Bibliograph

The return of the gift, European history of a global idea, Harry Liebersohn

Type

Label

The return of the gift, European history of a global idea, Harry Liebersohn

Language

eng

Index

index present

Literary Form

non fiction

Main title

The return of the gift

Medium

electronic resource

Nature of contents

dictionaries

Oclc number

701497668

Responsibility statement

Harry Liebersohn

Series statement

Cambridge Social Sciences eBooks

Sub title

European history of a global idea

Summary

This book is a history of European interpretations of the gift from the mid-seventeenth to the early twentieth century. Reciprocal gift exchange, pervasive in traditional European society, disappeared from the discourse of nineteenth-century social theory only to return as a major theme in twentieth-century anthropology, sociology, history, philosophy and literary studies. Modern anthropologists encountered gift exchange in Oceania and the Pacific Northwest and returned the idea to European social thought; Marcel Mauss synthesized their insights with his own readings from remote times and places in his famous 1925 essay on the gift, the starting-point for subsequent discussion. The Return of the Gift demonstrates how European intellectual history can gain fresh significance from global contexts.--, Provided by publisher

Table Of Contents

The crisis of the gift : Warren Hastings and his critics -- Liberalism, self-interest, and the gift -- The selfless "savage" : theories of primitive communism -- Anthropologists and the power of the gift : Boas, Thurnwald, Malinowski -- Marcel Mauss and the globalized gift

Classification