Walking about Lévi-Strauss. Contributions for an Archaeology of Thought

Abstract

[EN]In this text I intend to apply fully the thinking of Claude lévi-Strauss (LS) to archaeology and the study of prehistory. In doing so, I use LS' structural anthropology to consider certain topics traditionally 'forbidden' to prehistoric research (in particular an archaeology of mind, rationality or thought) and employ the archaeological record to complete an anthropology of 'pensée', which would remain unfinished if based only on anthropological data without a historical perspective. The text consists of four stages: first I remember LS' proposals useful to such a purpose; then I develop his statements further to create a history of thinking; I then move on to archaeologise and prehistorise such a history; finally ending with some critical remarks on LS and, in general, the text itself. A major topic of the paper is a discussion on certain main concepts used by LS (thought, thinking and mind) and their translation into English and Spanish.