Tristes Tropiques by Claude Levi-Strauss Essay Example for Free

Tristes Tropiques by Claude Levi-Strauss attemptTristes Tropiques, by Claude Levi-Strauss is ostensibly a getogue dealing with Amerindians, their native lands and their society. The actual story is more than husking and exploration, delving into the mind of the author, a French philosopher. It is ironic that Levi-Strauss bemoans the losses that his subjects have endured when he knows that it is his society that has caused theirs to fade away. Tristes Tropiques, the worrisome Tropics, relates the story of the anguish and misery caused by the introduction of Western values and mores on a non-Western pigeonholing of humanity. Levi-Strauss begins this work by saying that he hates traveling and explorers. The first thing we see as we travel round the world is our own filth, thrown into the face of mankind, (Levi-Strauss et al. p 24). He says that either we journey to a distant land to find the true savage, though there are precious few rattling left in this world and their differ ence makes them impossible to know, or we are the gawking tourist looking for a reality that does not exist, if it ever did. It is this paradox that drives Levi-Strauss. Levi-Strauss agrees to a meeting with the Tarunde Indians in their village. It is to be a observation gift swap in which he gets to witness first hand the structure and social entrap of the group. This passage is fraught with tangible fear for outsiders had been murdered there. It is a surreal episode and told with a smell of urgency. Yet the author goes on for pages describing a sunset at one point. Chapter after chapter delve into philosophical meandering and observations on world religions. Or in the brief glance, heavy with patience, serenity and mutual forgiveness, that, through and through some involuntary understanding, one can sometimes exchange with a cat, (415) he says in closing. peradventure there is some deep, or even metaphysical meaning to this. Or perhaps the emperor has no clothes. He takes a far too circuitous route to arrive at a shadowy point. Bibliography Levi-Strauss, C., Weightman, D. Weightman, J. Tristes Tropiques New York Penguin Books, 1992 Yee, D. Tristes Tropiques Claude Levi-Stauss A Book Review Retrieved 3-1-07 from http//dannyreviews.com/h/Tristes_Tropiques.html