The Antigone of Sophocles and Athenian Democracy
Subject Areas : Research in Theoritical Politics
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Keywords: tragedy Poltics Athenian democracy Polis opposition Family Law divine command human command,
Abstract :
The main purpose of this article is to find the relation between political implications of Sophocles’s Antigone and “Athenian Democracy”. To do so, we have used a structuralist approach the main feature of which is exploring binary oppositions in the text which in turn results in finding the oppositions within the political-social life that provides a ground for the creation of the text. From the point of view of political thought, the most prominent opposition in the tragedy of Antigone which creats a network of oppositions around itself, is the one drawn between “family”- with its values- and “political system” and the relationships among the citizenry. The importance of this opposition has been confirmed by Christian Meier, Jean Pierre Vernant, Charles Segal, and even Micheal Zelnak.It reveals a transition to the epoch of citizenry’s relations. It also caused the confrontation between “unwritten divine laws” and “man-made written laws”, the opposition that is the main focus of the present article.
