Myth Analysis: Structuralism and Levi Strauss

 

Structural Analysis of Myth : 

Theory, Practice and Application of Structuralism by Levi Strauss

According to Claude Levi Strauss, Myths are the primary and basic sources to look at the categories which constitutes structure of a society or culture through the emergence of binary opposition. When we look at myth, it understood in terms of time where past and present come together. If tribal people have myth there will be a similar kind of representation of the myth in the complex society through culture, paintings, stories etc.  Myth is the product of the creativity of Human mind in a free motion. Levi Strauss looked at Myth in 2 ways-

1.      As an historical analysis, like how myth enables us to understand the contemporary structure, folk, music, theatre etc.

2.      In terms of the structure of the myth, free from restriction of surface structure.

Any myth can be broken down into its constituent units and can be understood or coded in terms of binary opposition. Levi Strauss says, when we analyse myth, we look at it as a sequence of happening,( one thing after one thing). In myth after few units there is a  repeat like a music (notations of repeat), where the melody repeat itself is a way and creates the harmony.

1. Analysis of the Myth of Oedipus Rex:

Claude Levi Strauss segregated the myth into the level of Mythemes. Mythemes are the constituent units of a Myth. In mythic structure, mythemes are equivalent of the word sounds, like when we study language structure we identify its constituent unit through the word sounds.

Myths may have many versions. According to Levi Strauss the version he has studied on has certain key things to understand the myth. Like,

1.      Zeus ravished Europa

2.      Cadmus Killed the Dragon

3.      Spartoi killed each other

4.      Oedipus killed Laois

5.      Oedipus married Jacosta

6.      Eteocles killed his brother Polynices and

7.      Sister Antigone gave burial to her brother Polynices

Other than these, nothing is significant to understand the myth and without these events this particular myth doesn’t have any meaning.

Myth is the transformation of model. Analysis of the myth looking t the contradictions and binary oppositions of the myth. The contradicts are scattered, we have to pick out the binary oppositions .

Using Deductive Model, Levi Strauss first reduced the Oedipus myth into the individual mythemes, which are the constituent building blocks of the myth. He then ranged them in a unique pattern of Rows and Columns.

Mythemes for the Analysis of the myth of Oedipus Rex:

Blood relations are overrated	Blood relations are underrated	Monster slain (Denial of Autochthonous)	Walk clumsily (autochthonous)
Cadmus seeks his sister
Europa ravished by Zeus
		Cadmus kills the Dragon
	The Spartoi kills each other		Labdacos (Laois Father)  lame
	Oedipus kills his father Laois		Laois (Oedipus father) left sided
		Oedipus kills the Sphinx
Oedipus marries his mother Jacosta
		Eteocles kills his brother Polynices
Antigone buries her brother Polynices despite prohibition			Oedipus swollen foot

 

All the units that are listed in the chart are actually individual mytheme like Cadmus seeking his sister, Oedipus marries his mother Jacosta and Antigone buries her brother Polynices despite prohibition, Cadmus kills Dragon, Oedipus Kills the Sphinx and so on and forth, each unit represents one mytheme. Levi Strauss says if we read the mythemes horizontally by disregarding their divisions in column, we will get the narration or parole  of the myth and in Order to understand the structuring of the myth we need to read the mythemes vertically and have to pay attention to the columns instead of reading it horizontally.

Now, we can see that the 1^st two columns in the left are in an oppositional relationship to each other and in similar manner the last two columns in the right side are also in an oppositional relationship to each other.

This is the typical way in which a structuralist critique would engaged with a narrative.so have to 1^st segregate the narration into its constituent blocks and have to find out the oppositional relationships that exists between them, two find out the grammar of the relationship between the constituent parts and the structuring of the narration. Typically a structuralist criticism would produce such nit rose of binary opposites for the analysis.

2 left most column: they have something or other to do with family . In the 1^st column there are overrating of family relations while in column 2 there is the exact opposite that is underrating of family relations. 1^st column mythemes are talking about excessive intimate among blood relationships which ties the mythemes column 1 into a single bundle, overrating of blood relationships.  They make a mytheme category.

