Wild Thought: A New Translation of "la Pensee Sauvage"

Perhaps the most influential anthropologist of his generation, Claude Lévi-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, Lévi-Strauss elaborated his theory of structural unity in culture and became the preeminent representative of structural anthropology. La Pensée 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 Lévi-Strauss’s work among generations of Anglophone readers. Wild Thought: A New Translation of “La Pensée 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.

Table of Contents:
Translators’ Introduction by John Leavitt Prospectus for La Pensée sauvage, 1962 Preface 1    The Science of the Concrete 2    The Logic of Totemic Classifications 3    Systems of Transformation 4    Totem and Caste 5    Categories, Elements, Species, Numbers 6    Universalization and Particularization 7    The Individual as Species 8    Time Regained 9    History and Dialectic Appendix: On the Wild Pansy Bibliography Notes to the Translation Index

About the Author :
Claude Levi-Strauss (1908-2009) is the most important anthropologist of the twentieth century, a leader in structuralist thought, and one of the key figures in the history of modern thought. He held the chair of social anthropology at the College de France between 1959 and 1982 and was elected a member of the Academie francaise in 1973. His many influential works include Tristes Tropiques, Structural Anthropology, Totemism, and Wild Thought, among others. The Press has published many English editions of his works. Jeffrey Mehlman is University Professor of French at Boston University. He is the author of several books, as well as a translator of many texts by Lacan and Derrida, among others. John Leavitt is a translator and professeur titulaire of anthropology at the University of Montreal. He is the author of Linguistic Relativities and the editor of Poetry and Prophecy.

Review :
“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.”   "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 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." “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.” “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.” “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.” “Wild Thought is a fantastic rendering—a timely translation for anthropology’s most timeless mind.”