One of the world's most eminent social anthropologists draws upon his many years of study and research in the fi eld of kinship and social organization to review the development of anthropological theory and method from Lewis Henry Morgan (1818-1881) to anthropologists of the 1960s. It is the central argument of this book that the structuralist theory and method developed by British and American anthropologists in the study of kinship and social organization is the direct descendant of Morgan's researches.

First published in 1998. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

This book examines the structuralist theory and method developed by British and American anthrop- ologists in the study of kinship and social organization and how they are the direct des- cendants of the researches of Lewis Henry Morgan.

In her study of domestic organization in Gonja, a formerly important West African state, now part of Ghana, Esther Goody has concentrated on tracing the interrelationships between political and domestic institutions in a bilateral kinship system, untypical of the area. After outlining the problems which she is seeking to solve and describing the domestic, political and economic context of life in central Gonja, the author examines the several aspects of marriage fundamental to the establishment of domestic groups and their development. The practice of sending children to be reared by kin is...

Immigration is among the most contested issues in Western Europe. Studies commonly focus on political activity and the plight of minorities, but this book breaks new ground in its emphasis on the everyday reactions of Italians to immigration, nationalism and racism. Drawing on research carried out in Palermo, Jeffrey Cole considers the ambivalent responses of rich and poor Sicilians to immigrants. He places Italian attitudes in a European context, and investigates why anti-immigrant politics are concentrated in the wealthy Italian North.

The theme of this book is the analysis of the changes that have occurred in the kinship patterns of the Toka of South Zambia as a result of a shift in their form of production from hoe agriculture to ox-drawn ploughing. Dr Holy uses the rich, detailed ethnography that he provides about these changes to confront several theoretical issues of current anthropological interest, as well as to examine the basic methodological problems of anthropological enquiry. Emphasizing the distinction between the conceptual and cognitive world of the actors, and the transactions and events in which they...

Tradition is a central concept in the social sciences, but it is commonly treated as unproblematic. Dr. Boyer insists that social anthropology requires a theory of tradition, its constitution and transmission. He treats tradition "as a type of interaction which results in the repetition of certain communicative events," and therefore as a form of social action. Tradition as Truth and Communication deals particularly with oral communication and focuses on the privileged role of licensed speakers and the ritual contexts in which certain aspects of tradition are characteristically transmitted....

Bartered Brides is a detailed study of marriage among the Maduzai, a tribal society in Afghan Turkistan. It is the first study of the area which looks in depth at both the domestic aspects of marriage and its relation to the productive and reproductive activities of women, as well as marriage as a means of managing political and economic conflict and competition. The fieldwork was carried out in the early 1970s before the 1978 coup and Soviet invasion. In this respect the book offers a unique account of a world that has disappeared. Nancy Tapper presents both male and female perspectives,...

The Vezo, a fishing people of western Madagascar, are known as 'the people who struggle with the sea'. Dr Astuti explores their identity, showing that it is established through what people do rather than being determined by descent. Vezo identity is a 'way of doing' rather than a 'state of being', performative rather than ethnic. However, her innovative analysis of Vezo kinship also uncovers an opposite form of identity based on descent, which she argues is the identity of the dead. By looking at key mortuary rituals that engage the relationship between the living and the dead, Dr Astuti...

Among the Berti of Northern Darfur (Sudan), as among many Muslim societies, the formal religious practices are predominantly the concern of men, while local, unorthodox customary rituals are performed mainly by women. It is usual to dismiss such local, popular practices as pre-Islamic survivals, but Professor Holy shows that the customary rituals constitute an integral part of the religious system of the Berti. Carefully analysing the symbolic statements made in Berti rituals, Professor Holy demonstrates that the distinction between the two classes of rituals is an expression of the gender...