Abstract
ALTHOUGH the traditional evolutionary view of human society as a progression, which begins with food-gathering and ends with industrialism, does not now commonly occur in geographical and other textbooks in all its cruder simplicity, the various forms of human society are still often treated as if they could be classified in mutually exclusive types, each characterised by a single activity. Prof. Daryll Forde, by describing the life-histories and activities of peoples of primitive culture who, at least up to a few years ago, were untouched by Western civilisation, indicates the misleading trend ofxthis conception. He demonstrates by concrete example the inherent complexity in even the most simple of societies, and the degree to which it is possible to maintain the traditional division of hunters, pastoralists, culti vators and the like.
Habitat, Economy and Society: a Geographical Introduction to Ethnology.
By Prof. C. Daryll Forde. Pp. xiv + 500. (London: Methuen and Co., Ltd., 1934.) 15s. net.
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Anthropology and Ethnology . Nature 134, 613 (1934). https://doi.org/10.1038/134613a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/134613a0