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Methodologies of Structuralism

Claude Levi-Strauss analyzed myths using structuralism, identifying recurring narrative elements (mythemes) that operate in relationships of opposition, similar to the building blocks of language (Saussure's principles). Mythemes find meaning through their relationships and often involve binary oppositions. Vladimir Propp identified 31 narrative functions that folk/fairy tales universally follow in sequence, such as the hero receiving a call to adventure or encountering a magical helper. Paul Vehvilainen later simplified these to a 5-point system involving a lack, quest, encounter, test, and reward that follows the same ordered pattern.

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596 views11 pages

Methodologies of Structuralism

Claude Levi-Strauss analyzed myths using structuralism, identifying recurring narrative elements (mythemes) that operate in relationships of opposition, similar to the building blocks of language (Saussure's principles). Mythemes find meaning through their relationships and often involve binary oppositions. Vladimir Propp identified 31 narrative functions that folk/fairy tales universally follow in sequence, such as the hero receiving a call to adventure or encountering a magical helper. Paul Vehvilainen later simplified these to a 5-point system involving a lack, quest, encounter, test, and reward that follows the same ordered pattern.

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anthony
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Methodologies of

Structuralism
Claude Levi-Strauss
• One of the first scholar-
researchers to implement
Saussure's principles
• French anthropologist
• Attracted to the rich symbols in
myths
• He assumed myth possessed a
structure like language.
Mythemes
• Levi-Strauss identified recurrent themes running
through all of the myths he has read.
• basic structures, which he called mythemes, are
similar to the primary building blocks of language
• mythemes find meaning in and through their
relationships within the mythic structure which often
involve oppositions.
Mythemes that Show its
Opposing Nature
• Hating or loving one's parents,
• falling in love with someone who does or who
does not love you,
• cherishing or abandoning one's children
Intertextuality of Myth
• Shakespeare's King Lear
• Overestimates the value and support of children
when he trusts Regan and Goneril, his two oldest
daughters to take care of him in his old age
• He also underestimates the value and support of
children when he banishes his youngest and
most-loved daughter, Cordelia.
• the binary opposition of underestimating versus
overestimating love automatically occurs when
reading the text, for such mythemes have
occurred in countless other texts and
immediately ignite emotions within readers.
Vladimir Propp
• Russian Formalist critic
(1895-1970)
• Writer of the text of
Morphology of the Folk
Tale (1928)
• investigates Russian fairy
tales to decode their
langue
Narrative Functions
• all folk or fairy tales are based on thirty-one fixed
elements that occur in a given sequence.
• Each function identifies predictable patterns or
functions that central characters, such as the
hero, the villain, or the helper, enact to further
the plot of the story.
• Any story may use any number of these
elements, such as "accepting the call to
adventure," "recognizing the
hero," and "punishing the villain,”
among others, but each element occurs in its
logical and proper sequence.
Narrative Functions Simplified
• A lack of something exists.
• This lack forces the hero to go on a quest to
eliminate this lack.
• During the quest, the hero encounters a magical
helper.
• This helper is subjected to one or more tests.
• After passing the test(s), the hero receives a reward.
• Paul Vehvilainen, have simplified Propp's thirty-
one functions into a five-point system that, like
Propp's, always occurs in the same order.
• Like Propp's thirty-one functions, these
simplified five basic functions can be applied to
most fairy tales.

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