Folklore into Theory: Freud and Lévi-Strauss on Incest and Marriage

This article suggests that two major modern theories on incest and its prohibition, successively proposed by Freud and by Lévi-Strauss, are essentially transformations on a folklore leitmotiv tottering with age. The discussion examines Freud's weaving of traditional themes into psychoanalytic theory, and then engages Lévi-Strauss' meta-Freudian elaboration. This inquiry leads to asking whether penetration into the products of the mind by the mind necessarily involves reenacting fundamental patterns of thought. This question raises the issue of the status of theorization in academic realms, such as folklore and mythology, where discipline and object fuse into a single denomination.