Computational challenges to test and revitalize Claude Lévi-Strauss transformational methodology

Abstract

The ambition and proposal for data modeling of myths presented in this paper is to link contemporary technical affordances to some canonical projects developed in structural anthropology. To articulate the theoretical promise and innovation of this proposal, we present a discrete-event system specification modeling and simulation approach in order to perform a generative analysis and a dynamic visualization of selected narratives, aimed at validating and revitalizing the transformational and morphodynamic theory and methodology proposed by Claude Lévi-Strauss in his structural analysis of myth. After an analysis of Lévi-Strauss’s transformational methodology, we describe in detail how discrete-event system specification models are implemented and developed in the framework of a DEVSimPy software environment. The validation of the method involves a discrete-event system specification simulation based on the extension of discrete-event system specification models dedicated to provide a dynamic Google Earth visualization of the selected myth. Future work around the discrete-event system specification formalism in anthropology is described as well as future applications regarding the impact of computational models (discrete-event system specification formalism, Bayesian inferences, and object-oriented features) to new contemporary anthropological domains.

The New German-speaking School of Balkankompetenzen: Knowledge production and truth claims in post-colonial post-communist context

“…Above all, she failed to acknowledge the interactionalist and constructivist approach used for analyzing the instrumentality of religious shifting, since Albanian identity and cohesion are not postulated for pre-national periods and have nothing to do with later national interests, as she claims, but they are argued as action strategies for the social organization of cultural and religious similarities and differences (Doja, 2000b), better known in anthropology as ethnic boundary processes (Barth, 1969). A tendency is again in evidence here towards patronizing Albanian-born scholars with fashionable “international theories,” and failing to take into account how they might have examined the genealogies of poststructuralist takes (Doja, 2006d) that have misrepresented actual theoretical contributions of structural anthropology to general knowledge (See, for instance, Doja, 2005b, 2006f, 2006e, 2008a, 2008b, 2010a, 2018, 2019b, 2020; Doja et al, 2021; Doja and Abazi, 2021; Santucci et al, 2020). As part of a wider pattern of international scholarship, the tendency of Balkankompetent experts of the New German-speaking School to overlook or ignore Albanian scholars in academic debates may result from a simple insider/outsider classification of their biographies along eastern/western lines.…”

Computerantropologi

“…På den anden side kan computerantropologi indebaere en tilgang, hvor datavidenskabelige og digitale metoder anvendes til at udføre for eksempel kvantitative analyser af store maengder tekstdata. Disse tekstdata kan omhandle faenomener af central antropologisk interesse (Pedersen 2023) såsom sociale myter (Doja et al 2021) -for blot at naevne ét eksempel -uden at have for øje at skulle kombinere datavidenskabelige metoder og data med etnografiske ditto. Førstnaevnte tilgang fokuserer altså på den etnografiske metodes centrale betydning for at differentiere computerantropologi fra lignende tilgange i beslaegtede discipliner (fx sociologi eller politologi).…”

Notes on Structuralism: Introduction

“…It is also worth saying, despite the importance of the post-structuralist critique of structuralism, there has been renewed (and interdisciplinary) interest in Lévi-Strauss, taking off around about the time he entered his nineties (Wiseman, 2009). His algebraic formulations found in his early work, notably the so-called 'canonical formula' presented in 'The Structural Study of Myth' (Lévi-Strauss, 1963), has led to recent studies in structural and morphodynamic epistemology (Doja et al, 2021;Maranda, 2001;Petitot, 2001Petitot, , 2009Santucci et al, 2020;Scubla, 2011). So far, this work has tended to interrogate the mathematics in its pure sense.…”