David Graeber and David Wengrow – ‘The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity’. This new book from Graeber and Wengrow seeks to challenge assumptions about human social evolution and narratives of a linear development from primitive brutes to civilised people. Instead, the authors draw attention to the diversity of earlier human societies, arguing that humans had lived in large, complex, and decentralized societies for thousands of years. In doing so, Graeber and Wengrow fundamentally transform both our understanding of the past, and our vision for new ways of organising society in the future.

Schedule

  • Thursday 23rd December - Foreword, Chapters 1 & 2
  • Sunday 2nd January - Chapters 3 & 4
  • Sunday 9th January - Chapters 5 & 6
  • Sunday 16th January - Chapters 7 & 8
  • Sunday 23rd January - Chapters 9 & 10
  • Sunday 30th January - Chapter 11 & Conclusion

Outline

  • Invidiarum [none/use name]
    ·
    3 years ago

    So, I'm not denying fluid hierarchies nor that the structure of a society can be changed. But I've heard (more from the direction of psychology, but anyways) that general trends exist, according to material circumstances. E.g. societies with complex irrigation systems tend to be more communitarian (to keep them from clogging up/overflowing/drying out) while it tends to be easier to be individualistic if you just have to wait for rain. Or that cattle-herding likely produces more warlike and male dominated societies (since cattle are highly mobile and easily stolen and thus societies are organized around cattle-raids and and protection against them).

    This is the oversimplified way I remember it, but it just seems intuitively to be an important factor. And therefore I'm annoyed that they just gloss over it (as far as I've read). Maybe it's obsolete for state of the art anthropology, but then it ought to be addressed and criticized and not left to be the big elephant in the room.

    • D61 [any]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Or that cattle-herding likely produces more warlike and male dominated societies (since cattle are highly mobile and easily stolen and thus societies are organized around cattle-raids and and protection against them).

      I just finished chapter 5 and there's something similar mentioned there. But its with preserved fish instead of cattle. And the compare/contrast was between two regions where there was a bit of a difference in how the tribes in those areas did things and the authors were trying to use fish/acorns as a way to illustrate the idea that groups in contact with each other, living in a places with similar resources, knowing similar skills, and aware of each other's cultures were able to do things completely differently at the same time.

    • RedCloud [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      I see, I believe this is something they go over in chapter 5, which I've just started reading. We'll have to see where Graeber and Wengrow go with this.