When I read that Claude Lévi-Strauss had passed on, I dutifully posted the news on both my Facebook and Twitter accounts. I received one response on Twitter:
I didn’t receive any comments or “likes” (very odd I’d say, to “like” the passing of Lévi-Strauss) on Facebook. However something transpired over the next day that made me post the question “Are Asians hug-deficient?” The responses came swift and steadily:
Two things to note. Firstly, Asians are evidently indeed hug-deficient and it seems we should do something about that, maybe hold free hugs days or perhaps charge money for each hug. In any case the need is there, simmering beneath our polite Asian surfaces and serf-faces. As Lévi-Strauss’ fellow Frenchman and contemporary the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan would have it, there buried in all the resounding “YES!” resides the erupting of the traumatic Real when Ejin Tan irrepressibly puts it “hug me.”
Secondly, as the father of modern anthropology and a central figure in humanities, social studies and philosophy I trust that Lévi-Strauss would have something to say about Asians needing hugs but only expressing it on Facebook. The late gentleman might also have something to say about the scoreboard:
Death of Lévi-Strauss – 0 Comments, 1 Tweet
Asian Hug-deficiency – 2 Likes, 8 Comments
RIP, Monsieur Claude Lévi-Strauss.
Facebook
Flickr
Twitter
Youtube