Column 2 is binary opposite to column 1 which are the expression of what Levi Strauss calls the underrating of blood relations

Binary opposition set 2:  column 3 refers to 2 monsters, Dragon and Sphinx. Both of them by Levi Strauss described as the Thyonian creatures which means they are regarded as the creatures who are born out of the earth. These creatures all killed which signifies the denial of the thionic existence.

Column 4 on the other hand obeying the rule of structuralism and playing the role of binary opposition upholds the notion of thionic origin and thionic existence. This upholding of the thionic origin is gathered from the fact that all the characters mentioned in this column , all of them have defective feet or some problem of walking. This according to Levi Strauss is the typical character that various myths across the world associates with creatures who are born out of the earth, thionic creatures.

So, we have 2 kind of binary representation. 1^st two column represents the binary of overrating and underrating of blood relations and 2^nd opposition is represented by column 3 and column 4 which represents the denial of thionic existence and the assertion of the thionic existence. Now, if we place this two sets of oppositional relationship side by side they will look something like this, 

this then reduces the mythic narrative in a nit set of structural opposition but it does not produce any obvious explanation as of yet about how this underlying mythic structure provides human beings with a tool to negotiate his or her sense of being in the world or how does it structures his or her world view.

To connect this structural opposition underlined the Oedipus myth with a larger social culture context Levi Strauss argues that this underlined language of the Oedipus myth actually provides a tool to the primitive human being through which he articulates the  conflicting notions of his origin.

The society that produced this myth or in turns structured this myth was toned between two notions of human origin that How did human being came into being? The first notion was that the Human beings were Autochthonous which means that they have originally sprang out of the Earth, they were born out of the Earth and the 2^nd notion was human being originated from the sexual union between male and female within a social structure off family. Both the notions are validated by the quotidian experience.

Now the deep structural grammar under the Oedipus myth does not actually helps us to solve this conflict between the two notions of human origin but it gives us a language through which to coherently articulate this opposition and place them side by side for a better understanding.

In own words of Levi Strauss, “The myth has to do with the inability, for a culture which holds the belief that mankind is autochthonous, to find a satisfactory transition between this theory and the knowledge that the human beings are actually born from the union of man and woman. Although the problem obviously cannot be solved. The Oedipus myth provides a kind of logical tool which relates the original problem – born from one or born from two? – to the derivative problem: born from different or born from the same? ”

Following this logic the 1^st two column of Levi Straus’s chart get translated as follows…

Since column 1 is talking about overrating of blood relations and the uphold of the family structure, it could be taken to signify an assertion of the notion of human origin through sexual union. On the contrary column 2 since it speaks of underrating of blood relations and the family structure can be taken to mean a denial of the notion of human origin through sexual union. Column 3 which speaks of the denial of the existence of the thionic creatures can be taken as the signifier to the denial of human being autochthonous origin  where the column 4 which upholds the thionic existence can be takien to signify an assertion of human being’s autochthonous origin. The two sets of opposition can be written as this,

Two equal kind of Binary Unit. The equal sign representing the assertion of birth to sexual union equals on the other side denial of the autochthonous origin and in the below section the denial of the birth through sexual relation is equal to the assertion of autochthonous origin. So this is what the myth of Oedipus Rex means at a deeper level. This is the Lang of the Oedipus myth and narrative. And irrespective to any individual kind of paroles it is the structural grammar that is presented by its lang which guides the Oedipus narrative. There can be individual variations of paroles but this same lang will guide or structure all of the paroles. The structuralist analysis of narratives depends on identifying the underlined structuring principle that informs any kind of narrative. This is the way we can approach structurally in narrative.

