Category Archives: Claude Lévi-Strauss

Did Émile Benveniste try to escape to the USA from Lyon in the Second World War?

Posted on June 28, 2026 by stuartelden

As part of my research on Georges Dumézil and Émile Benveniste, I’ve been tracing their quite different experiences in the Second World War. Both lost their teaching positions under Vichy, although for very different reasons – Dumézil because he had once … Continue reading →

Posted in Claude Lévi-Strauss, Emile Benveniste, Jean de Menasce, Jean Wahl, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, Roman Jakobson, Sunday Histories, T.S. Eliot | Leave a comment

Trevor Pateman on Barthes as a teacher, and attending classes by Foucault, Derrida, Lévi-Strauss and Jakobson

Posted on February 18, 2026 by stuartelden

A very interesting short piece about spending the 1971-72 academic year in Paris – Trevor Pateman, “Roland Barthes: Writer, Intellectual, and also Professor”, Barthes Studies, 2025 (open access). It briefly mentions Foucault: But Barthes’ preferences were very similar to Foucault’s … Continue reading →

Posted in Claude Lévi-Strauss, Jacques Derrida, Jacques Lacan, Michel Foucault, Roland Barthes, Roman Jakobson | Leave a comment

Umberto Eco, Philosophers, Mythologists and Linguists

Posted on February 15, 2026 by stuartelden

19 February 2026 marks the 10th anniversary of the death of Umberto Eco. I only heard Eco speak once, at a book reading in October 1995 for The Island of the Day Before. Mario Vargas Llosa was the other scheduled speaker, but … Continue reading →

Posted in Claude Lévi-Strauss, Emile Benveniste, Georges Canguilhem, Georges Dumézil, Italo Calvino, Jacques Lacan, Louis Althusser, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, Michel Foucault, Roland Barthes, Roman Jakobson, Sunday Histories, The Archaeology of Foucault, Umberto Eco, Uncategorized | 5 Comments

Indo-European Thought in Twentieth-Century France update 31 – Paris archives, library problems, and working towards a complete draft

Posted on February 12, 2026 by stuartelden

The draft of the Mapping Indo-European Thought manuscript is slowly coming together. I’ve just begun a Fernand Braudel fellowship at the European University Institute in Florence. My plan was to come here with a complete draft, and to leave with a better … Continue reading →

Posted in Claude Lévi-Strauss, Clémence Ramnoux, Emile Benveniste, Felix Guattari, Georges Dumézil, Gilles Deleuze, Jacques Derrida, Jacques Lacan, Julia Kristeva, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, Marcel Detienne, Michel Foucault, Mircea Eliade, Roland Barthes, Sunday Histories, Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Roland Barthes and the Question of Territory – Animals, Spaces and Sound

Posted on January 25, 2026 by stuartelden

Roland Barthes only taught at the Collège de France for a short period, from the 1976-77 academic year until shortly before his premature death in early 1980. I was drawn to his lecture courses there for my current work because he sometimes … Continue reading →

Posted in André Leroi-Gourhan, Boundaries, Claude Lévi-Strauss, Emile Benveniste, Felix Guattari, Gilles Deleuze, Jacques Lacan, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, Music, Noam Chomsky, Roland Barthes, Roman Jakobson, Sunday Histories, Territory, Theory | 2 Comments

Claude Lévi-Strauss and Roger Caillois – Race, Games and a Ceremonial Sword

Posted on December 28, 2025 by stuartelden

Roger Caillois and Claude Lévi-Strauss both spent the war in exile from France. Lévi-Strauss had done fieldwork in Brazil in the 1930s, but when he left France he went through Martinique and was detained in Puerto Rico before going to … Continue reading →

Posted in Claude Lévi-Strauss, Georges Dumézil, Roger Caillois, Roman Jakobson, Sunday Histories, Uncategorized | 3 Comments

Books received – Davy, Luyssen, Deleuze, Lévi-Strauss and Dreyfus, Derrida

Posted on December 24, 2025 by stuartelden

Some second-hand or new French books, including Johanna Luyssen, Les Fragments d’Hélène, Deleuze’s Sur l’appareil d’État et la machine de guerre: Cours novembre 1979-mars 1980 and Sur Spinoza, Aux sources de tristes tropiques. Les carnets de terrain de Claude et Dina … Continue reading →

Posted in Claude Lévi-Strauss, Gilles Deleuze, Jacques Derrida | Leave a comment

Gordon and Tina Wasson, Slavic Studies in the Cold War, and the Hallucinogenic Mushroom

Posted on November 23, 2025 by stuartelden

R. Gordon Wasson was Vice President at the American investment bank J.P. Morgan & Co., a major supporter of Slavic Studies in the United States during the Cold War, and fascinated by hallucinogenic mushrooms.  His wife, Valentina Pavlovna Wasson was … Continue reading →

Posted in Claude Lévi-Strauss, Roman Jakobson, Sunday Histories, Uncategorized | 6 Comments

Indo-European Thought in Twentieth-Century France update 30 – archive work in Paris, Bern and Cambridge, MA, and Benveniste’s library

Posted on November 12, 2025 by stuartelden

The formal end of the Leverhulme major research fellowship for the Indo-European thought project was at the end of September, but I have a no-cost extension until the end of January. This is invaluable, and is effectively to extend the grant for … Continue reading →

Posted in Étienne Wolff, Claude Lévi-Strauss, David Harvey, Emile Benveniste, Ernst Kantorowicz, Erwin Panofsky, Georges Bataille, Georges Canguilhem, Georges Dumézil, Jacques Derrida, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, Michel Foucault, Pierre Bourdieu, Roman Jakobson, Sunday Histories, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Jacques Derrida, Given Time II, eds. Laura Odello, Peter Szendy and Rodrigo Therezo, trans. Geoffrey Bennington and Peggy Kamuf – University of Chicago Press, March 2026

Posted on November 3, 2025 by stuartelden

Jacques Derrida, Given Time II, eds. Laura Odello, Peter Szendy and Rodrigo Therezo, trans. Geoffrey Bennington and Peggy Kamuf – University of Chicago Press, March 2026 The long-awaited conclusion to Derrida’s seminar on the gift and time. In 1991, Jacques … Continue reading →

Posted in Claude Lévi-Strauss, Jacques Derrida, Jacques Lacan, Marcel Mauss, Martin Heidegger, Maurice Blanchot, Uncategorized | 1 Comment