Scan barcode
klparmley's review against another edition
4.0
I read this for an Anthropology of Religion class at the College of Charleston. It was fun and easy to read.
mnboyer's review against another edition
5.0
I am very lucky to have Bookman's, a local buy-sell-trade bookstore, because I have found an infinite amount of hidden gems hiding throughout the shelves. That can be said of Cannibals and Kings, which drew me in because... cannibals... and won me over with its intense discussion of civilization, adaptation, and general anthropology.
You probably don't hear this often, but this was a fun anthropology book. It was a quick read, largely in part because I couldn't put it down once I started reading. Now, you can argue I'm a huge nerd, and that is true, but Harris definitely has a writing style that is worthy of praise. Because this material has the potential to be dull (doesn't everything?) but manages to be a page-turner.
One fun fact I picked up from this book: The word barbecue comes from the Carib word barbricot, a grill made of green boughs, to prepare their cannibal feasts on (p176). Just keep that in mind the next time you're at a family gathering.
Oddly enough, you also learn a lot about different animals. Including the pig, which was "the first domesticated species to become too expensive to serve as a source of meat" (p195). Hmm. And in case you wonder about that, that's a pretty significant change in diet because for "every 100 pounds of feed consumed, a pig will produce about 20 pounds of meat, while from the same amount of feed cattle produce only 7 pounds" (p196). I'm definitely going to be bringing that up at the next 4-H meeting or County Fair that I attend.
Seriously though, a great book that tackles changes in civilization over thousands of year. And it does this in a very interesting, thrilling way that led to finish this book rapidly (in under 24 hours). I was also excited to see discussions of cannibalism because, let's be honest, the title is what lured me in. Harris includes examples from the Pacific, from Indigenous North and South America, etc. Very well rounded!
Definitely check this out if you're an anthropology nerd.
You probably don't hear this often, but this was a fun anthropology book. It was a quick read, largely in part because I couldn't put it down once I started reading. Now, you can argue I'm a huge nerd, and that is true, but Harris definitely has a writing style that is worthy of praise. Because this material has the potential to be dull (doesn't everything?) but manages to be a page-turner.
One fun fact I picked up from this book: The word barbecue comes from the Carib word barbricot, a grill made of green boughs, to prepare their cannibal feasts on (p176). Just keep that in mind the next time you're at a family gathering.
Oddly enough, you also learn a lot about different animals. Including the pig, which was "the first domesticated species to become too expensive to serve as a source of meat" (p195). Hmm. And in case you wonder about that, that's a pretty significant change in diet because for "every 100 pounds of feed consumed, a pig will produce about 20 pounds of meat, while from the same amount of feed cattle produce only 7 pounds" (p196). I'm definitely going to be bringing that up at the next 4-H meeting or County Fair that I attend.
Seriously though, a great book that tackles changes in civilization over thousands of year. And it does this in a very interesting, thrilling way that led to finish this book rapidly (in under 24 hours). I was also excited to see discussions of cannibalism because, let's be honest, the title is what lured me in. Harris includes examples from the Pacific, from Indigenous North and South America, etc. Very well rounded!
Definitely check this out if you're an anthropology nerd.
randomprogrammer's review against another edition
5.0
I'm sure a lot of Marvin's specific theories may be out of date by now, but when I read this as an early college student 11 years ago, I remember being floored by the innovative clarity of his ideas.
whitneyborup's review against another edition
4.0
Fascinating! I read this as a way to start familiarizing myself with cultural materialism/determinism. His idea is basically that ecological factors are responsible for all the twists and turns in population/quality of life/political and economic systems. The idea that war was a product of over-population, that it is a way of cutting down your own population as well as the enemy's, and that this, in turn, produces patriarchal and misogynistic societies was especially interesting to me.
mythical_plunger's review against another edition
5.0
"It is only through an awareness of the determined nature of the past that we can hope to make the future less dependent on unconscious and impersonal forces."
Before Harari or Jared Diamond wrote bestsellers that would bring anthropology to the masses, there was Marvin Harris.
Harris is not afraid of drawing conclusions. In a field, where the hesitancy towards establishing theories is more pronounced, where academics are content to limit themselves to the trees, Harris is looking at the forest. And that forest is the entire world.
