essay

The Icelandic family sagas as totemic artefacts

social approaches to viking studies • Glasgow • Published In 1991 • Pages: 11-17

By: Durrenberger, E. Paul.

Abstract
This article is a structural analysis of the Icelandic sagas. The author suggests '…that the sagas are neither art nor history, but articulations of what Lévi-Strauss (1966) calls a 'totemic operator', an overarching classification system which organizes all experience into an integrated whole in terms of which one can locate anyone or anything relative to all other being, things, events, and forces. It defines nature, the human place in nature, and any person's place in the natural and human order. Its logic is one of classification and analogy' (p. 12).
Subjects
Theoretical orientation in research and its results
Comparative evidence
Verbal arts
Ethnopsychology
Ethnosociology
culture
Early Icelanders
HRAF PubDate
2004
Region
Europe
Sub Region
Scandinavia
Document Type
essay
Evaluation
Creator Type
Ethnologist
Document Rating
4: Excellent Secondary Data
Analyst
John Beierle ; 2002
Field Date
no date
Coverage Date
ninth-thirteenth centuries AD
Coverage Place
general Iceland
Notes
E. Paul Durrenberger
For bibliographical references see document 5: [Sampson]
LCCN
gb 91006825
LCSH
Icelanders