Bøger af Laurent Dousset

This handbook brings the principles of human kinship in general, and Australian Aboriginal kinship in particular, closer to the reader in an understandable and pedagogic way. Aimed at a large public, including anthropologists, the handbook is divided into four parts: the historical and ethnographic background of important concepts such as 'culture', 'hunter-gatherer societies' etc.; the basic tools and notions needed to understand kinship (terminology, marriage, descent and filiation); an ethnographic analysis of the Australian Western Desert kinship and notions such as 'family', 'household' and 'domestic group'; a presentation of social organisation, in particular generational moieties, patri- and matrimoieties, sections and subsections. The concluding chapter discusses in a critical fashion the concept of kinship itself and elaborates on the idea of relatedness as a meaningful expansion.

The analysis of kinship plays a major role in social anthropology. However, the intellectual triumph of structuralism has transformed this analysis into an ivory tower and the methodological hegemony of functionalism inhibits any historical authority. Kinship, Ecology and History informs the reader of these old, yet long-lasting issues. By presenting new, original perspectives, this book reinvents the manner in which we can study kinship. It also examines ecology and history as a conjectural reflection, which make up the foundations on which human kinship can be reflected upon. Whether human kinship is understood in the form of systematics models or as articulated practices, it has to be conceived as a strategic means for modes of action and of transformation of life in society. The three case studies presented in this book give body to new issues. They deconstruct the existing models in order to re-establish kinship as a condition and consequence of social evolution.