Whether we're looking at ancient Mesopotamia, pre-Incan South America, Aztec Mesoamerica, the roman Empire or our own globalized, capitalistic societies there is one common thread:
Production is intensified whenever living standards decline (usually due to increases in population size).
A simple idea with tremendous repercussions: Progress is not inevitable; people are content when their standards of living are met, only when this is threatened i.e. when the current mode of production starts reaching is limit, is when change happens. For example: only when the wild fauna of the Americas was exterminated by the Indoamericans is when agriculture became the new mode of production, even though they agriculture way before.
Harris' theory of Cultural Determinism explained so many things that it blew my mind: the rise of the state, the creation of religion, cannibalistic societies, the industrial revolution, the rise of the Inca Empire, climate change, the survival of modern hunter-gatherers, among others.
This is a masterful piece of work, backed by extensive field work and written in an understandable, succinct style, making it accessible to the average reader. Highly entertaining, too.
Written in 1977, it doesn't feel dated in anyway. In fact, it's more relevant than ever: our current mode of production is also reaching its limits and, as Harris shows, these are the points of inflection that might determine our way of living for the next few centuries.
Before Harari or Jared Diamond wrote bestsellers that would bring anthropology to the masses, there was Marvin Harris.
Harris is not afraid of drawing conclusions. In a field, where the hesitancy towards establishing theories is more pronounced, where academics are content to limit themselves to the trees, Harris is looking at the forest. And that forest is the entire world.
Whether we're looking at ancient Mesopotamia, pre-Incan South America, Aztec Mesoamerica, the roman Empire or our own globalized, capitalistic societies there is one common thread:
Production is intensified whenever living standards decline (usually due to increases in population size).
A simple idea with tremendous repercussions: Progress is not inevitable; people are content when their standards of living are met, only when this is threatened i.e. when the current mode of production starts reaching is limit, is when change happens. For example: only when the wild fauna of the Americas was exterminated by the Indoamericans is when agriculture became the new mode of production, even though they agriculture way before.
Harris' theory of Cultural Determinism explained so many things that it blew my mind: the rise of the state, the creation of religion, cannibalistic societies, the industrial revolution, the rise of the Inca Empire, climate change, the survival of modern hunter-gatherers, among others.
This is a masterful piece of work, backed by extensive field work and written in an understandable, succinct style, making it accessible to the average reader. Highly entertaining, too.
Written in 1977, it doesn't feel dated in anyway. In fact, it's more relevant than ever: our current mode of production is also reaching its limits and, as Harris shows, these are the points of inflection that might determine our way of living for the next few centuries.
cancermoononhigh's review against another edition
4.0
Overall a very interesting book. My review is done in bullet points as to what I found interesting.
-Reproductive pressures predisposed our stone age ancestors to resort to intensification as a response to declining numbers of big game animals caused by climatic changes at the end of the last ice age. Intensification of the hunting and collecting mode of production in turn set the stage for adoption of agriculture, which led in turn to heightened competition among groups, an increase in warfare and the evolution of state.
-Infanticide during the paleolithic period could very well have been as high as 50%. A factor that could have led to the high rise of infanticide was the short lifespan of a paleolithic women to induce abortions.
-Contemporary hunters-collectors dealt with abortions by using numerous plant and animal poisons. Other abortion induced methods were using tight bands wrapped around the abdomen, vigorous massages, extreme cold/hot weather and blows to the abdomen.
-Hunter-collectors are more likely to turn to infanticide and geronticide when in times of stress. Old people that are too weak to contribute generally stay behind and "commit suicide." Infants could have been strangled, drowned, bashed against a rock, exposed to the elements are simply neglected by the mother.
-The fertility of a group is based on the number of women rather than the number of men.
-War and female infanticide are part of the price our stone age ancestors had to pay for regulating their population growth.
-With the rise of state women lost their status - they became wards of their fathers, husbands and brothers.
-After a society has made its commitment to a particular technology and ecological strategy for solving the problem of declining efficiency to may not be possible to do anything about the consequence of an unintelligent choice for a long time ago.
