notes on the early evolutionists

8/6/2019 Notes on the Early Evolutionists

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Comprehensive Examinations:Disciplinary Field in Social and Cultural Anthropology

Section 1: Foundational Issues/Debates

1a) Early Evolutionists

Historical/Contextual Insights from Eriksen and Nielsen'sA History of Anthropology

Prehistory of Anthropology:

One may be able to trace the origins of anthropological inquiry to Greek thinkers as far back as

Herodotus.

It may also be useful to think about Plato's dialogues as early anthropological writings, though

Plato does not necessarily deal with comprehensive accounts of different cultures

Eriksen and Nielsen on Aristotle:

Aristotle (384322 BC) also indulged in sophisticated speculations about the nature ofhumanity. In his philosophical anthropology he discusses the differences between humansin general and animals, and concludes that although humans have several needs incommon with animals, only man possesses reason, wisdom and morality. He also arguedthat humans are fundamentally social by nature. In anthropology and elsewhere, such auniversalistic style of thought, which seeks to establish similarities rather than differencesbetween groups of people, plays a prominent role to this day. Furthermore, it seems clearthat anthropology, up through history, has vacillated between a universalistic and arelativistic stance, and that central figures in the discipline are also often said to lean eithertowards one position or the other (2001: 3).

This is a useful point to keep in mind, especially in terms of one's attempt to conceptualize the

field of anthropology as a whole. One could consider how Tylor, Morgan, Spencer, Marx,Haraway, Latour, Tsing, Boellstorff, and many others confront the tension between universalism

and relativism in anthropology, in terms of both their methodological and theoreticalcommitments. It seems unlikely that any of them simply take on one position or the other,

though it might be the case that it's only recently that more nuanced debates are emerging in the

discipline...especially as as result of feminist/feminist Marxist anthropological theory...JUST A

THOUGHT

Eriksen and Nielsen suggest that Khaldun might also be considered an early

anthropologist...they even make the argument that Khaldun anticipated Durkheim's theory of

social solidarity

Eriksen and Nielsen on Medieval Contributions to anthropological theory/methodology:

There are nevertheless a few European writings from the late medieval period, whichmay be considered precursors of latter-day anthropology. Most famous is Marco Polos(12541323) account of his expedition to China, where he allegedly spent seventeen years.Another example is the great journey through Western Asia described in The Voyage andTravels of Sir John Mandeville, Knight, written by an unknown Englishman in the fourteenthcentury. Both of these books stimulatedthe European interest in alien peoplesandcustoms. Then, with the advent of mercantilist economies andthe contemporaneousRenaissance in the sciences andarts, the small, but rich European city-states of the late


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Middle Ages began to develop rapidly, and the earliest signs of a capitalist class emerged.Fired by these great social movements andfinancedby the new entrepreneurs, a series ofgrandexploratory sea voyages were now launchedby European rulers. These journeys toAfrica, Asia andAmerica are often described in the West as the great discoveries, thoughthe discovered peoples themselves may often have hadreason to question theirgreatness (see, for example, Wolf 1982) (2001: 4).

This might be a useful tidbit to help one begin engaging with Marx's contributions toanthropology, and the relationship between politics and economics in early anthropologicaltheories/methodologies...

Eriksen and Nielsen on proto-evolutionary ideas in philosophy/science:

As Todorov (1984) argues, the Indians struck at the very heart of the European idea ofwhat it means to be human. The Indians were humans, but they did not behave inways that Europeans considered natural for human beings. What was then human?What was natural? During the Middle Ages, philosophers assumed that God had createdthe world once and for all and given its inhabitants their particular natures, which they hadsince retained. Now it was becoming possible to ask whether the Indians represented an

earlier stage in the development of humanity. This in turn led to embryonic notions ofprogress and development, which heralded a radical break with the static world-view ofthe Middle Ages. In the later history of anthropology, notions of development and progresshave at times played an important role. But if progress is possible, it follows that

progress is brought about by the activity of human beings, and this idea, that peopleshape their own destinies, is an even more enduring notion in anthropology (2001: 6).

A less static world-view...this certainly connects the history of anthropology with Marx's view

of capitalist economies...which is a connection that will become increasingly important in yourreading...

Montaigne becomes an important figure at this point, partially because of his social, political

and religious commitments, but also because of the unique style he brings to hisEssais

Eriksen and Nielsen on Montaigne:

Amongthe most striking expressions of this new-found, subjective freedom, are theEssais (1580) of the French philosopher Michel de Montaigne (153392). With an open-mindedness and in a personal style that were unheard of at the time, Montaignespeculates about numerous issues large and small. Unlike nearly all his contemporaries,Montaigne, in his writings about remote peoples, appears as what we today would call acultural relativist. In the essay Of Cannibals, he even concludes that if he had beenborn and raised in a cannibal tribe, he would in all likelihood himself have eaten humanflesh. In the same essay, which would later inspire Rousseau, Montaigne also coined theterm le bon sauvage, the noble savage, an idea that has later been much debated in

anthropology (2001: 6).

Montaigne is, perhaps, an early evolutionist...at least in his treatment of the 'noble savages' in

Of Cannibals...or perhaps not...his style is more subtle.

It seems likely that Montaigne has had a major influence on many 20th and 21st century French

thinkers...in philosophy, anthropology, and boutique anthropological fields such as STS...

