Scan barcode
paulataua's review against another edition
4.0
Oldie but goodie! A Little bit outdated, but well worth the very stimulating read. Eleven short essays (all about 20 pages long), which represented the state of the art political anthropology around 1974. The first and last essay express his major concern with western ethnocentrism and how the west designed the field to reflect their own command/obey version of state power that meant that many of the small societies in the study were define as pre-political and not really demonstrating power relationships. The rest of the essays address a variety of topics relating to how power functioned in those small societies. Obligatory reading for those trying to understand how an alternative system might deal with power relations.
mveldeivendran's review against another edition
While I ponder over my inability to fathom the implications of the insights derived from these wrecking essays, here's some of the key takeaways:
On the necessity of the decolonized gaze of the others in a world of political realities and power structures which is often appropriated as absolute inevitable necessities from 'civilized' realities especially in these times of centralized structure of global coercion vested with political and economic interests.
On the foundational biases and assumptions in field disciplines of Political Science and Political Anthropology since the days of Enlightenment and realize to some extent how dogmatic any 'science' could be taking analogies from their own time and culturally influenced 'knowledge' and 'scientific facts.'
On the Plurality of social organisation and means of social control even if it means to imagine without explicit coercion and centralized power structures in any society.
On the critique of intolerance of plurality in the original school of Marxism where the doctrinal infrastructure is digged even further underground to find its roots of economic determinism in politically coercive/ dominant environments.
On the critique and invalidity of the Nietzschean idea of 'will to power' as something instrinsic and inherent to a part of human nature. I personally enjoyed these parts where in almost every chapter he namedrops subtly or provocatively calling out the ideas from gaya scienza, ressentiment and will to power, and wrecking them in a rather spellbounding ways. And to some extent, some parts discuss on the invalidity of Machiavellian ethics as well
On the necessity of the decolonized gaze of the others in a world of political realities and power structures which is often appropriated as absolute inevitable necessities from 'civilized' realities especially in these times of centralized structure of global coercion vested with political and economic interests.
On the foundational biases and assumptions in field disciplines of Political Science and Political Anthropology since the days of Enlightenment and realize to some extent how dogmatic any 'science' could be taking analogies from their own time and culturally influenced 'knowledge' and 'scientific facts.'
On the Plurality of social organisation and means of social control even if it means to imagine without explicit coercion and centralized power structures in any society.
On the critique of intolerance of plurality in the original school of Marxism where the doctrinal infrastructure is digged even further underground to find its roots of economic determinism in politically coercive/ dominant environments.
On the critique and invalidity of the Nietzschean idea of 'will to power' as something instrinsic and inherent to a part of human nature. I personally enjoyed these parts where in almost every chapter he namedrops subtly or provocatively calling out the ideas from gaya scienza, ressentiment and will to power, and wrecking them in a rather spellbounding ways. And to some extent, some parts discuss on the invalidity of Machiavellian ethics as well
rowanglass's review against another edition
challenging
informative
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
This is a foundational text in political anthropology and South American Indigenous ethnography, a work of theory as important to academic anthropology as to activists looking for ideas and alternatives outside the ethnocentric constraints of state ideology. Reading this and his other published work can only leave the reader regretting that Clastres died so young; perhaps anthropology and radical thought would both have been better off had he lived to produce more such groundbreaking work.
isabelabaldini's review against another edition
4.0
4.5?
talvez eu nem devesse avaliar, considerando que eu não sei nada sobre antropologia
talvez eu nem devesse avaliar, considerando que eu não sei nada sobre antropologia
brynhammond's review
4.0
I came to this through Christopher Boehm, [b:Hierarchy in the Forest: The Evolution of Egalitarian Behavior|2131522|Hierarchy in the Forest The Evolution of Egalitarian Behavior|Christopher Boehm|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1255633345s/2131522.jpg|2137001]. For early human politics, I'd say, go there, which builds on Clastres, and had told me Clastres' main message, about how early-style societies defend themselves against that perceived evil power - how they prevent power. Boehm dives into primate behaviour too to link up with our species (he's a primatologist turned anthropologist).
Still, I'm glad I read this. It's a set of essays. Once his age did betray him (I say with charity) when he used a smatter of pejorative terms for a cross-sexed person, whom he admits was happily ensconced in his society. He rises to heights of eloquence - in the chapters on religion, I found. There is one religion that holds the fort against any corruption by Christianty, and he talks poetry about it. In fact he gives a swathe of poetry from it, that wrenches your guts. It's a sad religion, of profundities he tries to speculatively construct from bits and pieces, and this hymn is... sorry; the Bible at least has great writing; it's like Lamentations or Jeremiah, or Job.
The text points out that things are evil. Men inhabit an imperfect, evil earth. It has always been so. The Guarani are used to misfortune. It is neither new nor surprising to them. They knew about it long before the arrival of the Westerners, who taught them nothing on the subject... They were a people relentlessly obsessed by the belief that they were not created for misfortune, and the certainty that they would one day reach the Land Without Evil. And their sages, ceaselessly meditating on the means of reaching it, would reflect on the problem of their origin. How does it happen that we inhabit an imperfect earth? The grandeur of the question is matched by the heroism of the reply: Men are not to blame if existence is unjust. We need not beat our breasts because we exist in a state of imperfection.
He makes you deeply sorry that the species has lost this religion, these ideas on evil and the human condition, other than fragments and a few faithful who call themselves The Last Men. And that's his whole campaign, though he writes on different subjects: to treat these Savages seriously... quote. Which perhaps is the language of 1974 (even with irony) but the prejudices are embedded in our heads and are structural in anthropology, and I'm sure he isn't obsolete. He wasn't to me.
Still, I'm glad I read this. It's a set of essays. Once his age did betray him (I say with charity) when he used a smatter of pejorative terms for a cross-sexed person, whom he admits was happily ensconced in his society. He rises to heights of eloquence - in the chapters on religion, I found. There is one religion that holds the fort against any corruption by Christianty, and he talks poetry about it. In fact he gives a swathe of poetry from it, that wrenches your guts. It's a sad religion, of profundities he tries to speculatively construct from bits and pieces, and this hymn is... sorry; the Bible at least has great writing; it's like Lamentations or Jeremiah, or Job.
The text points out that things are evil. Men inhabit an imperfect, evil earth. It has always been so. The Guarani are used to misfortune. It is neither new nor surprising to them. They knew about it long before the arrival of the Westerners, who taught them nothing on the subject... They were a people relentlessly obsessed by the belief that they were not created for misfortune, and the certainty that they would one day reach the Land Without Evil. And their sages, ceaselessly meditating on the means of reaching it, would reflect on the problem of their origin. How does it happen that we inhabit an imperfect earth? The grandeur of the question is matched by the heroism of the reply: Men are not to blame if existence is unjust. We need not beat our breasts because we exist in a state of imperfection.
He makes you deeply sorry that the species has lost this religion, these ideas on evil and the human condition, other than fragments and a few faithful who call themselves The Last Men. And that's his whole campaign, though he writes on different subjects: to treat these Savages seriously... quote. Which perhaps is the language of 1974 (even with irony) but the prejudices are embedded in our heads and are structural in anthropology, and I'm sure he isn't obsolete. He wasn't to me.
More...