-Infanticide in the 13th and 14th century in England was generally done by death by suffocation. Despite the high rate of female infanticide the population of England continued to increase until the Black Death carried between one fourth to one half of the population.
-The United States birth rate continues to fall while divorces, unmarried unions, childless marriages and homosexuality/marriages are all on the rise.
-Reproductive pressures predisposed our stone age ancestors to resort to intensification as a response to declining numbers of big game animals caused by climatic changes at the end of the last ice age. Intensification of the hunting and collecting mode of production in turn set the stage for adoption of agriculture, which led in turn to heightened competition among groups, an increase in warfare and the evolution of state.
-Infanticide during the paleolithic period could very well have been as high as 50%. A factor that could have led to the high rise of infanticide was the short lifespan of a paleolithic women to induce abortions.
-Contemporary hunters-collectors dealt with abortions by using numerous plant and animal poisons. Other abortion induced methods were using tight bands wrapped around the abdomen, vigorous massages, extreme cold/hot weather and blows to the abdomen.
-Hunter-collectors are more likely to turn to infanticide and geronticide when in times of stress. Old people that are too weak to contribute generally stay behind and "commit suicide." Infants could have been strangled, drowned, bashed against a rock, exposed to the elements are simply neglected by the mother.
-The fertility of a group is based on the number of women rather than the number of men.
-War and female infanticide are part of the price our stone age ancestors had to pay for regulating their population growth.
-With the rise of state women lost their status - they became wards of their fathers, husbands and brothers.
-After a society has made its commitment to a particular technology and ecological strategy for solving the problem of declining efficiency to may not be possible to do anything about the consequence of an unintelligent choice for a long time ago.
-Infanticide in the 13th and 14th century in England was generally done by death by suffocation. Despite the high rate of female infanticide the population of England continued to increase until the Black Death carried between one fourth to one half of the population.
-The United States birth rate continues to fall while divorces, unmarried unions, childless marriages and homosexuality/marriages are all on the rise.
visualradish's review against another edition
4.0
Marvin Harris explains away why my people (Indians) worship cows, why capitalism arose in Europe, why Industrial revolution didn't improve the standard of living for a long time and so on with just one theory!
rita42's review
4.0
Archeologist Lewis-Williams said that scientists tend to favour the evidence that is most relevant to their pre-conceived ideas and that these tendencies can call into question the most solid and the most thought through theories. But in this book, Marvin Harris managed to almost entirely avoid such baises.
Unfortunately it was not because he presented objectively valid data, but because he chose to not to rely on any physical evidence to further illustrate his arguments. Statements about early-human life expectancy, about female infanticide as population control, about widespread commonplace cannibalism in Mesoamerica…can seem arbitrary and are difficult to accept when they're not backed by any archeological data, field observation or any other form of undeniable scientific proof.
Perhaps requiring extensive material evidence from a book that was written over forty years ago isn’t really fair. Anthropology, ethnography, and archeology have come a very long way since Harris published this book, the information we now have wasn't available back then. And in light of this, the ecological argument, his principle theory behind all cultural behaviour, seems much more fascinating. It is an elegant and beautifully logical concept, it absolutely blew me away and I truly wish Harris was still alive so that he can develop his theory to the extent it deserves by taking advantage of all modern knowledge and scientific innovations to revise and update his book.
Unfortunately it was not because he presented objectively valid data, but because he chose to not to rely on any physical evidence to further illustrate his arguments. Statements about early-human life expectancy, about female infanticide as population control, about widespread commonplace cannibalism in Mesoamerica…can seem arbitrary and are difficult to accept when they're not backed by any archeological data, field observation or any other form of undeniable scientific proof.
Perhaps requiring extensive material evidence from a book that was written over forty years ago isn’t really fair. Anthropology, ethnography, and archeology have come a very long way since Harris published this book, the information we now have wasn't available back then. And in light of this, the ecological argument, his principle theory behind all cultural behaviour, seems much more fascinating. It is an elegant and beautifully logical concept, it absolutely blew me away and I truly wish Harris was still alive so that he can develop his theory to the extent it deserves by taking advantage of all modern knowledge and scientific innovations to revise and update his book.
More...