Wild Thought
A New Translation of "la Pensee Sauvage"
Claude Levi-Strauss author Jeffrey Mehlman translator John Leavitt translator
Format:Paperback
Publisher:The University of Chicago Press
Published:5th Nov '20
Should be back in stock very soon
Perhaps the most influential anthropologist of his generation, Claude Levi-Strauss left a profound mark on the development of twentieth-century thought, equal to that of phenomenology and existentialism. Through a fertile mixture of insights gleaned from linguistics and from sociology and ethnology, Levi-Strauss elaborated his theory of structural unity in culture and became the preeminent representative of structural anthropology. La Pensee sauvage, published in French in 1962, was his crowning achievement. Ranging over philosophies, historical periods, and human societies, it challenged the prevailing assumption of the superiority of modern Western culture and sought to explain the unity of human intellection. Unfortunately titled The Savage Mind when it first published in English in 1966, the original translation nevertheless sparked a fascination with Levi-Strauss's work among generations of Anglophone readers. Wild Thought: A New Translation of "La Pensee sauvage" rekindles that spark with a fresh and accessible new translation. Including critical annotations for the contemporary reader, it restores the accuracy and integrity of the book that changed the course of twentieth-century thought, making it an indispensable addition to any philosophical and anthropological library.
“The arrival of Mehlman and Leavitt’s new translation is, then, an event. Finally, there is a fresh, agile English rendering of one of the 20th century’s greatest, strangest and most challenging works.”
* London Review of Books *
"An accessible new translation of the modern classic by the predominant theorist of structural anthropology, this tome displaced Western culture’s sense of its own superiority and showed the structural unity of human intellect." * The Bookseller *
"The new title points to what the book subverts, namely the assumption that societies described as ‘primitive’ are intellectually undeveloped. Lévi-Srauss shows, on the contrary, an equality in their compulsion to observe and record distinctions and patterns." * The Prisma *
“This new translation of Lévi-Strauss’s masterpiece is a revelation. To read Wild Thought is to marvel in the curiosity not only of its illustrious author but also of the countless people whose conceptual wizardry spills out onto the pages. In engaging and delightful prose, Wild Thought lets Anglophone readers at last relish the sheer joyousness and ingenuity of an unparalleled intellectual adventure.” * Tim Ingold, University of Aberdeen *
“At last, a definitive and extensively annotated translation of Lévi-Strauss’s prescient La Pensée sauvage. Cultivating wild forms of thought is more important today than Lévi-Strauss could ever have imagined.” * Eduardo Kohn, McGill University *
“Wild Thought marks the turning point in Lévi-Strauss's long career, opening the way for his monumental analysis of the mythology of the Americas. But above all, it is the book that put anthropology at the forefront of the human sciences, by methodically dissolving the evolutionist and colonialist presuppositions of the whole metaphysical machinery of Reason, History, and Progress. This much-needed new English translation will reintroduce Lévi-Strauss's essential work for the next generation of scholars and expert anthropologists alike.” * Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, National Museum of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro *
“Wild Thought is a fantastic rendering—a timely translation for anthropology’s most timeless mind.” * Matthew Engelke, Columbia University *
ISBN: 9780226413082
Dimensions: unknown
Weight: unknown
328 pages