About the House Lévi-Strauss and Beyond

Product Description


The domestic unit is inseparable from its homestead, and the "house," at once a physical place and a social unit, is often also a unit of production and consumption, a cult group, and even a political faction. Inspired by Lévi-Strauss' suggestion that the multi-functional noble houses of Medieval Europe were simply the best-known examples of a widespread social institution, the contributors to this collection analyze "house" systems in Southeast Asia and South America, exploring the interrelationships among buildings, people, and ideas. They reveal some of the ways in which houses can stand for social groups and serve as images of process and order.


Review


'The essays ... are replete with fascinating data that fulfil a central promise of contemporary anthropology ... at a time when fewer and fewer detailed ethnographies seem to be published.' Book Review Essays

'Mark this volume as another milestone in the rehabilitation of kinship studies. About the House is a worthwhile collection that both implements and critically evaluates Lévi-Strauss's notion of the 'house society' in studies drawn from Southeast Asia and Amazonia. For both the teacher and the scholar, this book is worth the reading.' Peter Gose, University of Regina


Book Description


Exploring interrelationships, this collection analyzes "house" systems in Southeast Asia and South America. It is inspired by Lévi-Strauss's suggestion that the multi-functional noble houses of Medieval Europe were the best-known examples of a widespread social institution.


About the Author


Janet Carsten is Professor of Social and Cultural Anthropology at the University of Edinburgh. She is the author of "The Heat of the Hearth: The Process of Kinship in a Malay Fishing Community" (1997) and "After Kinship" (2004). She has co-edited "About the House: Levi-Strauss and Beyond" (1995) with Stephen Hugh-Jones, and edited "Cultures of Relatedness: New Approaches to the Study of Kinship" (2000). Her current research deals with new approaches to kinship in anthropology, adoption reunions, kinship and memory.

Hugh-Jones is a Lecturer in Social Anthropology at the University of Cambridge.