Eriksen and Nielsen also point to the legacy of debates surrounding empiricism and rationalismin anthropological inquiry...

Though empiricists trusted the senses, other thinkers, such as Descartes, did not trust the senses,


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and believed that rational thought was the true path to objective knowledge....

There is an important connection to Plato here...and the definitions of love and knowledge

provided in some of his more engaging dialogues.

Eriksen and Nielsen on why this is not QUITE anthropology:

In spite of these deep-going historical continuities, we maintain that anthropology as ascience only appeared at a later stage, though it is true that its birth was a more gradualprocess than is sometimes assumed. Our reasons for this are, first, that all the workmentioned so far belongs to one of two genres: travel writing and social philosophy. It isonly when these two aspects of anthropological inquiry are fused, i.e. when data and theoryare integrated, that anthropology appears. Second, and perhaps more controversially,we call attention to the fact that all the writers mentioned so far are influenced by theirtimes and their society. This is of course true of contemporary anthropologists as well(2001: 8).

Eriksen and Nielsen argue that anthropology as a scientific discipline might trace it's history

back to the 18

th

century, particularly with reference to the work of Giambattista Vico'sThe New

Science, which combined ethnography, philosophy and emerging forms of natural scientific

inquiry.

Vico might be considered one of the first evolutionary anthropologists, since he believed thathuman beings and human societies must go through three stages of development...

Eriksen and Nielsen on Vico's 3 Stages:

The first stage was the Age of Gods, an age of nature worship and rudimentary socialstructures, traits that Vico associated with primitive peoples. Then came the Age ofHeroes, with widespread social unrest due to great social inequality both theEuropean Middle Ages and Vicos own time have doubtlessly served as models here.

The final stage, the Age of Man was an envisioned future era ruled by reason. Manysimilar, more or less utopian developmental schemes have since been proposed, notleast during the nineteenth century. Implicit in these is the notion that not only Europeansocieties were capable of improvement; with proper guidance, the primitive peoples couldalso attain progress. This thought was undoubtedly a comforting one for Europeans as theyapproached the age of the great empires (2001: 10).

Nielsen and Eriksen go on to argue that, though a pioneer, it was Baron Montesquieu whodeveloped one of the first texts that could be considered a scientific anthropology...

Voltaire, Rousseau and a range of other thinkers also contributed to the history of

anthropological thought...many of them contributing to a encyclopedia in the 18th century...

Rousseau influenced Levi-Strauss and Marx...this might be an important point as you make

your way through Capital Volume 1

The Romantic Period, according to Eriksen and Nielsen was no longer universalistic, butparticularistic, and thinkers became increasingly interested in individuals and their relation to

social formations/groups...

Nationalism also emerges during this period...

Romanticism was important in Germany...

The Voltaire-Herder debate is a telling moment, pointing to important tensions between


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universalism and particularism...

This had an important impact on the 20th C development of cultural relativism

Kant was an important philosopher at this time...Eriksen and Nielsen call him the greatest

Eriksen and Nielsen on Kant's contributions:

Kant concurred with Locke and Hume that true knowledge derived from senseimpressions, but he also stressed (with Descartes) that sensory data were filtered andshaped by the faculties of the mind. Knowledge was both sensual and mathematical,positive and speculative, objective and subjective (2001: 14).

For Kant, knowledge is a creative process...people must develop/create a world that is

accessible to knowledge...one can never know the world in and of itself...

This is, obviously, an important aspect of anthropological thought....think of Clifford Geertz, for

instance.

In Eriksen and Nielsen's framework, Hegel completes...or attempts to complete...Kant's mode ofreasoning...which has an obvious impact on Marx's theoretical/methodological framework...

In Hegel, the idea of society becomes more important than the individual...there is also NOFIXED POINT....does this mean that

Methodological collectivism vs. methodological individualism is perhaps a useful way to think

about the differences between Kant and Hegel...HEGEL IS A METHODOLOGICAL

COLLECTIVIST...KANT IS A METHODOLOGICAL INDIVIDUALIST...

Eriksen and Nielsen on an important aspect of Hegel's thought:

He describes a Weltgeist, a world-spirit that evolves independently of individuals butmanifests itself through them. The Geisthas its centres and peripheries, and spreads

according to specific evolutionary laws. With this idea, Geana (1995) has suggested,Hegel was the first philosopher to envision a truly global humanity (2001: 15) .

It is also important to keep in mind the impact of the development of museums and

ethnographical collections in the history of anthropology as an academic, and perhaps even

scientific, discipline...

Social Evolutionary Thinkers:

The period from 1700-1914 saw major increases in population and commodity production,

which also coincided with a range of technological and scientific developments...

These factors all contributed to the development of anthropology, which Eriksen and Nielsendescribe as a distinctly modern discipline...

The French Revolution and the labour movement all played a role as well...

Eriksen and Nielsen on the impact of Evolutionary thinking:

Finally, an internationalised science emerged. The global researcher becomes apopular figure the prototype naturally being Charles Darwin (180981), whose Origin ofSpecies (1859) was based on data collected during a six-year circumnavigation of the globe


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(2001: 17.

The history of anthropology and the history of the biosciences clearly converge at this point...

