Landscape & Environment, Food - Sociocultural Aspects, Hunger & Famine, Socio-Cultural Anthropology - General & Miscellaneous, Physical Anthropology, Evolution
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Overview
In this brilliant and profound study the distinguished American anthropologist Marvin Harris shows how the endless varieties of cultural behavior — often so puzzling at first glance — can be explained as adaptations to particular ecological conditions. His aim is to account for the evolution of cultural forms as Darwin accounted for the evolution of biological forms: to show how cultures adopt their characteristic forms in response to changing ecological modes."[A] magisterial interpretation of the rise and fall of human cultures and societies."
— Robert Lekachman, Washington Post Book World
"Its persuasive arguments asserting the primacy of cultural rather than genetic or psychological factors in human life deserve the widest possible audience."
— Gloria Levitas The New Leader
"[An] original and...urgent theory about the nature of man and at the reason that human cultures take so many diverse shapes."
— The New Yorker
"Lively and controversial."
— I. Bernard Cohen, front page, The New York Times Book Review
A distinguished anthropoligist shows how the varieties of cultural behavior can be explained as adaptions to particular ecological conditions.
Book Details
Published
October 1, 1978
Publisher
New York : Vintage Books, 1978.
Pages
351
Format
Paperback
ISBN
9780394727004