Reading Comprehension

The student of mythology must embrace the contradiction between chaotic and illogical nature of myth and the startling similarity of myths collected from disparate cultures. Yet this very antinomy may lead us to a solution if we recognize the quandary as parallel to that of the early linguistic philosophers who sought to link sound and meaning in much the same way as Jung more recently sought to link "archetype" (a given mythological pattern) with fixed significance. Linguistics began to develop as a science with F. de Saussure's realization early in this century that the nature of linguistic signs (or sounds) is essentially arbitrary and that the combinations of signs, rather than the signs themselves, constitute the meaningful data. The same is true of myth.

Yet, as Claude Levi-Strauss has observed, "there is a very good reason why myth cannot simply be treated as language if its specific problems are to be solved; myth is language." Myth has to be recounted through the medium of language, so it is, at once, that language, and a kind of "language" itself. To conceptualize this duality, Levi-Strauss turned to Saussurean structuralism. Saussure's linguistics distinguished between langue (roughly "language," the living structural entity of any language, which transforms itself through time) and parole("speaking," the external manifestation of langue, that remains fixed in time). Similarly, myth can be seen as composed of two such elements: each recounting of a myth is the parole which partakes of and also informs the myth's langue (the structural totality of all versions of the myth). If parole is fixed in time (synchronous) and langue extends through time (diachronous) then we can posit a third level on which myth operates, a level which combines elements of the other two.

Myth is at once synchronous and diachronous. A myth recounts events of the remote past, yet it creates a timeless pattern which embraces and reconciles past, present, and future and is thus unique among linguistic phenomena. This distinction becomes clearer if we consider the relationship of poetry and myth. Although the two have sometimes been erroneously linked, they exhibit crucial differences and, in fact, must be placed at opposite ends of the spectrum of linguistic expression. Poetry can be translated only at the cost of severely distorting the original, yet myth retains its impact in translation no matter how it is transposed geographically and culturally. "Myth," said Levi-Strauss, "is language functioning on an especially high level where meaning succeeds practically at 'taking off' from the linguistic ground on which it keeps rolling."



Questions -

1. The primary purpose of this passage is to
(A) show how Saussure used linguistics in the study of mythology
(B) reconcile the contradiction between the irrational nature of myth and the global similarity of myth
(C) introduce a new methodology for the structural study of myth
(D) outline the contributions of Levi-Strauss to the interpretation of myths
(E) define terms which will be used in further discussion of myth

OA - C


2. It can be inferred that the purpose of distinguishing between parole and langue in relation to myth is to
(A) make it possible to differentiate among several variants of a myth
(B) demonstrate the similarity between myth and language
(C) illustrate the changing meanings assumed by one myth
(D) distinguish between specific versions of a myth and the unity of all its versions
(E) clarify the roles of sign and symbol in myth

OA - D

3. According to the passage, Jung's concept of "archetype"
(A) was inspired by the thinking of early linguistic philosophers
(B) invested recurrent elements in myths with specific meanings
(C) was a logical precursor of Saussurean structuralism
(D) was disproved by the work of Saussure
(E) can be used to study myth from a structural point of view

OA - B

4. The author quotes Levi-Strauss in the last paragraph primarily in order to
(A) stress the point that meaning in myth lies outside its mode of rendition
(B) argue that myth is more sophisticated than poetic expression
(C) refute the misconception that myth and poetry are essentially similar
(D) clarify the relationship between poetry and myth
(E) summarize the discussion of the similarities between the study of myth and the study of language

OA - A