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Excerpts from Caws 1997 Structuralism
| p. 43 | structuralism as general tendency | The notion of Gestalt in its connection with that of structure was analyzed in a paper read to the Linguistic Circle [where Lévi-Strauss was also active] by Ernst Cassirer [...] and published in the second issue of Word [Lévi-Strauss had published his 1945 article in the first issue of Word]. Called "Structuralism in Modern Linguistics," it was his last public lecture and it contained the remark [...] to the effect that structuralism was not an isolated phenomenon but the expression of a general tendency of thought that had become prominent in recent decades. |
| Lévi-Strauss missed Cassirer in New York | (However Lévi-Strauss by his own account was not present on this occasion and did not discover the parallel between his own work and Cassirer's until much later [Lévi-Strauss, private communication].) |