Abstract
AS we went to press last week, the concluding meeting of the British Association at Portsmouth was being held; and the thanks of the Association were being expressed to the local authorities for the work they had done and the trouble they had taken to make the visit to Portsmouth pleasant and memorable. Everyone agrees that the Portsmouth meeting was most enjoyable; and well it might be, considering that it was held at a seaside resort during the season when “sunny Southsea” is full of attractions. In spite of great difficulties, the Mayor (Alderman T. Scott Foster) was able to arrange for the accommodation of the secretaries and other officials in the best hotels, and to provide hospitality for distinguished visitors. There was little private hospitality, and the grant of 3500l. made to the Mayor by the Corporation of Portsmouth for the entertainment of the visitors can scarcely have covered the expenses involved.
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References
I refer here especially to the work of the sociological school of Durkheim and his followers. For an account of their principles and methods see L'Anne sociologique, which began to appear in 1898; Durkheim, Les R gles de Ia M thode Sociologique, Paris; and L vy-Bruhl, Les fonctions mentales dans les socit s inf rieures, Paris, 1910.
See especially A. L. Kroeher, Classificatory Systems of Relationship, Journ. Roy. Anthr. Inst., 1909, xxxix., 77; and Goldenweiser, Totemism: An Analytical Study. Journ. Amer. Folk-lore, 1910, xxiii.
Sitzber. d. Akad. d. Wiss. Mnchen, Hist. Cl., 1886, p. 181.
See especiallv Anthropogeographie, 1891, Th. ii., 795, and Die geographische Methode in der Ethnographie, Geograph. Zeitsch., 1897, iii., 268.
See especially Methode der Ethnologie, Heidelberg, 1911, and Die melanesische Bogenkultur und ibre Verwandten, Anthrops, 1909, iv., 726. The annual Ethnologica, edited by W. Foy, is devoted to the illustrations of this school of thought.
See especially L'origine de l'Id e de Dieu, Anthropos, III-v., 1908“10, and Grundlinien einer Vergleichung der Religion u. Mythologie austronesischen Vlker, Denksch. d. Akad. d. Wiss. Wien, Phil.—hist.1910, liii. Schmidt differs from Graebner in limiting the application of ethnological method to regions with general affinities of culture. Otherwise he remains an adherent of the doctrine of independent origin. (See Panbabylonismus und ethnologischer Elementargedanke, Mitt. d. anthropo. Gesellsch. in Wien, 1008, xxxviii., 73.)
It must not be understood from this account that all German anthropologists are adherents to the ethnological school. There are still those who follow the doctrines of Bastian, which have undergone an interesting modification through the adoption of the biological principle of Convergence.
I may note here that Mr. Lang. after having considered this problem from the purely evolutionary standpoint (Anthropological Essays presented to E. B. Tylor p. 203), concludes with the words, We seem lost in a wilderness of difficulties.
Zeit. f. Ethnol., 1905, xxxvii., 28, and Zur australischen Religions-geschichte, Globus, 1900, xcvi., 341.
See especially Zeitsch. f. Ethnol., 1909, xli., 340.
See Folk-Lore, 1910, xxi., 42.
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The British Association at Portsmouth . Nature 87, 352–368 (1911). https://doi.org/10.1038/087352a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/087352a0