Eriksen and Nielsen on Morgan, and the development of Biological and Social Evolutionism:

The evolutionism typical of nineteenth-century anthropology built on ideas ofdevelopment from the eighteenth century, bolstered by the experience of colonialism, and(starting in the 1860s) by the influence of Darwin and his most famous supporter, thesocial philosopher Herbert Spencer (1820 1903), who founded Social Darwinism, a socialphilosophy extolling the virtues of individual competition. But anthropology did not developinto a racist pseudo-science. All the leading anthropologists of the time supported theprinciple ofthe psychic unity of mankind humans were everywhere born with roughly thesame potentials, and inherited differences were negligible. Indeed, theories of socialevolution presupposed this principle. For if racial differences were held to befundamental, the cultural comparisons on which these theories were based would be

unnecessary (2001: 17).

Morgan was an urgent anthropologist who was worried that Native American culture would

be lost forever if he didn't trace, collect, organize, and preserve their cultural products...

He made important contributions to the study of kinship

Eriksen and Nielsen on how kinship influenced Morgan's evolutionary thinking:

For Morgan, kinship was primarily a point of entry to the study of social evolution. Heargued that primitive societies were organised on the basis of kinship, and thatterminological variations among kinship systems correlated with variations in social

structure. But he also supposed that terminology changed slowly, and that it thereforecontained clues to an understanding of earlier stages of social evolution (2001: 19).

Morgan believed in three stages of social development: savages, barbarians and civilizations

Evolution was mostly based on technological developments

Morgan, apparently had an influence on Marx's post-Hegelian evolutionary thinking....

Marx and Morgan can be considered materialist thinkers...in a broad sense of the term (But

it's useful to keep in mind Harvey's suggestion that Marx is not SIMPLY a materialistthinker...especially in terms of the relationship between appearances and essences...

Eriksen and Nielsen on Marx's evolutionary thinking:

Marx tried throughout his life to reconcile an idealist impulse from German philosophy(particularly Hegel) with a materialist world-view. It is sometimes said that he placed

Hegel on his feet: he retained Hegels dialectical principle, but argued that the movement ofhistory took place on a material, not a spiritual, level. Society, according to Marx, consists ofinfrastructure and superstructure. The former comprises the conditions for existence material resources and the division of labour; the latter includes all kinds of ideationalsystems religion, law and ideology. In all societies, the primary contradiction runs throughthe infrastructure: between the of production (that organise labour and property) and theforces of production (e.g. technology or land). When technological advances render previous


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relations of production obsolete, class conflict ensues, and the relations of production arechanged e.g. from slavery to feudalism to capitalism. Marx predicted that thecapitalist system would itself give way to socialism (ruled by a dictatorship of theproletariat), and finally to classless communism a utopia, where everything is owned by all

(2001: 20).

Questions arise concerning whether or not Marx can be used to study non-Western societies,especially in the context of his dicussion of class relations/struggles...is it REALLY applicable

to anthropological theory (a similar concrn is raised in the work of Foucault)...

Eriksen and Nielsen on a potentially interested connection between Marx and Morgan:

We might note, for example, that his difficulties with bringing materialism and(Hegelian) idealism together are reminiscent of Morgans problem with the materialistcauses of kinship terminology. Only in the 1980s did we see a concerted effort at solvingthe paradox (2001: 21).

Eriksen and Nielsen on Victorian anthropologists, such as Tylor and Bastian AND others:

But Tylor did not share Morgans interest in kinship terminology, and insteaddeveloped a theory ofcultural survivals. Survivals were cultural traits that had lost theiroriginal functions in society, but had continued, for no particular reason, to survive. Suchtraits were of crucial importance to the effort to reconstruct human evolution (2001: 23).

Tylor's most significant, and lasting, contribution to anthropology is his definition of

culture...which will become important in your OWN notes on Tylor...

Interested in the 'psychic unity of humanity'...

Eriksen and Nielsen on a potentially interesting way to frame the difference between anthropologists,biologists and sociologists in the mid-late 19th C:

In the years between 1840 and 1880, a whole range of new problems was raised bysociologists and anthropologists. While Marx developed the first grand theory in sociology,comprising modernisation, value formation, power and ideology, and while Darwinformulated the principles of biological evolution, anthropologists were engaged in a dualproject. In part they were busy devising grand evolutionary schemes unilineal in intentand universalistic in pretensions; in part they were documenting the immense range ofhuman socio-cultural variation and out of the knowledge thus accumulated grew thefirst low-level theories, pertaining to specific ethnographic domains, such as kinship, androoted in specific and detailed empirical descriptions (2001: 24).


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Spencer, Herbert. 1860. The Social Organism. Westminster Review, 17(1), 90- 121.

Eriksen and Nielsen on Spencer's role in evolutionary anthropology:

The evolutionism typical of nineteenth-century anthropology built on ideas ofdevelopment from the eighteenth century, bolstered by the experience of colonialism, and(starting in the 1860s) by the influence of Darwin and his most famous supporter, thesocial philosopher Herbert Spencer (1820- 1903), who founded Social Darwinism, a socialphilosophy extolling the virtues of individual competition. But anthropology did not developinto a racist pseudo-science. All the leading anthropologists of the time supported theprinciple of the psychic unity of mankindhumans were everywhere born with roughly thesame potentials, and inherited differences were negligible. For if racial differences wereheld to be fundamental, the cultural comparisons on which these theories were basedwould be unnecessary (17).

