Towards Goethean Anthropology: On Morphology, Structuralism, and Social Observation

In the first volume of Zur Morphologie (On Morphology), Goethe speaks of "drei große[n] Weltgegenden" (three great regions of the world) that he had begun to explore in Italy in the late 1780s, namely Kunst, Natur, and menschliche Gesellschaft (art, nature, and human society).¹ Though his principles of observation will most prominently be developed in reference to natural phenomena—through his analyses of the growth of leaves, for example—Goethe holds that, in effect, "alles ist Blatt" (everything is leaf), such that phenomena outside of nature, including human culture and society, can be interpreted in analogous morphological terms. While Goethe's highly articulated positions on nature and art are well known, if we speak of his method of observing human society, we arrive in territory that is still largely unexplored. In Zur Morphologie, however, he states with no qualifications: "Ich verstehe die menschliche Gesellschaft" (MA 12:69; I understand human society). Though he will never explicitly expound a theory of social observation, the distinctive practice of seeing that he cultivates regarding science and art conjoins readily with his morphological conception of form to yield a method that proves fruitful also for the Weltgegend of the social.

Over the course of his life, Goethe on several occasion composes methodical observations of social phenomena—especially of ritualized festivities—in a way that, according to the categories of our time, would certainly fall within the social sciences: In Frankfurt, in 1764, he observes the election and coronation of Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II, and, almost half a century later, composes an account of it as part of Dichtung und Wahrheit (Poetry and Truth); in the late 1780s, he takes an interest in various aspects of contemporaneous Italian life, including lower-class labor in Naples and, most famously, the Carnival in Rome, and publishes accounts of both in the Teutscher Merkur (German Mercury); and in 1814, he witnesses the festival of Saint Roch in Bingen, publishing a description in Über Kunst und Alterthum (On Art and Antiquity). Viewed within the scope of his whole oeuvre, the writings in this genre are certainly few and sporadic, yet they are composed with an acuity, and are of a quality, James Sydney Slotkin has asserted, that "might well excite the envy of professional ethnographers."²

Goethe's principle that rigorous empirical attention to visible form can yield richer understanding than speculation into the putative inner content of phenomena prefigures important developments in twentieth-century thought and, indeed, a number of scholars, including Philippe Descola, Tzvetan Todorov, and Jean Petitot, have called attention to the affinities that link Goethe's morphological paradigm with the structural anthropology of Claude Lévi-Strauss.³ As Mark Schneider notes, Lévi-Strauss himself expressly acknowledges "Goethe's place in the intellectual heritage of structuralism, finding in his botanical work the origins of an 'epistemological attitude' crucial to the method."⁴ This article proceeds on the premise that, beyond the general epistemological affinity that Lévi-Strauss points to,⁵ we can furthermore establish consonances between the two thinkers in terms of the actual practice of anthropology. I will discuss the above-mentioned writings by Goethe chronologically, showing how his method of social description develops from instance to instance, crystallizing into a consistent method. As a point of reference within the canon of anthropology, I will also, where pertinent, show how his practice gains an ever more distinct consonance over time with the work of his twentieth-century colleague. The insights gained from this inquiry will be of significance not only for the history and theory of the social sciences, but also for our understanding of the finer contours, the conceptual idiosyncrasies, and theoretical potentials of Goethean thought as a paradigm whose purview well transcends the specificity of its more familiar organic and aesthetic contexts.

In Frankfurt, 1764

Goethe's earliest methodical observation of a public spectacle dates from well before even his serious literary work had begun.⁶ In 1764, when the selection of a new Holy Roman emperor was about to take place in their home city of Frankfurt, Goethe's father...