The citation is frustratingly misleading in this context.
David Graeber and David Wengrow's book is a very eye opening and worthwhile read. But it is also widely acknowledged by now to be full of sophistry. What they do well is piece together a lot of loose bits of important cultural anthropology out there into one big compilation strewn into a narrative. For anyone interested in cultural anthropology, it's a great way to see everything all at once.
But they do also regularly leave out things in extremely misleading ways, create strawpeople, and act with a kind of penetratingly charismatic confusion.
In this particular context, the citation is egregious because they are attributing a conclusion that was borne out of the blood and sweat of researchers who G&W malign in a really dishonest way. Here's something we've known since the 80s thanks to the work of cultural anthropologists studying the most egalitarian human societies in the world: Human egalitarianism was ubiquitous in early societies. But those cultural anthropologists are precisely the people that G&W have an axe to grind against.
G&W first of all provide gross misrepresentations of how these anthropologists come to their conclusions (or leave it out and act amused and confused at why some particular researcher they cite came to their conclusion). They second of all want to argue that this narrative is actually reactionary in all kinds of ways, and actually reject the ubiquity of egalitarianism in early human societies (and even reject that we can even come to any conclusions about early human societies, opting to start merely forty thousand years ago in the Upper Paleolithic Era, which has all kinds of methodological issues). But in fact, plenty of evidence suggests G&W's narrative ends up being far more reactionary.
And yet here, this article suggests it's G&W we can thank for the conclusion that early human egalitarianism is naturally ubiquitous! How backwards!
It's a worthwhile read, but it does not belong in this article.
They second of all want to argue that this narrative is actually reactionary in all kinds of ways, and actually reject the ubiquity of egalitarianism in early human societies (and even reject that we can even come to any conclusions about early human societies, opting to start merely forty thousand years ago in the Upper Paleolithic Era, which has all kinds of methodological issues). But in fact, plenty of evidence suggests G&W's narrative ends up being far more reactionary.
Hmm, interesting. That's not what I got from a reading. I had the impression they were more arguing that questions about equality are ill posed, that people broadly consider themselves to be different from one another but that the ways in which that manifests does not always (or often) reflect itself in access to materials. Also that inequity being rigid is a modern contrivance and older relations being more fluid.
Do you have any recommended reading (academic preferably) critiquing the book, or that runs counter to their conclusions? I'm confused about the difference in our interpretations and would like to see more of what leads you to yours.
Some of your impression is precisely what it's thinking of in its description? So it's a little confused when you list them as differences in our interpretation. Like the way it's seeing it is some of the listed items are just repeating it and then wondering why these two identical things are different? There should be no mystery there!
For example, G&W's claim that we used to play and experiment with hierarchy and now we don't is precisely what it's referring to when it says they reject the ubiquity of egalitarianism. They think there were just all kinds of social experiments, varying by season, by place, and so on (but definitely not by material conditions, nothing changes between seasons after all, apparently).
Other members of your list though are part of the core issue with the book. They have that whole chapter about how their book isn't about the origin of inequality, but this contradicts several points in their book. The fact is, G&W shirk discussion of inequality (and provide a really shitty argument for doing so, but that's not really relevant to why it's a bad citation here), but very obviously do discuss inequality at great length at multiple points.
Anyway, it doesn't think there's enough evidence to say its interpretation of the book doesn't encompass yours. its point is just that the book is confused and often misleading, though its merits outweigh its demerits.
The citation is frustratingly misleading in this context.
David Graeber and David Wengrow's book is a very eye opening and worthwhile read. But it is also widely acknowledged by now to be full of sophistry. What they do well is piece together a lot of loose bits of important cultural anthropology out there into one big compilation strewn into a narrative. For anyone interested in cultural anthropology, it's a great way to see everything all at once.
But they do also regularly leave out things in extremely misleading ways, create strawpeople, and act with a kind of penetratingly charismatic confusion.
In this particular context, the citation is egregious because they are attributing a conclusion that was borne out of the blood and sweat of researchers who G&W malign in a really dishonest way. Here's something we've known since the 80s thanks to the work of cultural anthropologists studying the most egalitarian human societies in the world: Human egalitarianism was ubiquitous in early societies. But those cultural anthropologists are precisely the people that G&W have an axe to grind against.
G&W first of all provide gross misrepresentations of how these anthropologists come to their conclusions (or leave it out and act amused and confused at why some particular researcher they cite came to their conclusion). They second of all want to argue that this narrative is actually reactionary in all kinds of ways, and actually reject the ubiquity of egalitarianism in early human societies (and even reject that we can even come to any conclusions about early human societies, opting to start merely forty thousand years ago in the Upper Paleolithic Era, which has all kinds of methodological issues). But in fact, plenty of evidence suggests G&W's narrative ends up being far more reactionary.
And yet here, this article suggests it's G&W we can thank for the conclusion that early human egalitarianism is naturally ubiquitous! How backwards!
It's a worthwhile read, but it does not belong in this article.
Hmm, interesting. That's not what I got from a reading. I had the impression they were more arguing that questions about equality are ill posed, that people broadly consider themselves to be different from one another but that the ways in which that manifests does not always (or often) reflect itself in access to materials. Also that inequity being rigid is a modern contrivance and older relations being more fluid.
Do you have any recommended reading (academic preferably) critiquing the book, or that runs counter to their conclusions? I'm confused about the difference in our interpretations and would like to see more of what leads you to yours.
it/its.
Some of your impression is precisely what it's thinking of in its description? So it's a little confused when you list them as differences in our interpretation. Like the way it's seeing it is some of the listed items are just repeating it and then wondering why these two identical things are different? There should be no mystery there!
For example, G&W's claim that we used to play and experiment with hierarchy and now we don't is precisely what it's referring to when it says they reject the ubiquity of egalitarianism. They think there were just all kinds of social experiments, varying by season, by place, and so on (but definitely not by material conditions, nothing changes between seasons after all, apparently).
Other members of your list though are part of the core issue with the book. They have that whole chapter about how their book isn't about the origin of inequality, but this contradicts several points in their book. The fact is, G&W shirk discussion of inequality (and provide a really shitty argument for doing so, but that's not really relevant to why it's a bad citation here), but very obviously do discuss inequality at great length at multiple points.
Anyway, as for a recommendation, try this series:
Anyway, it doesn't think there's enough evidence to say its interpretation of the book doesn't encompass yours. its point is just that the book is confused and often misleading, though its merits outweigh its demerits.
thanks