+ All Categories
Home > Documents > Barnard 2000

Barnard 2000

Date post: 10-Apr-2018
Category:
Upload: anth5334
View: 226 times
Download: 0 times
Share this document with a friend
10
8 Str ucturalism, from lingui stics to anthropology 'Struc turalism' refers to those th eoretic al persp ectives which giv e primacy to pa ttern ove r substance. For a structurali st, mea ning comes through knowing how things fit together, not fro m understanding thin gs inisola- tion. There are so me simil arities between structu ralism and structural-func - tionali sm: both are concer ned with rel atio ns bet ween thi ngs . However, the re are import ant dif fer enc es. Str uct ura l-fu nct ionali sm finds orde r within soci al re lations . Structu ralists are gener ally as interested in struc- tur es of thought as in s truc tur es of society. Mor eover, the struc tura l- functio nalism of Radcli ffe-Bro wn was bas ed mainly on inductive reason - ing. On e starts with data and sees what generaliza tions can be made about them. Stru cturali sts often employ a method which is primari ly deduc tive, tha t is, base d on cert ain pre mise s. Str uct ura list s might foll ow t hes e premise s and see where they lead, rather as inalgebra or g eometry . They oft en pref er to wor k o ut log ic al possibi lit ies f ir s t, a nd then see how 'rea lity ' fits . Inde ed, for a tr ue stru cturalist, the re is no reali ty except th e relatio n between things. Claud e Levi-Strau ss has bee n interes ted in b oth the intemallogic of a cult ure and the re lat ion of that logic to st ruc tures beyond the cul~ e.- the Stru cture of al l possib le stru ctures of some par tic ula r kind. TIll s ISes- peciall y the cas e in his work on kinship (e.g., Levi-Str auss 1969a [1949~; 1966a) , argu abl y the most str uct ure d rea lm of cult ure . Yet, whil e U:,~ Straus s is both the best known and the most charac teristic of strUctu rahs t thin ker s, stru ctural ist thought is applic able more wide ly. I t came into ant hropol ogy thr ough ling uis tics , and the wor k of Fe rdin and de Sa~s~ sur e, among others, is si gni fica nt in its antic ipat ion of the strUct ur ahst ant hropol ogical ente rpr ise . Structuralist though t has gone throu gh an - thro pol ogy to litera ry critic ism too, but the last field will not concer n US here. I fthe Fre nch stru ctur alism of Le vi- Strauss is cha rac terized by a con- ith th crur al - cern WI e s tr uc t u re of all possibl e st ructu res then Dutc h str u ism focuses more on regi ons , as in regi onal str uct ura l ana lys is (se e al so Structuralism, from linguistics to anthropology chapte r4)· British st ructur alism, at least in the han ds of its early pro pon- ents,focuses more on parti cul ar soc iet ies. The se nat ional tra ditions will be touche d on at the end of this cha pte r. Saussur e and structura l lingu istics Swisslingui st F erdina nd de Sauss ure is arg uably the most impo rtant structu ralistof a ll. Howeve r, the theory with which he is associ ated is not onehe wrote on. Ra the r, we know it through his lec tur es, col lect ed and publish edin h is name in 191 6 - thr ee yea rs aft er his death. His inf lue nce in the English-speak ing worl d was slow to catch on. The lec tur es were publis hedin English only in 1960. I sha ll dra w her e on a subsequently revise dediti on (Saussure 1974) . Saussu re and his 'Cour se' S.a ~~sure (de Sa uss ure ) was born in Gene va in 1857. He studie d the re (Illltlally, physic s a nd chemist ry) and in Lei pzig (compa rative philolo gy), and~etaught philolo gy in Paris before returning to his na tive city in 189 1 . Inhis life time he was best known for compa rat ive and histor ica l studie s on Indo-Eur opean vowel s ys t e ms. Some of this wor k seems to for e- s~ado wstructu ralism: later commen tators (e.g., Culler 1976: 66--7) have ~cked up on the fac t tha t eve n in his tor ical rec ons truc tion Saussure saw Li~re[ ~tion betwee n elemen ts of la nguag e as the key to linguis tic analys is. e hisnear c ont emporary Durkheim, he had a fo ot in bot h diac hronic ~ sy?ch. ronic camps - indeed he virt ual ly invent ed the distinction. of! e In hIS~ub ~ishe~ work h e maint ained the tra ditional histor ical view Ra~~age, Inhis private lec tur es he ant icip ate d Boa s, Mal inowski, and SUb· C Itfe -Br own in stre ssing synchr oni c and relat ional elements of his  jett. The lectures S . kn aussur e gave I nGeneva bet wee n I906 and 1911 bec ame 197 ow n [ as the Course in General Lingu istics or simply the Course (Saussure 4 1916]) Thi ( 1 0 0 the li . s a ong With some of the work of Edward Sapir) mar ks ear leSt emphas · hr la ngu I ISon sync orne, str u ctu ral analysis I nthe s tu dy of  stud a g f e . t al.s o mark s the foundation of semiolo gy or semiotic s (the sur/ ~ mea nmg thro ugh 'sig ns' ) and the dawn of str uctu rali sm. Sau s- COne t~ at the wid er, semiol ogi cal implica tions of his work, but his dispa: ~.In lthe Course was expl icit ly with language . Indeed, he spea ks racialh ging y of t he use of li ngu isti cs, for exa mpl e, in rec onstructin g the 222_S ).lstOr y and Psy cholo gical make-u p of ethnic groups (1974 [1916]:
Transcript
Page 1: Barnard 2000

8/8/2019 Barnard 2000

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/barnard-2000 1/10

Page 2: Barnard 2000

8/8/2019 Barnard 2000

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/barnard-2000 2/10

Page 3: Barnard 2000

8/8/2019 Barnard 2000

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/barnard-2000 3/10

Page 4: Barnard 2000

8/8/2019 Barnard 2000

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/barnard-2000 4/10

Page 5: Barnard 2000

8/8/2019 Barnard 2000

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/barnard-2000 5/10

Page 6: Barnard 2000

8/8/2019 Barnard 2000

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/barnard-2000 6/10

Page 7: Barnard 2000

8/8/2019 Barnard 2000

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/barnard-2000 7/10

Page 8: Barnard 2000

8/8/2019 Barnard 2000

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/barnard-2000 8/10

Page 9: Barnard 2000

8/8/2019 Barnard 2000

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/barnard-2000 9/10

Page 10: Barnard 2000

8/8/2019 Barnard 2000

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/barnard-2000 10/10


Recommended