Spencer's piece opens with the following statement:

Sir James Macintosh got great credit for the saying, that 'constitutions are not madebut grow.' In our day the most significant thing about this saying is, that it was ever thoughtso significant. As from the surprise displayed by a man at some familiar fact you may judgeof his general culture; so from the admiration which an age accords a new thought, itsaverage degree of enlightenment may be safely inferred (90).

Spencer criticizes the claim that things are made, and believes that they are the result of natural,necessary growth, from homogeneous and unstable to heterogeneous and stable forms

This, for Spencer, is true of biological organisms as well as societies

Spencer, sounding a little like William Paley, argues that the division of labour in society is

necessary, and slow growth out of a previous moment in time...

It is not by 'the hero as king,' any more than by 'collective wisdowm,' that men havebeen segregated into producers, wholesale distributors, and retail distributors. The whole ofour industrial organization, from its most conspicuous features down to its minutest details,has become what it is, not only without legislative guidance, but, to a considerable extent,in spite of human wants and activities (91).

Spencer believes that societies grow in terms of what is most suitable to their properfunctioning

Confusingly, he says that this is also true of despotic states.

After a description of how this idea has been played out in Plato and Hobbes, Spencer outlinessome of the ways in which the growth of societies corresponds with the development of

individual living organisms:

1) That commencing as small aggregations they insensibly augment in mass; some of them

reaching eventually perhaps a hundred thousand times what they originally were2) That while at first so simple in structure as to be almost considered structureless, they assume,

in the course of their growth, a continually increasing complexity of structure

3) That though in their early developed state there exists in them scarcely any mutual dependence

of parts, these parts gradually acquire a mutual dependence, which becomes at last so great, that


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the activity and life of each part is made possible only by the activity and life of the rest

There is a connection between the third parrallelism and Durkheim's theory of 'organicsolidarity'

Keep in mind that Durkheim was also, to some extent, an evolutionist...

The highest societies AND the highest organisms display the greatest degree of both complexity

AND stability...he is speaking specifically about England, and perhaps Europe more broadly,when he refers to the highest societies. This will, eventually, be one of the reasons why

evolutionists fail to influence many later anthropologists...

The rest of the article is a frustrating description of the ways in which the lowest forms of society

correspond with the lowest form of individual organisms

Like Morgan, Spencer believed that societies develop through stages, but he used mostly

biological analogies, whereas Morgan based his comparison on technological innovations.

Is this significant

Money, commodities, circulation...Marx?

Almost unawares we have come upon the analogy which exists between the blood of aliving body and the circulating mass of commodities in the body politic (109).


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Tylor, Edward Burnett. 1871. The Science of Culture, Chapter 1 fromPrimitive Culture.

Tylor begins with his famous, and influential, definition of culture

Culture or Civilization, taken in its wide ethnographic sense, is that complex wholewhich includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities andhabits acquired by man as a member of society (1871: 1).

Tylor is interested in the study of the laws of human thought and human action...

The relationship between thoughts and actions is a basic, but significant, element of

anthropological modes of inquiry...

On the one hand, the uniformity which so largely pervades civilization may beascribed, in great measure, to the uniform action of uniform causes; while on the otherhand its various grades may be regarded as stages of development or evolution, eachthe outcome of previous history, and about to do its proper part in shaping the histoy of

the future (1)

This is a position that is, more or less, consistent with Morgan and Spencer's evolutionary

frameworks...

But what exactly is a uniform cause and how does it shape uniform actions...

Keep in mind that Marx, at least according to Harvey, does not find himself interested in causal

questions...perhaps this is an important distinction between Marx and evolutionaryanthropologists during the late 19th century...

Tylor immediately starts making comparisons between cultures and civilizations and findings in

the natural sciences...

the unity of nature, the fixity of laws, the definite sequence of cause and effects are all

fundamental in these fields of inquiry...and Tylor believes they are important to the study ofhuman beings as well.

He mentions Aristotle, Pythagoras and Leibniz

Tylor points to one of the key problems in anthropological thinking:

But when we come to talk of the higher processes of human feeling and action, ofthought and awareness, knowledge and art, a change appears in the prevalent tone ofopinion. The world at large is scarcely prepared to accept the general study of humanlife as a branch of natural science, and to carry out, in a large sense, the poet'sinjunction to, 'Account for moral as for natural things' (2).

Though people might not be prepared for a study of humans that follows a similar trajectory asthe natural sciences, Tylor believes most people, if it was presented to them clearly, would findsuch a position desirable...

There are many who would willingly accept a science of history if placed before themwith substantial definiteness of principle and evidence, but who not unreasonably reject thesystems offered to them, as falling too short of a scientific standard (2).


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Tylor is interested in the development of true knowledge, which he distinguishes fromspeculative dogmatism

He argues that the belief in human will is not arrived at by sound reasoning, even if it is latent

in people's minds...

None will deny that, as each man knows by the evidence of his own consciousness,definite and natural causes does, to a great extent, determine human action. Then, keepingaside from considerations of extra-natural interference and causeless spontaneity, let ustake this admitted existence of natural cause and effect as our standing ground, and travelon it as it will bear us (3).

Tylor believes that even those who oppose this belief still recognize it...he sees this as afundamental contradiction in their reasoning...