 

2. The Myth of Persephone:

Greek Goddess of the Underworld

It was a beautiful day like all the others in this land, the sun shone brightly in the sky, the hills were lush and green, and flowers blossomed from the earth. The lovely young maiden, Persephone, frolicked with her friends upon the hillside, as her mother Demeter sat near by, and her father Zeus peered down from the sky above. Laughter could be heard in between the young girls' whispered secrets, as they gathered handfuls of purple crocuses, royal blue irises and sweet-smelling hyacinths. Persephone thought to bring some to her mother, but was soon distracted by a vision of the most enchanting flower she had ever seen. It was a narcissus, the exact flower her father hoped that she would find. As she reached down to pluck it from its resting place, her feet began to tremble and the earth was split in two. Life for Persephone would never be the same again. From this gaping crevice in the ground emerged the awe-inspiring God of the Underworld, Hades, and before Persephone could even think to utter a word, she was whisked off her feet onto the God's golden chariot. As the crack of the whip upon his majestic horses brought her to her senses, she realized she was about to taken into the black depths from which he'd come. The thought of this brought terror to her heart, yet any creams of protest were soon lost within the darkness, as they descended quickly into the Underworld below.

While Persephone's cries could not be heard above the ground, the pain in Demeter's heart quickly alerted her to the fact that something was terribly wrong. She searched high and low for her dear daughter, who had vanished from both the heavens and the earth. Consumed by depression over the loss of her child, she soon ceased to remember her worldly duties as Goddess of Grain and Growth. As she watched the plants wither and die all around her, she felt her own hopes begin to fade as well.

At the same time, deep down in the realm of the dead, Hades hoped to explain his actions to the sweet Persephone. Professing his love, he told her of the plan her father helped deploy and begged her to stay and be his wife. Yet, Persephone longed for something more, the comforts of her mother's home and a view of the lush green grass and blue sky up above.

Far above the darkness of the Underworld, her mother continued to wander the forlorn earth. Eventually she found her way to the town of Eleusis, where she rested by a flowing fountain. Stripped of all her vital energy, she appeared old and wrinkled beyond her years. Soon four young females found the aging Goddess, and agreed to take her home. Their parents were glad to offer the elderly woman lodging and a stable position caring for their little son. Wishing to reward the family for their kindness, Demeter attempted to offer the child the gift of immortality, by sticking him in the fire each night and removing him every morning before dawn. When the child's mother found him in the flames, she was horrified. Her mortal mind could not comprehend the actions of the Goddess, and she asked her to leave their home at once. This immediately brought back Demeter's fighting spirit, who surprised them by exposing her true self. The family begged the Goddess for forgive them and in return agreed to her demands: "A temple would be built in my honour, and you will teach the world my secret to immortality." Within no time, the town built a beautiful temple on the hillside, which the Goddess blessed before continuing on her journey.

Yet it didn't take long for Demeter's happiness to be replaced with rage, as she recalled the disappearance of her daughter. She flew to the home of Zeus and demanded that Persephone be found at once. She also questioned every immortal she could find and eventually uncovered Zeus' plot. In an attempt to appease Demeter's growing anger, he dispatched a messenger to retrieve their daughter from the depths. Upon his entry to the Underworld, the messenger Hermes was amazed at what he found. Instead of finding a frail and fearful Persephone, he found a radiant and striking Queen of the Dead. She had adjusted well to her new position, saying she had even found her calling. The Goddess was now in charge of greeting the new arrivals and helping them adapt to their new life. While she wished to see her mother up above, she was torn by her desire to remain Hades' wife. Hoping to comfort Persephone in her confusion, Hades came to his Queen's side. He gently kissed her forehead and urged her, "Do not fret, eat instead from this fruit I know you will like." As she pressed the red pomegranate seeds to her lips, she listened to his words. He told her he would miss her very much, but her duties as a daughter mattered too. So, she climbed into the chariot and bid her husband farewell, as Hermes sped them off to the middle realm of mother earth, the home of her devoted mother.

The flowers sang joyfully of her return, while her mother beamed with pride. Yet, the child that she had born and raised had changed while she was gone. She had grown into a goddess, one both beautiful and wise and the more that Demeter inquired about her experiences below, the more she came to worry that the life they knew was gone. She recalled a declaration Zeus had made from the heavens up above: in order for Persephone to return to the home and life she had known, the young goddess must be as pure as the day she left her mother's side. However, the ruby stain upon her lips spoke of the beauty's fate. Persephone had tasted of the fruit of life. It could not be erased. Even so, Zeus loved his daughter too much to send her back to Hades without the hope of returning to her mother's abode above. So, each spring Persephone comes back with the flowers that pave her way, to tell the story of rebirth, hope and harmony. And each fall when she leaves again for the Underworld below, her mother mourns and winter comes, while she waits for her return. Yet, for Persephone there is no remorse. She looks forward to the time she spends as Hades' Queen and wife, and to guiding those who have lost their way to the next phase of their life.

