Anti-Structural Systems | home
Anthropological Systems of Antistructure | Ritual Process and Ritual Reversals | Antistructural Systems | Structure and Anti-Structure | Symbolic Play | Human Development and the Problem of Antistructure | Conventional Anthropology
Anthropological Systems of Antistructure
Anti-Structural Systems refer to a basic articulatory framework within the department of developmental productions, the concern of which is the systematic extension of applied anti-structural systems on earth for the purposes of human recreation, symbolic mediation and remediation of interhuman relationships and behavior, in order to reinforce patterns of alternative development that are considered in the larger scope of the world to be constructive and non-destructive.
Anti-structure is defined as a human need for organized play that is a consequence of our being a symbolically engineered and constructed creature. We may define this as a need to periodically escape from the normal constraints of life within the contexts that are symbolically elaborated in supra or paranormal or alternative ways, but that make sense within the cultural frameworks within which we normally live. We may include in the repertoire of modern human behavior periodic acts of going to the movies, visiting theme parks or other kinds of recreational facilities or places, taking trips and vacations, and even dreaming, going to dinner, or taking a break form normal routine activities.
Anti-Structural systems have been regularly utilized by all societies in order to reinforce conventional patterns of constraint and normal social structure, and at times to symbolically/behaviorally sanction appropriate patterns of attitude and behavior, or to induce certain directions of change in the motivation and mobilization of social resources toward common objectives. The control function that is associated with such deliberate manipulation of anti-structural systems may be quite a powerful tool of mass persuasion and propagandistic manipulation of worldview, values and behavioral patterns of response, both because if used effectively it can operate at multiple levels of suggestion and influence, and because its modus operandi, being ritually circumscribed in normal cultural terms and forms, remains often indirect and normally beyondself-conscious awareness.
The purpose of Anti-Structural Systems as an articulatory subsystem of Lewis Works is to both understand how anti-structure typically functions in the human social world as well as in the symbolic structuration of the human psyche, and to create and implement new designs for the sake of both individual empowerment, human development, and improvement of pro-social human behavior and relationships, especially across otherwise divisive cultural boundaries anethnocentric cleavages that may serve to divide and set one community off against another.
The links to the primary portals of this framework are found below:
