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This is the first collection of Franz Steiner's keynote papers on comparative economics and the classification of labor,complemented by major unpublished texts on politics, civilization, and cultural criticism. This enables a complete re-evaluation of Steiner's thought. His ideas on truth, value, and civilization are highly critical of Western culture and offer perhaps the earliest critique of Orientalism in British anthropology. Equally significant is the inclusion of Steiner's unpublished lectures on Aristotle and Simmel, the latter probably being the first lecture series devoted to Simmel's ideas by a British-based anthropologist, as well as hitherto unedited political writings.
Another side to Steiner's thought is shown by his aphorisms, often caustic texts and newly translated from the German, as well as by verse translations of his poems relevant to his scholarship. These include an extract from his autobiographical poem, "Conquest", that places his anthropological writings into a personal and ultimately religious framework.A detailed introduction, based on new research, provides a thorough study of Steiner's ideas and establishes the wider intellectual context, thus rounding off a most remarkable collection of texts by one of the most remarkable anthropologists of this century.
List of contents
List of Illustrations
Prefatory Note to Volume II
Acknowledgements
A Note on Quotations
PART I: INTRODUCTIONS Chapter 1. Franz Steiner. A Memoir
M. N. Srinivas Chapter 2. Orientpolitik, Value and Civilisation: The Anthropological Thought of Franz Baermann Steiner
Jeremy Adler and Richard Fardon PART II: ORIENTPOLITIK AND THE CIVILISING PROCESS Chapter 3. Orientpolitik
Chapter 4. Gypsies in Carpathian Russia
Chapter 5. Letter to Georg Rapp
Chapter 6. On the Process of Civilisation
Chapter 7. Letter to Mr. Gandhi
Chapter 8. Memorandum
PART III: SLAVERY, ECONOMICS, AND LABOUR Chapter 9. Slavery. From A Comparative Study of the Forms of Slavery
Slave. A Term of Interstructural Reference
The Slavery-Serfdom Dichotomy and European Experience
Chapter 10. Notes on Comparative Economics
Chapter 11. Towards a Classification of Labour
PART IV: KINSHIP, CLASSIFICATION, AND SOCIAL STRUCTURE Chapter 12. Language, Society, and Social Anthropology
Chapter 13. The Study of Kinship
Chapter 14. Aristotle's Sociology
Chapter 15. Some Problems in Simmel
PART V: ESSAYS AND DISCOVERIES Chapter 16. On the Margins of the Social Sciences
Chapter 17. Malinowksi and Conrad
Chapter 18. Remarks on Truth, Method, and the Sciences
PART VI: CONQUESTS I-VII Chapter 19. Conquests. From an Autobiographical Poem
Bibliography and References to Volumes I and II
Name Index to Volumes I and II
Subject Index to Volumes I and II
About the author
Jeremy Adler is Professor of German at King's College London and specializes ininterdisciplinary subjects such as literature and science, poetry and painting, literature and anthropology.
Summary
This is the first collection of Franz Steiner's keynote papers on comparative economics and the classification of labor,complemented by major unpublished texts on politics, civilization, and cultural criticism. This enables a complete re-evaluation of Steiner's thought. His ideas on truth, value, and civilization are highly critical of Western culture and offer perhaps the earliest critique of Orientalism in British anthropology. Equally significant is the inclusion of Steiner's unpublished lectures on Aristotle and Simmel, the latter probably being the first lecture series devoted to Simmel's ideas by a British-based anthropologist, as well as hitherto unedited political writings.
Another side to Steiner's thought is shown by his aphorisms, often caustic texts and newly translated from the German, as well as by verse translations of his poems relevant to his scholarship. These include an extract from his autobiographical poem, "Conquest", that places his anthropological writings into a personal and ultimately religious framework.A detailed introduction, based on new research, provides a thorough study of Steiner's ideas and establishes the wider intellectual context, thus rounding off a most remarkable collection of texts by one of the most remarkable anthropologists of this century.
Additional text
"These works... must be read and reread for their brilliance as individual pieces, but reading them as a collectivity makes the experience all the more richer and intellectually challenging." • American Anthropologist
