Pathways of Power: Building an Anthropology of the Modern World Paperback - 2001 - 1st Edition

First line

My first serious effort to reflect on anthropology as a discipline was undertaken more than a decade after I earned my doctorate, after three rounds of intensive fieldwork and several theoretical excursions into the anthropology of complex societies.

From the rear cover

"Eric Wolf has literally set the terms for anthropological thinking about peasantries, culture and power, complex societies, and interactions between noncapitalist societies and capitalism. Every item in this excellent collection has stimulated and influenced both my own thought and that of many others in our field, as well as beyond it. "--Katherine Verdery, University of Michigan

"This powerful body of work begins ('Anthropology') and ends ('Concepts') in a rather speculative vein, taking us into the ideas of others and then back to Wolf. In these two sections we get a picture of the development of currents in anthropology (and the social sciences more broadly) from the early fifties to the present and the way in which Wolf's intellectual and political development was threaded through those debates and controversies. In the middle two sections ('Connections' and 'Peasants') we get the pathbreaking pieces that made Wolf the major figure he is. "--Gavin Smith, University of Toronto

"There is a large audience, to be found in anthropology and in related fields like history, cultural studies, gender studies, etc., who will receive the writings of Eric Wolf with appreciation. . . . His work is fully in the comparative anthropological tradition . . . [and] demonstrates the power of comparative historical analysis. "--Abraham Rosman, Barnard College, Columbia University

Media reviews

Citations

• Choice, 05/01/2001, Page 1667