earth)to the time dimension mediatingbetween
summerandwinter, .e.,betweenbirthanddeath).But whilethe shift is beingmade
fromspace o time,the final solution(triad)re-introducespace, incea triadconsists
in a dioscurpair plus a messiahsimultaneously resent;and while the point of
departurewas ostensiblyormulatedn termsof a spacereferent sky andearth)this
was neverthelessmplicitlyconceived n termsof a time referent(firstthe messiah
calls; then the dioscursdescend).Therefore he logic of myth confrontsus with a
double,reciprocalxchangeof functions o whichwe shall returnshortly(7.3.).
7.2.I. Not onlycan we accountor theambiguous haracterf thetrickster, utwe
may also understand notherpropertyof mythical iguresthe worldover,namely,that the same god may be endowedwith contradictoryttributes;or instance,he
maybe good and badat the sametime.If we comparehevariants f the Hopi mythof the originof Shalako,we mayorder hemso thatthe followingstructure ecomes
apparent:
(Masauwu:)' (Muyingwu:Masauwu) (Shalako:Muyingwu) (y:Masauwu)
wherex and y represent rbitrary aluescorrespondingo the fact that in the two
"extreme" ariants he god Masauwu,while appearingalone insteadof associated
with anothergod, as in variant wo, or beingabsent,as in three,still retains ntrinsi-
callya relativevalue.In variantone,Masauwu alone) is depictedashelpfulto man-
kind (thoughnot as helpfulas he couldbe), and in versionfour,harmful o man-
kind (thoughnot asharmfulas he couldbe); whereasn two,Muyingwus relativelymore helpful than Masauwu,and in three,Shalakomorehelpfulthan Muyingwu.We find anidentical erieswhenorderingheKeresan ariants:
(Poshaiyanki:) - (Lea:Poshaiyanki) (Poshaiyanki:iamoni) (y:Poshaiyanki)
7.2.2. This logical framework s particularlynterestingsince sociologistsare
alreadyacquaintedwith it on two other evels:first,withthe problemof thepeckingorderamong hens; and second, t also correspondso what this writerhas called
generalexchangen the fieldof kinship.By recognizingt alsoon the levelof mythi-cal thought,we may find ourselvesn a betterposition o appraisets basic mpor-tancein sociologicaltudiesandto give it a moreinclusive heoreticalnterpretation.
7.3.0.Finally,whenwe havesucceededn organizinga wholeseriesof variantsn
a kindof permutationroup,we are n a position o formulatehelawof thatgroup.
Althoughit is not possibleat the presentstageto comecloser hanan approximateformulationwhichwill certainly eedto be mademoreaccuraten thefuture, t seems
that everymyth (consideredas the collectionof all its variants)correspondso a
formulaof thefollowing ype:
fx(a) : fy(b) fx(b) : a- I(y)
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where,two termsbeing givenaswell as two functionsof theseterms, t is stated hata relationof equivalencetillexistsbetween wo situationswhen termsandrelationsare inverted,undertwo conditions: . that one term be replacedby its contrary;2. thatan inversionbe madebetween hefunctionandthetermvalueof twoelements.
7.3.1. This formulabecomeshighly significantwhen we recallthat Freud con-sideredthat two traumas(and not one as it is so commonlysaid) arenecessarynorderto give birthto this individualmythin which a neurosisconsists.By tryingto
apply the formulato the analysisof those traumatisms and assumingthat they
correspondo conditions. and2. respectively)we shouldnotonlybe ableto improveit, but wouldfind ourselvesn the much desiredpositionof developing ideby sidethe sociological ndthepsychological spects f thetheory;we mayalsotake it to the
laboratoryndsubjectt to experimentalerification.
8.0.At thispointit seemsunfortunatehat,with thelimitedmeansat thedisposalof Frenchanthropologicalesearch, o furtheradvancecan be made. It shouldbe
emphasized hat the task of analyzingmythological iterature,which is extremelybulky, and of breaking it down into its constituent units, requires team work and
secretarialhelp. A variantof averagelength needs several hundredcards to be
properlyanalyzed.To discovera suitablepatternof rows and columnsfor those
cards,specialdevicesareneeded,consistingof verticalboardsabout wo meters ongandone andone-halfmetershigh,wherecards anbepigeon-holedndmovedatwill;in order o buildup three-dimensional odelsenablingone to comparehe variants,severalsuch boardsare necessary, nd this in turn requiresa spaciousworkshop,a
kind of commodityparticularly navailablen WesternEuropenowadays.Further-more,as soon as the frame of referencebecomesmulti-dimensionalwhichoccursatan earlystage,as has been shown in 5.3.) the board-systemas to be replacedbyperforated ardswhich in turn requireI.B.M.equipment,etc. Since there is little
hope that such facilities will become available n Francein the near future, it ismuchdesired hat someAmericangroup,betterequipped hanwe areherein Paris,will be inducedby this paperto starta projectof its own in structuralmythology.
8.I.o.Threefinal remarksmayserveasconclusion.8.I.i. First,the questionhasoftenbeenraisedwhymyths,andmoregenerallyoral
literature,re so muchaddicted o
duplication, riplication r quadruplicationf thesamesequence. f our hypotheses reaccepted,he answer s obvious:repetitionhasas its function o makethe structure f themythapparent. orwe have seenthatthe
synchro-diachronicaltructure f the mythpermitsus to organize t intodiachronical
sequences(the rows in our tables) which shouldbe readsynchronicallythe col-
umns). Thus, a mythexhibitsa "slated"tructurewhichseepsto the surface,f one
maysayso,through herepetition rocess.8.I.2.However, he slatesarenot absolutelydentical o each other.And sincethe
purposeof mythis to providea logicalmodelcapableof overcoming contradiction
(an impossible chievementf, as it happens,hecontradictions real),a theoretically
infinitenumberof slateswill begenerated, achoneslightlydifferent romtheothers.Thus,mythgrowsspiral-wise ntil theintellectualmpulsewhich hasoriginatedt isexhausted. ts growthis a continuousprocesswhereas ts structure emainsdiscon-tinuous. f this is the casewe shouldconsider hat t closelycorresponds,n therealmof the spokenword,to the kindof beinga crystal s in the realmof physicalmatter.
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This analogymay help us understandbetter he relationship f mython one handto bothlangueandparoleon theother.
8.I.3. Prevalentattemptsto explain alleged differencesbetween the so-called
"primitive"mind and scientificthought have resortedto qualitativedifferencesbetweenthe working processes f the mind in both cases while assuming hat the
objects o whichtheywereapplying hemselves emained erymuchthe same.If our
interpretations correct,we areled towarda completelydifferentview,namely, hatthe kind of logic which is used by mythicalthought is as rigorousas that ofmodernscience,and that the difference ies not in the qualityof the intellectual
process,but in the natureof the thingsto whichit is applied.This is well in agree-ment with the situationknown to prevail n the field of technology:whatmakes asteelax superioro a stoneone is not that the firstoneis bettermadethanthesecond.
Theyare
equallywell
made,butsteel s a different
hingthan stone.In the same
waywe maybe ableto showthatthe samelogicalprocesses reput to use in mythas in
science,and thatman has alwaysbeenthinking equallywell; the improvementies,not in an allegedprogress f man'sconscience, ut in the discovery f new thingstowhich t mayapply tsunchangeablebilities.
ScolePratiquedesHautes1tudes,Sorbonne
Paris,France
444