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Product Description
Product Description
In Purity and Danger Mary Douglas identifies the concern for purity as a key theme at the heart of every society. In lively and lucid prose she explains its relevance for every reader by revealing its wide-ranging impact on our attitudes to society, values, cosmology and knowledge. The book has been hugely influential in many areas of debate - from religion to social theory. But perhaps its most important role is to offer each reader a new explanation of why people behave in the way they do. With a specially commissioned introduction by the author which assesses the continuing significance of the work thirty-five years on, this Routledge Classics edition will ensure that Purity and Danger continues to challenge and question well into the new millennium.
About the Author
Mary Douglas (1921-). One of the most distinguished anthropologists of modern times. Natural Symbols, another of her major works, is also available in Routledge Classics.
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First Sentence
Our idea of dirt is compounded of two things, care for hygiene and respect for conventions. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index
Our idea of dirt is compounded of two things, care for hygiene and respect for conventions. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Few anthropological works have had as profound an impact as Mary Douglas's Purity and Danger. In it she outlines an anthropological theory of purity and pollution that has become a central part of what is otherwise an often conflicted and vaguely-defined subject area. This is not to say Douglas's work has never been criticized, but that many of her ideas are now so deeply ingrained in anthropological thinking that they simply appear as a given to students learning them today, whereas they revolutionized the interpretation of so-called "primitive" thought.
A reader encountering Douglas's ideas for the first time may be surprised to find that "dirt" is not intrinsically dirty, but is, rather, "matter out of place". This concept epitomizes what we might call the "anthroplogical mindset": a close attention to cultural interpretations -- and the specificity thereof.
The book begins with a sketch of European historical materials whose relation to some of the other issues surveyed is not clearly elucidated. However, this minor writer's fault can be forgiven, and the reader is encouraged to focus on Douglas's comparative analysis of sources as varied as her fieldwork among the Lele, and her (now canonical) reading of the book of Leviticus.
Beyond her addition to the canon of anthropological theory, Douglas also deserves praise for her willingness to critique her own material. The preface she wrote for the Routledge Classics paperback includes a reconsideration of her work on Leviticus that entirely justifies publishing the new edition.
A reader encountering Douglas's ideas for the first time may be surprised to find that "dirt" is not intrinsically dirty, but is, rather, "matter out of place". This concept epitomizes what we might call the "anthroplogical mindset": a close attention to cultural interpretations -- and the specificity thereof.
The book begins with a sketch of European historical materials whose relation to some of the other issues surveyed is not clearly elucidated. However, this minor writer's fault can be forgiven, and the reader is encouraged to focus on Douglas's comparative analysis of sources as varied as her fieldwork among the Lele, and her (now canonical) reading of the book of Leviticus.
Beyond her addition to the canon of anthropological theory, Douglas also deserves praise for her willingness to critique her own material. The preface she wrote for the Routledge Classics paperback includes a reconsideration of her work on Leviticus that entirely justifies publishing the new edition.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
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14 reviews
48 of 48 people found the following review helpful
Clean or dirty? Your culture decides.
5 Jan 2001
Format:Paperback
All cultures have definite ideas about what is clean and what is dirty. Drawing from previous hallmark works on how cultures make classifications (Levi-Strauss's The Raw and the Cooked, etc.), Douglas makes clear and concise arguments about the use of ritual in separating that which is considered pure from what's considered unclean. The convincing argument she makes is that such rituals and clearly defined boundaries of purity reinforce a society's common definitions, increasing its unity and therefore its ability to work together to succeed. Additionally, Douglas alludes to Malinowski's anxiety-reduction theories of totems to theorize that clear definitions of right and wrong and of clean and unclean reduce the stress in a given society, helping everyone to know who they are and what is expected of them. In fact, she feels, a lack of such distinctions can be fatal to the integrity of a group. If everyone went on their own deciding what was good or bad, there would be chaos - the danger alluded to in the title.
A highlight of the book is the chapter titled "Abominations of Leviticus", in which she interprets the Jewish divisions between kosher and graev (no pork, no mixing of milk and meat, etc) in a cultural context. Here she shows that the Levites divided "pure" animals (deer, cattle, sheep, goats, etc) from those considered "mixed" (pig, rabbit, woodchuck), or having an undesireable combination of traits rather than just being dirty in aspect, as is commonly believed.
31 of 36 people found the following review helpful
pangolin stew
27 Sep 2000
Format:Paperback
Why was one locust cleaner than the other? Man, I had no idea either till I picked up this book. In fact, I had no idea that Jewish dietary laws made any distinctions at all on the locust front. (I mean, as far as I'm concerned, you could leave the locusts off the menu altogether and it's a fair bet I wouldn't even notice.) Mary Douglas, extensively supported by a gaggle of other similarly academically endowed individuals in quote form, however, delves right into the whole locust conundrum and she does it in a truly fascinating manner. What begins as a graceful though predictable swan dive assessment of profanity as disruption of cultural order jack knifes thrillingly there in the middle to talk about physical creatures as metaphoric representations of religious and cultural values. The book starts out talking about dirt and ends up in a fascinating examination of how we as humans, both "primative" and "civilized", twist our concrete world to become metaphor for psychological and spiritual experience Cool, huh. Also, as an added treat, Douglas spends A LOT of time talking about the South American Lele cult of the pangolin. (For laypeople, that's that funny armadillo/anteater thing that looks quite alot like a pinecone.) Douglas takes some fairly weighty theories of cultural anthropology and turns them into an entertaining and infinitely readable piece. A nice trick. Oh, and did I mention the anteater? What's not to love?
39 of 47 people found the following review helpful
insightful, but uneven
5 Nov 2004
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
At the instigation of an anthropology teacher, I read this book when I was about 19 and found it shattering and profound. Now, however, returning to it years later (and having read in the meantime dozens of books on anthropology and anthropological issues, and having thought for years about what I thought I learned in this book) I'm not so sure it's as perceptive as I thought. In other words, I think what I may have found mind-blowing in my younger years was the insights of anthropology itself -- not so much the contributions of Ms. Douglas.
Having said that, there are four or five extremely interesting observations herein that will help explain, or at least clarify, some puzzling issues: why gangs "jump" initiates, why Muslims do not permit nonbelievers to enter Mecca, why frats "haze" their new recruits, etc., although you pretty much have to fill in those blanks for yourself: Ms. Douglas does not explicitly extend her theories to cover such aspects of modern society. I used to think the book was deep; now, I think (in general) that she doesn't go far enough with her theories, instead stopping short just when things are getting interesting.
Another unfortunate aspect of this book is that the author felt it necessary, in the first few chapters, to refute previous, erroneous ideas about filth and pollution. Unfortunately, many of the theories she refers to are complicated and difficult to follow, at least before you read the rest of the book. In other words, I think she should have left that section for last, instead just launching into her conclusions directly.
Having said that, there are four or five extremely interesting observations herein that will help explain, or at least clarify, some puzzling issues: why gangs "jump" initiates, why Muslims do not permit nonbelievers to enter Mecca, why frats "haze" their new recruits, etc., although you pretty much have to fill in those blanks for yourself: Ms. Douglas does not explicitly extend her theories to cover such aspects of modern society. I used to think the book was deep; now, I think (in general) that she doesn't go far enough with her theories, instead stopping short just when things are getting interesting.
Another unfortunate aspect of this book is that the author felt it necessary, in the first few chapters, to refute previous, erroneous ideas about filth and pollution. Unfortunately, many of the theories she refers to are complicated and difficult to follow, at least before you read the rest of the book. In other words, I think she should have left that section for last, instead just launching into her conclusions directly.
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