After weeks crossing the high seas, Claude Levi-Strauss breathed in his first lungful of the New World, a perfume tinged with pepper or tobacco. The sensory awakening was the start of a journey that turned a young Parisian scholar into a founder of modern anthropology.

On that 1930s trip that took him across the Atlantic to Latin
America, Levi-Strauss' scholarly upbringing guided him on a
methodical search for humankind's inner workings as he met tribes
in Brazil's jungles. His studies would later electrify -and divide
- the intellectual world with the idea that cultures share
similarities underlying their myths and patterns of behavior.

Levi-Strauss' death at age 100 was announced in Paris on
Tuesday. French media said he died on Friday.

Born on Nov. 28, 1908, in Brussels, Belgium, to French parents
of Jewish origin, he was forced to flee France during World War II
after Germany invaded and the collaborationist Vichy regime passed
anti-Jewish laws. He ended up in New York, which he called "the
most fruitful period of my life."

He was widely regarded as having reshaped anthropology, becoming
the leading advocate of what is now known as structuralism. His
ideas reached into fields including the humanities and philosophy.

France reacted with emotional tributes led by President Nicolas
Sarkozy, who called him the "indefatigable humanist" and noted
his environmental side which led him to worry "about the
disappearance of many living plant and animal species, and ... the
impact of man's activities on the planet."

Koichiro Matsuura, director-general of the U.N.'s Paris-based
cultural arm, UNESCO, said Levi-Strauss' theories "changed the way
people perceived each other, striking down such divisive concepts
as race and opening the way for a new vision based on recognition
of the common bond of humanity."

As a youngster, Levi-Strauss organized adventurous expeditions
into the French countryside. He studied in Paris and went on to
teach and travel in Brazil, captivated by that first impression of
"tobacco smell, pepper smell" and doing much of the research that
led to his breakthrough books.

Drafted into the French army only for it to be crushed by the
invading Germans, he soon had to flee France for New York, where he
became a visiting professor at the New School for Social Research.
He mixed with fellow scholars, spent long hours at the New York
Public Library and lived in a tiny rented room in Greenwich
Village.

"Everything I know I learned in the United States," he once
said.

Despite several job offers to remain in America, he returned to
France in 1944 after the liberation of Paris and entered government
service, but quit four years later to pursue his scholarly
research.

Structuralism - defined as the search for the underlying
patterns of thought in all forms of human activity - compared the
formal relationships among elements in any given system.

Levi-Strauss' classic example was the taboo on incest, present
in all societies, which he argued was man's way of promoting and
preserving social harmony.

Yet he rejected the title of "father" of structuralism, which
he said had been badly deformed and its scientific claims
exaggerated. He also spoke with modesty of his achievements.

But Setha Low, president of the American Anthropological
Association, said Levi-Strauss was one of the most "innovative and
creative theorists that anthropology has ever produced," though
she said some of his theories are contested. One complaint is that
he failed to sufficiently take into account history and the
empowerment of individuals.

French anthropologist Philippe Descola, who wrote his thesis
under Levi-Strauss' guidance, told AP last year that "today,
nobody shares the entire philosophy of Levi-Strauss," but that his
influence is still strong.

What was important, he said, was that Levi-Strauss advanced the
idea that cultural diversity is a positive thing - an "idea that
wasn't very popular" 40 years ago.

Honored by universities worldwide, accepted into the Academie
Francaise, home of France's scholarly elite, Levi-Strauss was also
a skilled handyman, loved music and believed in the virtues of
manual labor and outdoor life.

He was married three times and had two sons, Matthieu and
Laurent.

The Academie Francaise said it planned a ceremony of tribute for
Thursday.