DiscussionThinking about “others”held on the occasion of the launch of the book translationTropical Sadness, to introduce the book as well as the contributions of author Claude Lévi-Strauss to Vietnamese readers. The discussion was organized by Tri Thuc Publishing House in collaboration with the French Embassy in Vietnam, Phan Chau Trinh Cultural Foundation and the French School of the Far East (EFEO).
This is an opportunity for those interested in issues of anthropology, ethnology, philosophy in general, and the role and contributions of author Claude Lévi-Strauss to participate in an open dialogue. After the speakers' discussion, the discussion devoted most of the time to the opinions of experts and the public discussing the content of the book and evaluating the author.
The seminar featured the following speakers:
- Mr. Nguyen Ngoc - Writer, Cultural Researcher;
- Mr. Olivier Tessier – Anthropologist working at the French School of the Far East;
- Mr. Do Lai Thuy - Cultural researcher, translator representative.
Time: 14:30 – 16:00, October 23, 2009 (Friday)
Location: L'Espace - French Cultural Center, 24 Trang Tien - Hanoi.
“I hate voyages and explorers.” The opening sentence of the work
Tropical Sadness(1955) by Claude Lévi-Strauss, seemingly paradoxical, but it oriented his way of looking at the world. The encounter with the “other” and the “others”, the ethnographer’s revelatory efforts to decipher the cultural complexity of each society, are just as many factors that participate in defining universality and affirming the great diversity of humanity. In this regard,
Tropical Sadnessis a deeply humanistic narrative, a blend of travelogue, literary text and ethnographic research, and from this intersection the author offers a distant and sometimes seemingly disillusioned view of human impulses “When the rainbow of human civilizations is no longer submerged in the void dug by our anger; when we are still there and there is still a world – then that fragile span that connects us to the unattainable will still remain…”
(Excerpt)Press release of Tri Thuc Publishing House)
