Anthropological History of Andean Polities

by Edited by John V. Murra , Nathan Wachtel , Jacques Revel

• ISBN13: 9780521105392
• ISBN10: 0521105390
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2009-03-19
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

This collection of essays by scholars from the Andes, Europe and the United States was originally published in the French journal Annales as a special double issue entitled The Historical Anthropology of Andean Societies. It combines the perspectives of archaeology, anthropology and history to present a complex view of Andean societies over various millenia. The unique features of the Andean landscape, the impact of the Inka state on different regions and ethnic groups, the transformations wrought through the colonial presence and the creation of nineteenth-century republics are all analysed, as are the profound continuities in some aspects of Andean culture and social organisation to the present day. The book reflects some of the most innovative research that occurred in the 1970s and 80s. Apart from its substantive interest for students of the Andes and American civilisations in general, it shows the possibility of closer collaboration between history and anthropology.

Table of Contents

Introduction

Ecology and Society

The tropical Andes: a changing mosaic

The evolution of a valley: population and resources of Tarapaca over a millenium

'Horizons' in Andean archaeology

The Ethnic Group and the State

The expansion of the Inka state: armies, war and rebellions

Storage, supply and redistribution in the economy of the Inka state

The extraction of precious metals at the time of the Inka

Vertical politics on the Inka frontier

Systems of Classification

Some aspects of the Inka kinship system

The classification and naming of South American camelids

The semiology of Andean textiles: the talegas of Isluga

Symbolic Representations and Practices

Inka dynasty and irrigation: another look at Andean concepts of history

Urco and uma: Aymara concepts of space Therese

Mirrors and maize: the concept of yanantin among the Macha of

From asymmetry to triangle: symbolic transformations in northern

From Ethnic Polities to Communities

Men of the water: the Uru problem (sixteenth and seventeenth centuries)

The ethnic groups in the valleys of Larecaja: from descent to residence

The Andean community today Antoinette

Bibliography

Index

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