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The Social Life of Things

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The Social Life of Things

The Social Life of Things

Commodities in Cultural Perspective
Arjun Appadurai, New School University, New York
January 1988
Available
Paperback
9780521357265
$35.00
USD
Paperback
USD
eBook
    Description

    The contributors to this volume examine how things are sold and traded in a variety of social and cultural settings, both present and past. Bridging the disciplines of social history, cultural anthropology, and economics, the volume marks a major step in our understanding of the cultural basis of economic life and the sociology of culture.

    Product details

    January 1988
    Paperback
    9780521357265
    339 pages
    226 × 150 × 18 mm
    0.562kg
    Available

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    Contents

    Table of Contents

    • Foreword Nancy Farriss
    • Preface
    • Part I. Toward an anthropology of things:
    • 1. Introduction: commodities and the politics of value Arjun Appadurai
    • 2. The cultural biography of things: commoditization as process Igor Kopytoff
    • Part II. Exchange, Consumption, and Display:
    • 3. Two kinds of value in the Eastern Solomon Islands William H. Davenport
    • 4. Newcomers to the world of goods: consumption among the Muria Gonds Alfred Gell
    • Part III. Prestige, Commemoration, and Value:
    • 5. Varna and the emergence of wealth in prehistoric Europe Colin Renfrew
    • 6. Sacred commodities: the circulation of medieval relics Patrick Geary
    • Part IV. Production Regimes and the Sociology of Demand:
    • 7. Weavers and dealers: the authenticity of an oriental carpet Brian Spooner
    • 8. Qat: changes in the production and consumption of a quasilegal commodity in northeast Africa Lee V. Cassanelli
    • Part V. Historical Transformations and Commodity Codes:
    • 9. The structure of a cultural crisis: thinking about cloth in France before and after the Revolution William M. Reddy
    • 10. The origins of swadeshi (home industry): cloth and Indian society, 1700–1930 C. A. Bayly
    • Index.
      • Show more

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    About the authors
      Contributors

    • Nancy Farriss, Arjun Appadurai, Igor Kopytoff, William H. Davenport, Alfred Gell, Colin Renfrew, Patrick Geary, Brian Spooner, Lee V. Cassanelli, William M. Reddy, C. A. Bayly

      • Editor
    • Arjun Appadurai , New School University, New York

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