Analysis of The Myth of Persephone:

The myth of Persephone is one of the oldest of all Greek myths. Her story is a personification of some of the most universal concepts about life and death. In her youth, Persephone represents the powerful bond between a mother and a daughter and the often difficult transition from maidenhood to marriage. As the Goddess of Springtime and Rebirth, she is eternally connected to the cycles of the earth, which lies barren in her absence and bloom again each spring with her return. And her initiatory experience in the realm of the dead is such a powerful experience that it changes her life forever. It is after this transformation that we remember her most for her role as the Greek Goddess of the Underworld. Duality is a driving force in many renditions of Persephone's story. In her younger years she is often called Kore, the grain or corn maiden, yet once she has made the terrifying transition into womanhood she is mostly referred to as Persephone. She also plays a role as the winter Goddess of the Underworld, who cyclically changes into the springtime Goddess of Rebirth, which are two very different personifications of the same deity.  The ability to integrate all these aspects of her dualistic life as wife and daughter, innocence and wisdom, death and rebirth are what makes Persephone such a powerful goddess.

The myth has different version. To segregate the original myth of Persephone into its constituent part there are several mythemes which constitutes the whole mythical structure. There are certain key things to understand the myth of Persephone, these are

1.     Persephone plucked the flower of deception and abducted  by Hades.

2.     Demeter consumed by depression over the loss of Persephone and ceased to remember all her duties

3.     Hade informed Persephone about her father’s pledge

4.     Demeter uncovered Zeus' plot

5.     Hermes found Persephone as in charge of greeting the new arrivals and helping them adapt to their new life

6.     Persephone eat the  pishogue pomegranate seed

7.     Demeter mourns and winter comes when Persephone leaves for underworld and

8.     Persephone’s decision to come back to the earth in each spring.

Using Deductive Model, the myth of Persephone is being divided into the individual mythemes, which are the constituent building blocks of the myth. The mythemes are being  arranged  in such a pattern of Rows and Columns and listed in the chart that if we read the mythemes horizontally by disregarding their divisions in column, we will get the narration or parole of the myth and in order to understand the structuring of the myth we need to read the mythemes vertically and have to pay attention to the columns instead of reading it horizontally.

Mythemes for the analysis of the myth of Persephone:

Affinal Relation Overrated	Affinal Relation  Underrated	Denial of Rebirth	Assertation to Rebirth
Persephone plucked the flower of deception
Abduction of Persephone  by Hades
		Demeter ceased to remember all her duties
			Hades hoped to explain his actions to Persephone
	Hade informed Persephone about her father’s conspiracy
		Demeter attempted to order the family to  teach the world her secret to immortality
		Demeter recalled the disappearance of her daughter
	Demeter uncovered Zeus' plot
			Hermes found Persephone as in charge of greeting the new arrivals and helping them adapt to their new life.
Persephone eat the  pishogue pomegranate seed	Hade let the Persephone  to obey her duty as a daughter
			Demeter  beamed with pride and flowers started singing joyfully
Persephone had tasted of the fruit of life that could not be erased.		Demeter mourns and winter comes when Persephone leaves for underworld	Each spring Persephone comes back to the earth

Now, we can see that the 1^st two columns in the left are in an oppositional relationship to each other and in similar manner the last two columns in the right side are also in an oppositional relationship to each other.

So, according to  the typical way in which a structuralist critique would engaged with a narrative, the constituent blocks of the narration has been segregated and identified the oppositional relationships that exists between them.

Analysis through  mytheme categories:

2 left most column, they have something or other to do with family or kinship. In the 1^st column there are overrating of affinal relations while in column 2 there is the exact opposite that is underrating of affinal relations.

In the 1^st column, mythemes are representing about the deception and abduction of Persephone as  Hades  knew to woo such a beautiful young goddess who had no reason to travel to his Underworld domain and delude Persephone to taste the pomegranate seeds just to make her obliged to back to the underworld again, these are the overrating of  affinal relations which ties the mythemes column 1 into a single bundle. 

