| Chapter 1: | Myth and Theory |
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around which subsequent levels of data can be formatted. This qualitative valency is fundamentally positive, negative, or neutral; however, other more complex and subtle shadings of interrelation are possible (Kunin 1995, 39). If the valency is positive, then the two categories are viewed as being possessed of some sort of interlinking relationship: it may be expected that they overlap in some manner or need to be taken together to form a whole (Kunin 1998, 5). If the categories are possessed of a negative qualitative valency, then they are mutually exclusive and cannot interrelate (ibid.). Neutral qualitative valency is indicative of a degree of ambiguity and suggests that there is no necessary relation between the categories (ibid.).
Lévi-Strauss often signified these relationships by means of the symbols –, +, and n; however, he himself admitted that his application of these symbols is not always consistent and, confusingly, the + and – signs can also signify ‘first or second term’, respectively (Lévi-Strauss 1994, xi; italics original). The level of S2 is comparable to Dumézil’s quest for a single Indo-European structure; however, it is important to note that for Lévi-Strauss, any shared structuring system at this level is abstract. At the level of S2, the relationship between the elements has become set; however, the categories are still contentless. If we return to the analogy of two computer disks, it may be imagined that at the level of S2, the computer disks are still blank and it is only at the level of S3 that any data is written onto them. A perhaps more apt computing analogy was used by Kunin, when he argued that this level is analogous to the specific programming data: it is the elements that are ‘categorized based on the abstract programming already inputted’ (Kunin 2004, 8). The level of S3 is highly culturally specific, and variation between even related cultures would be expected. The categories into which the mythological material is organised at this stage are the mythemes, which we earlier discussed (Kunin 2004, 13). It is this level, therefore, that is perhaps most useful to the anthropologist, as it tells us how any single cultural unit organises its mythic data and, indeed, by extension, other kinds of data as well. This is the level at which cultural contextualisation is most useful as a means to help us understand what the relevant mythemes are that lie