« Lyrisme et probité »

Ce que le structuralisme doit au surréalisme

Abstract

How can we assess what philosophy or a human science owes to an artistic movement ? To explore this question, I take the example of Lévi-Strauss's relationship with Surrealism. While the relationship between the founder of structural anthropology and André Breton has already been studied from a historical perspective, it remains to be seen what structuralism owes philosophically to Surrealism. When Lévi-Strauss acknowledged the movement's “lyricism and probity” in 1960, was he suggesting that its influence was as much aesthetic as ethical ? To verify this hypothesis, I take two cases of intellectual encounters between Lévi-Strauss and Surrealism: the hasard objectif, and the definition of the subject. This second example will furthermore enable us to relate surrealism to the anthropologist's other great mentor, Rousseau.