Now it appears that this view of human will and conduct, as subject to definite law, isindeed recognized and acted upon by the very people who oppose it when stated in the

abstract as as general principle, and who then complain that it annihilates man's free-will, destroys his sense of personal responsibility, and degrades him to a soulless machine.He who will say these things will nevertheless pass much of his own life in studying themotives which lead to human action, seeking to attain his wishes through them, framing inhis mind theories of personal character, reckoning what are likely to be the effects ofnew combinations, and giving to his reasoning the crowning character of true scientificinquiry (4).

Tylor believes in the value of treating lessons of experience as being that which helps one

develop rational modes of thinking and action....PERHAPS

Whether the doctrine be wholly or but partly true, it accepts the very condition underwhich we search for new knowledge in the lessons of experience, and in a word the wholecourse of our rational life is based upon it (4)

Tylor suggests that it is the relationship between generals and particulars that help people study,and understand, human laws AND natural laws

Thus at all times historians, so far as they have aimed at being more than merechroniclers, have done their best to show not merely succession, but connexion, among theevents upon their record. Moreover, they have striven to elicit general principles of humanactions, and by these to explain particular events, stating expressly or taking tacitly forgranted the existence of a philosophy of history (4).

Does this point hold true for Morgan and Spencer as well? How might Marx differ?

Significantly, Tylor recognizes the difficulties faced by historians interested in developing these

general laws. In fact, he argues that the general historians is faced with so many issues that it ismost likely impossible for them to fulfill these ambitious goals.

A more specific focus, such as the history of culture that Tylor strives to develop, is, he

believes, more likely to generate useful results, and insights into general laws of human thoughtand action.


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If field of inquiry be narrowed from History as a whole to that branch of it which ishere called Culture, the history, not of tribes or nations, but of the condition of knowledge,religion, art, custom, and the like among them, the task of investigation proves to lie withinfar more moderate compass (5).

Though the difficulties do not disappear, Tylor believes that they are now more manageable

Funny to consider how Haraway, Latour and others deal with a more specific focus...and try to

show how, the further in you go the more nuanced and complex an area of interest becomes...

Might be worth considering how, if at all, scale is conceptualized in these early anthropological

thinkers...

Tylor believes that these issues can be highlighted by a preliminary investigation into howCultures evolve over time...

Surveyed in a broad view, the character and habit of mankind at once display thatsimilarity and consistency of phenomena which led the Italian proverb-maker to declare

that all the world is one country...To general likeness in human nature on the one hand,and to general likeness to the circumstances of life on the other, this similarity andconsistency may no doubt be traced, and they may be studied with especial fitness incomparing races near the same grade of civilization (5).

Tylor believes that these connections can be seen no matter how you compare various cultures.

Civilized people and savages can be studied alongside one another, and the general,

consistent laws will present themselves. Tylor suggests that any ethnological museum will makethese connections apparent...

As a result, Tylor wants to treat humankind as a homogeneous mass, not a series of distnct races

or ethnicities...though he does argue that each group is divided between various stages ofevolutionary development...

Tylor provides examples of some of the details ethnographers MUST account for:

A first step in the study of civilization is to dissect it into details, and to classify thesein their proper groups. Thus, in examining weapons, they are to be classed under spear,club, sling, bow and arrow, and so forth; among textile arts are to be ranged matting,netting, and several grades of making and weaving threads; myths are divided under suchheadings as myths of sunrise and sunset, eclipse-myths, earthquake-myths, local mythswhich account for the parentage of a tribe by turning its name into the name of an imaginaryancestor; under rites and ceremonies occur such practices as the various kinds ofsacrifice to the ghosts of the dead and to other spiritual beings, the turning to the eastin worship, the purification of ceremonial or moral uncleanness by means of water or fire(7).

Interesting connections are made between species of these various forms of culture...

Bows and arrows are species, methods of weaving are species...ethnographers must trace the

geographical and historical distribution of these various species in order to account for their

differences, and for what stage of evolutionary development a given tribe is in...

Obvious connections to biological evolutionary theories (especially Darwin)


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Tylor on what might be called Problems of Ethics and Narrative Structure in Ethnographic

research:

It is a matter worthy of consideration, that the accounts of similar phenomena ofculture, recurring in different parts of the world, actually supply incidental proof of their own

authenticity. Some years since, a question which brings out this point was put to me by agreat historian'How can a statement as to customs, myths, beliefs, etc., of a savagetribe be treated as evidence where it depends on the testimony of some traveller ormissionary, who may be a superficial observer, more or less ignorant of he native language, acareless retailer of unsifted talk, a man prejudiced, or even wilfully deceitful?' (8).

Tylor agrees that this is an important question...

For Tylor, the fact that very different people, in very different places, end up describing verysimilar customs, myths, and practices...it is difficult to chalk this up to mere fraud or accident...

A story by a bushranger in Australia may, perhaps, be objected to as a mistake or aninvention, but did a Methodist minister in Guinea conspire with him to cheat the public bytelling the same story there? (9).

Tylor argues that the connections between these stories must be thought of as more or less true

and, as a result, ethnographers should be skeptical of research that offers seemingly anomalousaccounts of specific cultures...one should be skeptical of stories that don't connect to distant

others...THIS IS KIND OF AN ODD ARGUMENT...

Tylor is not interested in exceptional facts but in general averages in the development of asystematic study of civilization and the laws of human thought and action...

GENERAL QUALITIES OF ORGANIZED BODIES...might be interesting to connect Spencer

to this statement...

