Elementary Forms and their Dynamics

Revisiting Mary Douglas

Bibliographic Data

ID2144804
AuthorsPerri Six (Russian State Agrarian Correspondence University, corresponding author), Perri (0000-0002-9767-5973)
Year2014
Volume24
Issue3
Pages287-307
Publication date2014-07-03
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueAnthropological Forum (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0066-4677 • E-ISSN: 1469-2902
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/00664677.2014.933090
OpenAlexW1584647924
LanguageEN
Citations received8
References cited41

Mary Douglas's oeuvre furnishes the social sciences with one of the most profound and ambitious bodies of social theory ever to emerge from within anthropology. This article uses the occasion of the publication of Fardon's two volumes of her previously uncollected papers to restate her core arguments about the limited plurality of elementary forms of social organisation, about the institutional dynamics of conflict, and about conflict attenuation. In reviewing these two volumes, the article considers what those anthropologists who have been sceptical either of Douglas's importance or of the Durkheimian traditions generally, will want from these books to convince them to look afresh at her work. It concludes that the two collections will provide open-minded anthropologists with enough evidence of the creativity and significance of her achievement to encourage them to reopen her major theoretical works. An internal critique of some aspects of Douglas's handling of her arguments is offered, before the conclusion identifies the wider significance of her arguments for the social sciences

Creativity · Dynamics (music · Epistemology · Political science · Skepticism · Social science · Sociology · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Contemporary Sociological Theory and Practice · Emile Durkheim and Sociology · Law · Philosophy

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