Structuralism: Claude Levi-Strauss and Prague School of Linguistics

Born to a French-Jewish parents in Brussels (Belgium) on 28 November 1908, Claude Levi-Strauss, lived quite a long life, only 29 days short of 101 years. On 30 October 2009, he died in Paris. Levi-Strauss has been one of the most influential intellectual figures of the twentieth century, not only in anthropology, but his academic and intellectual influence surpassed far across the disciplinary boundaries. Even today, he is remembered and profoundly respected as an ‘anthropologist-cum-ethnologist-cum-linguist-cum-sociologist-cum philosopher’. Structural Anthropology or Structuralism is known by his name. He held the Chair of Social Anthropology at the College de France from 1959 to 1982. He was elected a member of Academie Francaise in 1973, and was a member of the School for Advanced Studies in Social Science in Paris. He was also recipient of the prestigious Italian literary International Nonino Prize in 1986. Besides the above, he received numerous honours from universities and institutions from across the world. He was the instrumental figure in opening and proliferating the teaching and researches in anthropology in France. Alongside James Frazer and Franz Boas, Claude Levi-Strauss is also considered by many, as the ‘father of modern anthropology’.