Tylor on distribution and diffusion of culture:

To turn from the distribution of culture in different countries, to its diffusion withinthese countries. The quality of mankind which tends most to make the systematic study ofcivilization possible, is that remarkable tacit consensus or agreement which so far induceswhole populations to unite in the use of the same language, to follow the same religion andcustomary law, to settle down to the same general level of art and knowledge (9-10)

Tylor flat out argues that there are so many similarities between societies, and their cultures,

that we can ignore differences...psyhic unity of mankind...

Later on a number of thinkers, most importantly Geertz, will problematize this way of thinkingabout culture, and the differences noted between different human societies...

Tylor suggests that the emergence of statistics helps us understand similarities in a range ofareas, including birth rates and suicide rates. This, for Tylor, is further justification that

difference is unimportant in anthropological study

Determining what can and should be left out of anthropological studies is something that hascome up in all of the readings thus far...in Malinowski, Levi-Strauss, Geertz and others....this

seems to be a major problem for anthropologists

Statistics cannot, however, be used to study lower levels of humanity...so one has to accept


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accounts from secondary sources, the reliability of which might be suspect...but Tylor suggests

that these sources are great, or at least as great as they can be!

It is with such general qualities of organized bodies of men that ethnography hasespecially to deal

Geertz suggests that it is important to study individuals, and to see how those individuals

interact and combine with one another in the development of the various stages of culture. Onemust recognize both the wholes, and the parts that make them up...

Tylor cautions againsts a kind of relativism that would see every individual action, or social law,as inherently true and good for its time. He points to slavery, and certain spiritual beliefs as

being both without logic, and potentially dangerous

It being shows that the details of Culture are capable of being classified in a greatnumber of ethnographic groups of arts, beliefs, customs, and the rest, the considerationcomes next how far the facts arranged in these groups are produced by evolution fromone another (13).

Geertz argues that, though naturalists who study animals and plants might have a hard timedetermining whether evolution is an ideal, or a genuine process that actually unfolds over time,

the ethnography can rest assured that it is...

Mechanical invention supplies apt examples of the kind of development which affectscivilization at large. In the history of fire-arms, the clumsy wheel-lock, in which a notchedsteel wheel was turned by a handle against the flint till a spark caught the priming, led tothe invention of the more serviceable flint-lock, of which a few still hang in the kitchens ofour farmhouses, for the boys to shoot small birds with at Christmas; the flint-lock in timespassed by an obvious modification into the percussion-lock, which is just now changing itsold-fashioned arrangement to be adapted to breech-loading (14)

For Tylor, human populations advance, like locks for fire-arms, through necessary stages ofcultural development. They move gradually from one stage to the next...from a lower state of

humanity to a higher state of humanity...

Then Tylor introduces his idea of survivals:

These are processes, customs, opinions, and so forth, which have been carried on byforce of habit into a new state of society different from that in which they had theiroriginal home, and they thus remain as proofs and examples of an older condition ofculture out of which a newer has been evolved (15).

Tylor believes that these survivals can introduce us to the habits of people living hundreds, if

not thousands, of years ago.

Survival can also pass into revival, in the case of a habit or belief that spontaneously bursts into

a new age, one which had thought it long dead...

Survivals show how old ways of living, thinking, and acting, continue to linger, even in

societies that are no longer suited to what motivated their existence, or invention, in the firstplace.

The study of the principles of surival has, indeed, no small practical importance, formost of what we call superstition is included within survival, and in this way lies open


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to the attack of the deadliest enemy, a reasonable explanation (15).

survivals are an indispensable component of ethnographic inquiry.

Tylor summarizing the important elements of anthropological study:

Progress, degradation, survival, revival, modification, are all modes of the connexion thatbinds together the complex network of civilization (16).

Looking around the rooms we live in, we may try here how far he who only knows his owntime can be capable of rightly comprehending even that (16).

Tylor believed that even the most rudimentary fact will be shown to be part of an evolutionary

chain of cause and effect...

He, therefore, championed the study of myths, childhood stories, and any number of seemingly

silly elements of culture...he believed all would reveal an inherent evolutionary mode of

development...from simple to complex, from savage to refined and civilized.

He called his task rational ethnography Important to keep in mind that Tylor, like Spencer and Morgan, believed Europeans to be the

most civilized

The ultimate goal, therefore, was to see in remote communities a glimmer of Europe'sevolution...how it got from there to the space and time of civilized perfection...

Significantly, evolution is not smooth...there is always interference from degeneration, andsome elements of ancient cultures dissolve completely...leaving no trace...

Even in Tylor, therefore, we see the job of the ethnography, as described by Geertz, to be

inherently, and necessarily, incomplete.

Interesting Connection with Durkheim:

Nowhere, perhaps, are broad views of historical development more needed than in thestudy of religion. Notwithstanding all that has been written to make the world acquaintedwith the lower theologies, the popular ideas of their place in history and their relation tothe faiths of higher nations are still of the mediaeval type (20)

Perhaps by mistake, Tylor leaves the door open for a study of capitalism as a religious

institution...

Odd connection to Weber, Durkheim, and others...

Morgan, Lewis Henry. 1877. Ethnical Periods.


