• DOI:10.1353/jhi.2005.0054
• Corpus ID: 54015565

The Advent of Heroic Anthropology in the History of Ideas

@article{Doja2005TheAO,
  title={The Advent of Heroic Anthropology in the History of Ideas},
  author={Albert Doja},
  journal={Journal of the History of Ideas},
  year={2005},
  volume={66},
  pages={633 - 650}
}

• A. Doja
• Published 20 December 2005
• Art
• Journal of the History of Ideas

In this article the advent of Levi-Strauss’s structural
anthropology is described as a reaction against the predominantly phenomenological bias of French philosophy in the post-war years as well as against the old humanism of existentialism which seemed parochial both in its confinement to a specific tradition of western philosophy and in its lack of interest in scientific approach. Nevertheless, the paradigm of structural anthropology cannot be equated with the field of structuralism,
which became a very contestable form of intellectual fashion. The reception of Levi-Strauss’s theory in the English-speaking world carried on both the same enthusiasm and the same distortions and simplifications, to the extent that in the course of anti-structural criticism, the main
thrust of the epistemological approach of Levi-Strauss seems to have been lost, to the collective detriment of social sciences and anthropology.