Remembering Claude Levi-Strauss from afar and close up

Claude Lévi-Strauss was a great intellectual of the 20th century, one of the founders of modern humanities and the “father of structural anthropology”, a consistent adherent of humanistic values. Even the most irreconcilable critics of structuralist theory recognized the strength of his scholarship and social responsiveness. Today, reference to the intellectual heritage of C. Lévi-Strauss allows us to substantiate and understand the need for a new humanistic order in the relationships between cultures and peoples. The article presents some retrospective and modern materials about Claude Lévi-Strauss, including correspondence between the renowned French anthropologist and Samara cultural scientists in the context of a topical dialogue about culture and the world. In correspondence with C. Lévi-Strauss, I had to be convinced more than once that a person's intellectual greatness is to a large extent measured by his ability to make the distant close, the unattainable attainable, the complex simple, the purely personal universal, and the external complicit. Science inspires and encourages its creator to be responsive, accessible and involved in a great dialogue with modernity. Knowledge clarifies, practices convince, values guide — this is the path of personal asceticism in science. A true creator of culture strives to be where new ideas and ideas are born, consonant with the painful, experienced and instructive experience of his professional research. Along this path, a life strategy is being built to connect people and bring cultures closer, to keep time and generations connected, and to respond to the challenges of the time both on a global scale and at the level of simple human participation.