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Morgan Biography and Summary of his work:

Morgan grew up on a farm in New York State, and was educated as a lawyer. He was, according toEriksen and Nielsen, a prosperous and active participant in local politics (18). Morgan was an early

activist of Native American political rights. During the 1840s he lived with the Iroquois, and was even

adopted into one of their clans. He was given the name Tayadaowuhkuh: 'he who builds bridges'.In his work, Morgan was interested in studying and documenting the complexities of Native

American Culture, which he believed would be lost or destroyed with the steadily increasing

population of European immigrants in North America. As Eriksen and Nielsen put it [t]his attitude,often referred to as urgent anthropology, was shared by the second great American anthropologist,

Franz Boas, and has since been widespread in research on indigenous peoples.

Morgan developed close ties with the peoples he studied. At the same time, he made crucial

theoretical contributions to anthropological thought. He developed the first typology of kinshipsystems, introducing a distinction between classificatory and descriptive kinship:

Descriptive kinship: (like our own) differentiate kinsmen of the direct ascending or descending line(linear kin) from kinsmen 'to the side' (collateral kin, such as siblings, cousins and in-laws) (Eriksen

and Nielsen: 18).

Classificatory kinship: (as with the Iroquois) does not differentiate these categories. Here the same

term might be used, for example, for all linear and collateral male kin on the father's side (father,

father's brother, father's brother's son, etc.). But Morgan did more than formulate a theory; he groundedit in years of intensive study of existing kinship systems around the world. In his influential Systems of

Consanguinity and Affinity of the Human Family (1870), the results of this research are presented,

defining kinship, once and for all, as a primary anthropological concern (Eriksen and Nielsen, 19).

Kinship was, for Morgan, a crucial entry point into the study of social evolution

He believed that primitive societies were organized on the basis of kinship, and thatdifferences in terminology correlated to differences in social structure.

He also held that kinship terminology was slow to change, or slowly evolved, and, as a result,

contained clues to an understanding of earlier stages of social evolution (Eriksen and Nielsen:

19).

Ancient Society (1877) is Morgan's attempt at a grand synthesis of all of his work. He introduces his

own version of the evolutionary stages argument, claiming that societies go through three stages ofevolutionary development:

1) savagery: hunters and gatherers,

2) barbarism: associated with the development of agricultural technologies3) civilization: formation of the state, and urban development

Like Tylor, Morgan uses technological development as a point of entry into his discussion of socialevolution. Transitions between Morgan's three stages are the result of technological progress, and

changes in kinship terminology. It seems that, for Morgan, kinship terminology was associated with

technological advance.

It seems clear that Morgan's system didn't work


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Part of the problem, according to Eriksen and Nielsen, was the fact that the details of Morgan's

system were hazy

As Eriksen and Nielsen put it:

At times, isolated technological features are accorded unreasonable weightforexample, pottery is the criterio of the transition between two stages. Where would thatleave the Polynesian chiefdoms, with their complex political systems, but no trace ofpottery? It is only fair to add that Morgan himself was conscious that his conclusionswere often speculative, and critical of the quality of his (mostly secondary) data (19).

Morgan's influence:

Morgan was influential in kinship studies, and on the development of cultural materialism in the United

States. Significantly, Morgan influenced Marx and Engels. As Eriksen and Nielsen put it, [w]hen

Marx discovered Morgan towards the ends of his life, he and his partner, Friedrich Engels, attempted

to integrate Morgan's ideas in his own, post-Hegelian, evolutionary theory (19).

Ancient Society, Chapter 1: Ethnical Periods:

Morgan opens with the following statement:

The latest investigations respecting the early condition of the human race are tendingto the conclusion that mankind commenced their career at the bottom of the scale andworked their way up from savagery to civilization through the slow accumulations ofexperimental knowledge (1877: 3).

This focus on 'experimental knowledge' is an important component of Morgan's theoretical

framework

Morgan argues that the linear progression from savagery to barbarism to civilization is the same

for the entire human family

The implication is that, groups deemed 'savages' today will, through the acquisition of new toolsand experimental knowledge, develop into barbarians and, if they continue to develop technical

and experimental tools, they will eventually become as civilized as Europeans and North

Americans

It is important to keep in mind that Morgan, like Spencer, is interested in the slow

accumulation of tools and knowledge...it is a view of evolution that can be connected with

Darwin.

Morgan outlines two lines of investigation:

1) leads through inventions and discoveries

2) the other leads through primary institutions

With the knowledge gained therefrom, we may hope to indicate the principle stages ofhuman development. The proofs to be adduced will be drawn chiefly from domesticinstitutions; the references to achievements more strictly intellectual being general aswell as subordinate (4).

Morgan argues that there are a number of ideas, passions, and aspirations that are formed and


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developed as societies evolve. Apart from technical inventions, these include:

1) Subsistence: Subsistence has been increased and perfect by a series of successive arts,

introduced at long intervals of time, and connected more or less directly with inventions anddiscoveries (4).

2) Government: The germ of government must be sought in the organization into gentes in the

Status of savagery; and followed down, through the advancing forms of this institution, to theestablishment of political society (5)

One might consider how this definition of government might connect with Foucault and

Agamben. This might be a stretch, but it could be useful.