Column 2 is binary opposite to column 1. Where Hade informed Persephone about her father’s conspiracy, Demeter uncovered Zeus' plot and Hade let the Persephone  to obey her duty as a daughter, these are the expression of what represent the underrating of affinal  relations in the mythical context.

So column1 and column2 creates one set of binary occupation. Beside  to this, column 3 refers to the event, Demeter ceased to remember all her duties as the Goddess of Heaven and Earth due to the mourns for her daughter and she ordered the family to teach the world her secret to immortality. Both these event signifies the denial of the concept and possibility of Rebirth.

On the other hand Column 4 obeying the rule of structuralism and playing the role of binary opposition upholds the notion of Rebirth and possibility of Regain the life. This upholding of the concept of Rebirth is gathered from the fact that all the characters mentioned in this column like, Hades hoped to explain his actions to Persephone, Hermes found Persephone as in charge of greeting the new arrivals and helping them adapt to their new life, Demeter  beamed with pride and flowers started singing joyfully  and Each spring Persephone comes back to the earth, all of them are providing the hope and possibility of regaining of life.

So now, the myth have 2 kind of binary representation. 1^st two column represents the binary of overrating and underrating of affinal relations and 2^nd opposition is represented by column 3 and column 4 which represents the denial of the concept of rebirth and the assertion of the concept of rebirth. Now, if we place this two sets of oppositional relationship side by side they will look something like this, 

Now this figure has reduced the mythic narrative in a nit set of structural opposition although yet it does not produce any obvious explanation  about how this underlying mythic structure provides human beings with a tool to negotiate his or her sense of being in the world or how does it structures his or her world view.

To connect this structural opposition underlined the myth of Persephone with a larger social culture context it can be understood that the underlined language of the myth of Persephone is actually providing a tool to the primitive human being through which articulation of the  two conflicting notions of death and rebirth can be better understood.

The society that produced this myth or in turns structured this myth was toned between two notions of human life that What is the destiny of Human life, Immortality or Rebirth after death?

In the first notion immortality can be gained through the secret of the Goddess Demeter or through affinal relation with the Hades, God of Underworld which is the denial of the rebirth of the grains in the earth due to the mourns of Demeter and refusing all her duty as the Goddess of Earth and Heaven. In the second notion the underrating of the affinal relation is what provides the possibility for Demeter to be beamed with pride having her daughter back and flowers to be started singing joyfully  and the  Earth to reframe its beauty, which means assertion to the possibility of rebirth.  Both the notions are validated by the quotidian experience.

Now the deep structural grammar under the myth of Persephone does not actually helps us to solve this conflict between the two notions of human destiny but it gives us a language through which to coherently articulate this opposition of immortality and rebirth after death and place them side by side for a better understanding.

Following this structuralist logic the 1^st two column of the mytheme chart get translated as follows…

Since column 1 is talking about overrating of affinal relations and the uphold of the status from a maiden to the Goddess, it could be taken to signify an assertion of the notion of immortality through affinal union. On the contrary column 2 since it speaks of underrating of affinal relations and the family structure can be taken to mean a denial of the notion of immortality for affinal union. Column 3 which speaks of the denial of the possibility of rebirth can be taken as the signifier to the denial of human being  immortal destiny where the column 4 which upholds the possibility of the regain of life and rebirth , it can be taken to signify an assertion of the concept of rebirth of human being after death. So now the two sets of opposition can be written as this,

These two equal kind of Binary Unit can be identified from the above analysis. The equal sign representing the assertion of immortality through affinal union equals on the other side denial of the possibility of rebirth and in the below section the denial of the immortal living through affinal relation is equal to the assertion of the possibility of regain life or rebirth. So this is what the myth of Persephone means at a deeper level. This is the Lang of the Persephone narrative. There can be individual variations of paroles but this same lang will guide or structure all of the paroles. The structuralist analysis of narratives depends on identifying the underlined structuring principle that informs any kind of narrative. This is the way the myth of Persephone is approached structurally in narrative.