Semiotics for Beginners by Daniel Chandler

Semiotics for Beginners by Daniel Chandler
underlying each institution and each custom, in order to obtain a principle of interpretation valid
for other institutions and other customs, provided of course that the analysis is carried far
enough. (Lévi-Strauss 1972, 21)
Lévi-Strauss undertook synchronic studies of systems of cultural practices, seeking to identify
underlying semantic oppositions in relation to such phenomena as myths, totemism and kinship rules.
Individual myths and cultural practices defy interpretation, making sense only as a part of a system of
differences and oppositions expressing fundamental reflections on the relationship of nature and
culture. This is expressed in terms of the relations between humankind and various other
phenomena, such as: animals, plants, supernatural beings, heavenly bodies, forms of food and so on.
Certain binary distinctions based on the form of human body are universal and seem fundamental -
notably male/female and right/left. 'Such natural pairs are invariably loaded with cultural significance -
they are made into the prototype symbols of the good and the bad, the permitted and the forbidden'
(Leach 1970, 44). Lévi-Strauss argues that within a culture 'analogical thought' leads to some
oppositions (such as edible/inedible) being perceived as metaphorically resembling the 'similar
differences' of other oppositions (such as native/foreign) (Lévi-Strauss 1974).
Lévi-Strauss reported three stages in his analytical method:
(1) define the phenomenon under study as a relation between two or more terms, real or
supposed;
(2) construct a table of possible permutations between these terms;
(3) take this table as the general object of analysis which, at this level only, can yield
necessary connections, the empirical phenomenon considered at the beginning being only one
possible combination among others, the complete system of which must be reconstructed
beforehand. (Lévi-Strauss 1964, 16)
For Lévi-Strauss, myths represent a dreamlike working-over of a fundamental dilemma or
contradiction within a culture which can be expressed in the form of a pair of oppositions. The
development of the myth constitutes a repeated reframing of this tension through layers of paired
opposites which are transformations of the primary pair. These layers begin with classifications based
on physical perception and become increasingly more generalized. Claude Lévi-Strauss has
demonstrated how cooking transforms Nature into Culture: South American myths oppose the raw to
the cooked (Lévi-Strauss 1970). He comments on his theorizing: 'In order to construct this system of
myths about cooking, we found ourselves obliged to use oppositions between terms all more or less
drawn from sensory qualities: raw and cooked, fresh and rotten, and so forth. Now we find that the
second step in our analysis reveals terms still opposed in pairs, but whose nature is different to the
degree that they involve not so much a logic of qualities as one of forms: empty and full, container
and contents, internal and external, included and excluded, etc.' (cited in Jameson 1972, 118-119).
In a major review of the anthropological literature, Lévi-Strauss famously and provocatively declared
that 'exchange, as a total phenomenon, is from the first a total exchange, comprising food,
manufactured objects and that most precious category of goods, women' (Lévi-Strauss 1969, 60-1).
We have referred already to his reflections on the significance of our preparation of food. His
observations on the social phenomenon of exchange are distinctive because he argued that exogamy
(marrying outside the group) and more generally 'the relations between the sexes' are a form of
communication (ibid., 493-4). Language, economics and sexuality - thus arguably the basis of all