Category Archives: Emile Benveniste

Indo-European Thought in Twentieth-Century France update 26: Benveniste’s late publications; Sunday Histories; beginning archival work in the United States

Posted on February 14, 2025 by stuartelden

Since the last update in December, I’ve been making some good progress on this project. The focus has mainly been on Benveniste’s work in the 1960s. But, as ever, I’ve found myself backtracking to earlier parts of his career and seeing some potentially … Continue reading →

Posted in Alexandre Koyré, Claude Lévi-Strauss, Emile Benveniste, Ernst Kantorowicz, Georges Dumézil, Henri Lefebvre, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, Michel Foucault, Roman Jakobson, Sunday Histories, Uncategorized, Understanding Henri Lefebvre | Leave a comment

Sunday histories – short essays on Progressive Geographies

Posted on February 2, 2025 by stuartelden

Updated June 2025: The full list of essays in this series is here. Over the past several years, my Progressive Geographies blog has become too much of a noticeboard, sharing information about books, talks or shorter pieces by other people … Continue reading →

Posted in Emile Benveniste, Georges Dumézil, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, Michel Foucault, Sunday Histories | 2 Comments

Thomas Sebeok, Umberto Eco and the Semiotics of Nuclear Waste

Posted on February 2, 2025 by stuartelden

The oldest texts preserved are inscriptions which date back about 5,000 years, though the dating is disputed, and how they should be read presents its own controversies. Most of the earliest texts are on tablets or in stone; with surviving … Continue reading →

Posted in Emile Benveniste, Julia Kristeva, Roman Jakobson, Sunday Histories, Umberto Eco | 19 Comments

Marie-Louise Sjoestedt (1900-1940): an important scholar of Celtic languages and mythology

Posted on January 26, 2025 by stuartelden

One of the challenges with my current project on Indo-European thought in France is how male-dominated it is. If you look at a photograph of the professors of the Collège de France in 1967, you can perhaps see why. It wasn’t much better at the … Continue reading →

Posted in Antoine Meillet, Emile Benveniste, Georges Dumézil, Sunday Histories | 15 Comments

Benveniste and the Linguistic Circle of Prague

Posted on January 19, 2025 by stuartelden

There are some good histories of the Linguistic Circle of Prague, which met in the years before the Second World War, and which included Russian scholars as well as ones from Czechoslovakia. Jindřich Toman’s The Magic of a Common Language is a particularly … Continue reading →

Posted in Antoine Meillet, Emile Benveniste, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, Roman Jakobson, Sunday Histories, Uncategorized | 11 Comments

Benveniste, Dumézil, Lejeune and the decipherment of Linear B

Posted on January 5, 2025 by stuartelden

In April 1956, at Gif-sur-Yvette just outside of Paris, the first meeting of the International Colloquium on Mycenaean texts took place. The proceedings of the conference, edited by Michel Lejeune, were published later that year as Études mycéniennes: Actes du Colloque international sur … Continue reading →

Posted in Emile Benveniste, Georges Dumézil, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, Sunday Histories | 16 Comments

Books received – Foucault, Greimas, Lévi-Strauss, Derrida, Vernant, Lejeune

Posted on December 30, 2024 by stuartelden

Most of these bought on a recent Paris trip, and a couple from online second-hand stores. Spectres of Marx is a new edition, including a debate with Étienne Balibar; Du même à l’autre is the most recent seminar volume, including … Continue reading →

Posted in Claude Lévi-Strauss, Emile Benveniste, Georges Dumézil, Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault | 1 Comment

Indo-European Thought in Twentieth-Century France update 25: Benveniste’s teaching, a talk at St Andrews, Tzvetan Todorov, Roman Jakobson, and some archival work in Paris and Oxford

Posted on December 20, 2024 by stuartelden

I’m overdue an update on this project, but while I’ve been working hard, I haven’t felt there has been much to say until now. I’ve also had some further health problems, leading to another shorter stay in hospital and the … Continue reading →

Posted in Alexandre Koyré, Claude Lévi-Strauss, Emile Benveniste, Georges Dumézil, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, Michel Foucault, Roman Jakobson | 3 Comments

Émile Benveniste, Problèmes de linguistique générale – Problems in General Linguistics and other English translations – list updated

Posted on December 19, 2024 by stuartelden

I’ve updated the page Émile Benveniste, Problèmes de linguistique générale – Problems in General Linguistics and other English translations Thanks to Jordan K. Skinner, the editor of the forthcoming new edition of Problems for some new information. A translation of a … Continue reading →

Posted in Emile Benveniste, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Émile Benveniste, Problèmes de linguistique générale – Problems in General Linguistics and other English translations

Posted on December 3, 2024 by stuartelden

Émile Benveniste’s Problèmes de linguistique générale was published in two volumes in 1966 and 1974 by Gallimard, and later reprinted in the Tel series (volumes 1 and 2). The first volume brought together essays from 1939 to 1964, and was compiled … Continue reading →

Posted in Bartolus of Sassoferrato, Emile Benveniste, Ferdinand de Saussure, Georges Dumézil, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, Uncategorized | Leave a comment