3) Language: Human speech seems to have been developed from the rudest and simplest formsof expression. Gesture or sign language, as intimated by Lucretius, must have preceded

articulate language, as thoughts preceded speech (5)4) The Family: With respect to the family, the stages of its growth are embodied in systems of

consanguinity and affinity, and in usages relating to marriage, by means of which, collectively,

the family can be definitely traced through several successive forms (5)5) Religion: The growth of religious ideas is environed with such intrinsic difficulties that it may

never receive a perfectly satisfactory exposition. Religion deals so largely with the imaginativeand emotional nature, and consequently with such uncertain elements of knowledge, that all

primitive religions are grotesque and to some extent unintelligible. This subject also falls

without the plan of this work excepting as it may prompt incidental suggestions (5)6) House Life and Architecture: House architecture, which connects itself with the form of the

family and the plan of domestic life, affords a tolerably complete illustration of progress from

savagery to civilization. Its growth can be traced from the hut of the savage, through thecommunal houses of the barbarians, to the house of the single family of civilized nations, with

all the successive links by which one extreme is connected with the other. This subject will be

noticed incidentally (5).

Perhaps not surprisingly, Tylor also makes reference to the evolution of homes...

7) Property: The idea of property was slowly formed in the human mind, remaining nasceny andfeeble through immense periods of time. Springing into life in savagery, it required all the

experience of this period and of the subsequent period of barbarism to develop the germ, and to

prepare the human brain for the acceptance of its controlling influence. Its dominance as apassion over all other passions marks the commencement of civilization. It not only led

mankind to overcome the obstacles which delayed civilization, but to establish political society

on the basis of territory and property. A critical knowledge of the evolution of the idea of

property would embody, in some respects, the most remarkable portion of the mental history ofmankind (6).

Think about this last passion in the context of Foucault's description of biopolitics and

governmentality...is there something in Foucault's work that connects with Morgan'sevolutionary framework? Just a thought.

Morgan's description of the evolution of government:


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Morgan claimed that all forms of government are reducible to two general plans, using the world plan

in its scientific sense (6). The two plans were, for Morgan, distinct:

1) Society (societas): The 'gens' is the society's unit of organization. The successive stages of

integration, in the archaic period, were as follows:

I) the gens: For Morgan, the gens predates families. According to Maurice Bloch, the

gens for Morgan is the source from which both later kinship systems and later political

systems evolved (46).II) The phratry. Aggregates of kinship groups based on non-kinship principles. Later this

term would be used to describe any aggregate of people....often identified by a division

of labour.III) the tribe. A group existing before, or outside of, the state...IV) the confederacy of tribes, which constituted a people or nation (populus)

Such, through prolonged ages, after the gens appeared, was the substantiallyuniversal organization of ancient society; and it remained among the Greeks and Romans

after civilization supervened (6).

2) The State (civitas): The township or ward, circumscribed by metes and bounds, with theproperty it contains, is the basis or unit of the latter, and political society is the result. Political

society is organized upon territorial areas, and deals with property as well as with persons

through territorial relations (6). The successive stages of integration are:

I) The township or ward: the unit of organization for the State, or political societyII) the county or province: a aggregation of townships or wardsIII) the national domain or territory: the people of the national domain are organized into a

political body

Connect this with Foucault and Agamben. Is there a hint of biopolitics here?

It taxed the Greeks and Romans to the extent of their capacities, after they hadgained civilization, to invent the deme or township and the city ward; and thus inauguratethe second great plan of government, which remains among civilized nations to the presenthour. In ancient society this territorial plan was unknown. When it came it fixed theboundary line between ancient and modern society... (7).

Morgan argues, along with Tylor, that elements of savage and barbarous societies still

exist...similar to Tylor's theory of 'survivals'

RECAPITULATIONof the Transitions between periods and conditions of Human social evolution.


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I. Lower Status of Savagery: From the Infancy of the Hu- & man Race to thecommencement of the next Period.

II. Middle Status of Savagery: From the acquisition of a fish subsistence and a knowledgeof the use of fire, to etc.

III. Upper Status of Savagery: From the Invention of the Bow and Arrow, to etc.

IV. Lower Status of Barbarism: From the Invention of the Art of Pottery, to etc.

V. Middle Status of Barbarism: From the Domestication of aniimals on the Easternhemisphere, and in the Western from the cultivation of maize and plants by Irrigation, withthe use of adobe-brick and stone, to etc.

VI. Upper Status of Barbarism: From the Invention of the process of Smelting Iron Ore,with the use of iron tools, to etc.

VII. Status of Civilization: From the Invention of a Phonetic Alphabet, with the use of

writing, to the present time.

Each of these periods has a distinct culture and exhibits a mode of life more orless special and peculiar to itself. This specialization of ethnical periods renders it possibleto treat a particular society according to its condition of relative advancement, and to make ita subject of independent study and discussion (13)

There is an interesting connection to be made between this last quote and the development of

structuralist and functionalist modes of ethnographic inquiry

Diffusionism would not hold this view...

Significantly, in justifying the above chart, Morgan quotes Tylor on the history of weaving incertain locations...

Another advantage of fixing definite ethnical periods is the direction of special investigation to those

tribes and nations which afford the best exemplification of each status, with the view of making eachboth standard and illustrative (16)

The importance of standard, exemplary, and typical cases, is crucial to evolutionary

anthropology.

On differences:

Differences in the culture of the same period in the Eastern and Western hemispheresundoubtedly existed in consequence of the unequal endowments of the continents; but

the condition of society in the corresponding status must have been, in the main,substantially similar (16-17).

notes on the early evolutionists

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