Stealing People's Names by Simon J Harrison
Among the people of Avatip, a community in the Sepik region of Papua New Guinea, the most prestigious and valued forms of wealth are personal names. In this intriguing study, Simon Harrison analyses the significance of names in the context of Avatip ritual, cosmology and concepts of the person, and shows how the Avatip system of names parallels the gift-exchange systems of many other Melanesian societies. In ritualized debates, which form the public arena of Avatip political life, rival leaders and the groups they represent struggle in oratorical contests for the possession of strategic names, and, as they do so, continually manipulate possibilities of this symbolically constituted economy, these competitive processes over the past century have been progressively egalitarian type to one based on hereditary inequality and rank. The author offers a critique of the analytical arguing that it obscures the processes of political evolution in Melanesia and disguises the fundamental similarities underlying the sociocultural diversity of the region.-
Outline of a Theory of Practice
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Kinship and Marriage
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The Anthropology of Numbers
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Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity
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Production and Reproduction
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Muslim Society
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People of the Sea
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The Sacred Void
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In the Society of Nature
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The Architecture of Memory
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Kinship and Class in the West Indies
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World Conqueror and World Renouncer
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Power and Intimacy in the Christian Philippines
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Contesting Culture
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Spirits of Protest
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The Roads of Chinese Childhood
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Resources and Population
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Mangrove Man
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The Trading Crowd
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Mass Culture and Modernism in Egypt
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The Making of the Modern Greek Family
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Power and Religiosity in a Post-Colonial Setting
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Social Inequality in a Portuguese Hamlet
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People and the State
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Individual and Society in Guiana
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Priests, Witches and Power
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Religion and Custom in a Muslim Society
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Tradition as Truth and Communication
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Bartered Brides
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Hunters and Herders of Southern Africa
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Spirit Possession and Personhood among the Kel Ewey Tuareg
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Varieties of Javanese Religion
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Strategies and Norms in a Changing Matrilineal Society
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The New Racism in Europe
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South Coast New Guinea Cultures
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Overlooking Nazareth
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The Fish People
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Identity through History
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A Place of their Own
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Tradition and Modernity in the Mediterranean
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Casting out Anger
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Elite Politics in Rural India
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The Making of the Basque Nation
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The Abandoned Narcotic
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People of the Zongo
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Native Lords of Quito in the Age of the Incas
A short review cannot do justice to the complex and subtle analysis Harrison providesThis is a very rich ethnography that makes substantial contributions to important theoretical discussions in anthropology. Read it to appreciate it. Nancy McDowell, American Anthropologist
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9780521026475 |
| ISBN 10 | 0521026474 |
| Title | Stealing People's Names |
| Author | Simon J Harrison |
| Series | Cambridge Studies In Social And Cultural Anthropology |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press |
| Year published | 2006-06-01 |
| Number of pages | 240 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |