Cultural Materialism The Struggle for a Science of Culture

by Harris, Marvin

• ISBN13: 9780759101357
• ISBN10: 0759101353
• Edition: Revised
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2001-08-21
• Publisher: AltaMira Press

Summary

Cultural Materialism, published in 1979, was Marvin Harris's first full-length explication of the theory with which his work has been associated. While Harris has developed and modified some of his ideas over the past two decades, generations of professors have looked to this volume as the essential starting point for explaining the science of culture to students. Now available again after a hiatus, this edition of Cultural Materialism contains the complete text of the original book plus a new introduction by Orna and Allen Johnson that updates his ideas and examines the impact that the book and theory have had on anthropological theorizing.

Author Biography

Marvin Harris is graduate research professor at the University of Florida.

Table of Contents

Introduction to the Updated Edition	vi
Allen Johnson
Orna Johnson
Preface	xv
Acknowledgments	xix
About the Author	xx
Part I: Cultural Materialism as a Research Strategy
Introduction to Part I	3	(2)
Research Strategies and the Structure of Science	5	(24)
The Epistemology of Cultural Materialism	29	(17)
Theoretical Principles of Cultural Materialism	46	(31)
The Scope of Cultural Materialist Theories	77	(42)
Part II: The Alternatives
Introduction to Part II	117	(2)
Sociobiology and Biological Reductionism	119	(22)
Dialectical Materialism	141	(24)
Structuralism	165	(51)
Structural Marxism	216	(42)
Psychological and Cognitive Idealism	258	(29)
Eclecticism	287	(28)
Obscurantism	315	(28)
Bibliography	343	(28)
Index	371