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dreamtokens 's review for:
Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches: The Riddles of Culture
by Marvin Harris
I very eagerly borrowed The riddles of culture by Marvin Harris from the library, happy that they had it and very excited to read it. I expected chapters of interesting information, and my expectations were exceeded. I really enjoyed reading it, after I started I almost couldn 19t stop. I 19ve read that Harris is quite controversial in anthropology, but of course, in such a field and with such claims as those he makes, it would be impossible not to be. On my part, I don 19t have enough knowledge to critique this materialist approach, and I must say it fascinated me.
The book aims to explain different cultural practices which we might call irrational, illogical and maybe even damaging economically. In the first chapter, he shifts the focus from the exoticism of the belief in the 1Escared cow 1D of India and to the practical advantages of not killing cows for most small farmers: mainly oxen as offspring and dung as fuel. The second explains the interdiction on pig meat for the Muslims as a health precaution and the love of pig in the Maring society as a way of keeping resources available. The cycle of war and violence of the Yanomamo he explains as well as a competition for animal protein, not as a result of biological male aggressivity.
1EApart from childbearing and related sexual specialities, the assignment of social roles on the basis of sex does not follow automatically from the biological differences between men and women. Knowing only the facts of human anatomy and biology, one could not predict that females would be the socially subordinate sex. 1D
The famous potlach he subordinates to the economic system, as a way of creating prestige when the ruling class is disorganized. As the Bushmen have said to anthropologist Richard Lee:
1EWe refuse one who boasts, for someday his pride will make him kill somebody. So we always speak of his meat as worthless. This way we cool his heart and make him gentle. 1D
The Phantom Cargo story from New Guinea he ascribes to a way of understanding the world which could only be natural to those people, given their religion, history, and access to knowledge. Expecting a 1Eship 1D with goods from the West was expecting the Big Man to redistribute wealth, and there was no way of understanding that this will not happen, especially as they have been lead to believe it at times.
Lastly Harris turns to the rise of the Messiah and tries to explain the popularity of the Christian religion, conveniently spread through the Roman Empire. This he ties to the Middle Age witch hunt, which he claims was a way for the political and religious power to keep the masses afraid 13 thus it was a constructed witch hunt, a looking for witches extensively, a creation of witches. In the very last chapter, Harris turns to our own time and space, 1Ethe return of the witch 1D. The New Age spirituality promotes individuality and responsibility of the self, as opposed to social responsibility. In that way, it is a belief of the middle classes, comfortably revolting by themselves.
1EMillions of educated youth seriously believe that the proposal to kiss away the corporate state as if it were an evil enchantment is no less effective or realistic than any other form of political consciousness. Like its medieval predecessor, our modern witch fad blunts and befuddles the forces of dissent. 1D
Marvin Harris argues against the claim that science will drive away moral sensibility, in fact, he argues the opposite.
1EI see no reason why further indulgence of involuted, ethnocentric, irrational and subjective modes of consciousness should result in anything markedly different from what we have always had: witches and messiahs. [...] we must regard the expansion of scientific objectivity into the domain of lifestyle riddles as a moral imperative. It 19s the only thing that 19s never been tried. 1D
The book aims to explain different cultural practices which we might call irrational, illogical and maybe even damaging economically. In the first chapter, he shifts the focus from the exoticism of the belief in the 1Escared cow 1D of India and to the practical advantages of not killing cows for most small farmers: mainly oxen as offspring and dung as fuel. The second explains the interdiction on pig meat for the Muslims as a health precaution and the love of pig in the Maring society as a way of keeping resources available. The cycle of war and violence of the Yanomamo he explains as well as a competition for animal protein, not as a result of biological male aggressivity.
1EApart from childbearing and related sexual specialities, the assignment of social roles on the basis of sex does not follow automatically from the biological differences between men and women. Knowing only the facts of human anatomy and biology, one could not predict that females would be the socially subordinate sex. 1D
The famous potlach he subordinates to the economic system, as a way of creating prestige when the ruling class is disorganized. As the Bushmen have said to anthropologist Richard Lee:
1EWe refuse one who boasts, for someday his pride will make him kill somebody. So we always speak of his meat as worthless. This way we cool his heart and make him gentle. 1D
The Phantom Cargo story from New Guinea he ascribes to a way of understanding the world which could only be natural to those people, given their religion, history, and access to knowledge. Expecting a 1Eship 1D with goods from the West was expecting the Big Man to redistribute wealth, and there was no way of understanding that this will not happen, especially as they have been lead to believe it at times.
Lastly Harris turns to the rise of the Messiah and tries to explain the popularity of the Christian religion, conveniently spread through the Roman Empire. This he ties to the Middle Age witch hunt, which he claims was a way for the political and religious power to keep the masses afraid 13 thus it was a constructed witch hunt, a looking for witches extensively, a creation of witches. In the very last chapter, Harris turns to our own time and space, 1Ethe return of the witch 1D. The New Age spirituality promotes individuality and responsibility of the self, as opposed to social responsibility. In that way, it is a belief of the middle classes, comfortably revolting by themselves.
1EMillions of educated youth seriously believe that the proposal to kiss away the corporate state as if it were an evil enchantment is no less effective or realistic than any other form of political consciousness. Like its medieval predecessor, our modern witch fad blunts and befuddles the forces of dissent. 1D
Marvin Harris argues against the claim that science will drive away moral sensibility, in fact, he argues the opposite.
1EI see no reason why further indulgence of involuted, ethnocentric, irrational and subjective modes of consciousness should result in anything markedly different from what we have always had: witches and messiahs. [...] we must regard the expansion of scientific objectivity into the domain of lifestyle riddles as a moral imperative. It 19s the only thing that 19s never been tried. 1D