McGee and Warms have definitively established themselves as the benchmark for readers in the history of anthropological theory. Their selection of readings is intelligent and comprehensive, and they carefully maintain a balance between classic sources and contemporary writers. They deserve the highest praise for demonstrating to students that primary sources are interesting, indeed inspiring, and for carefully placing them in historical context.
Anthropological Theory is an impressive work dealing, as promised, with both the theory and the history behind the development of anthropological ideas. The sixth edition contains both a wide-ranging collection of important articles and well-researched and significant introductions and annotations. I don’t know of any better introduction to the history of anthropology.
This is an excellent introduction: one that gives essential historical depth to crucial theoretical debates.
An undergraduate textbook chronologically surveying the history of anthropological theory through readings ranging from 19th century evolutionism to postmodernism in the 1990s. Each reading is accompanied by commentary providing a background to the article's main concepts and its relationship to the social and historical context in which it was written. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
First published in 1996, this seventh edition of the Anthropological Theory reader, compiled by anthropologists McGee and Warms (both, Texas State Univ.), contains 43 articles published between 1860 and 2016, and is divided into five roughly chronological parts that chart this expanding field's diverse interests. The collection is distinguished by two valuable features. First, the editors include an introductory essay for each section, with contemporary biographical references, to contextualize the authors within the field as a whole and in a social sense more broadly as well. Secondly, and most importantly, in addition to including their essays' original endnotes, the contributing authors also provide a running commentary on each piece in the form of updated footnotes to explain difficult, abstract concepts and to emphasize those points they feel make the piece in question important to the development of theory. Designed as a reader for introductory classes in anthropology, this collection will find a ready audience in colleges and universities offering programs in this field. Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through graduate students.
First published in 1996, this seventh edition of the Anthropological Theory reader, compiled by anthropologists McGee and Warms (both, Texas State Univ.), contains 43 articles published between 1860 and 2016, and is divided into five roughly chronological parts that chart this expanding field's diverse interests. The collection is distinguished by two valuable features. First, the editors include an introductory essay for each section, with contemporary biographical references, to contextualize the authors within the field as a whole and in a social sense more broadly as well. Secondly, and most importantly, in addition to including their essays' original endnotes, the contributing authors also provide a running commentary on each piece in the form of updated footnotes to explain difficult, abstract concepts and to emphasize those points they feel make the piece in question important to the development of theory. Designed as a reader for introductory classes in anthropology, this collection will find a ready audience in colleges and universities offering programs in this field. Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through graduate students.
First published in 1996, this seventh edition of the Anthropological Theory reader, compiled by anthropologists McGee and Warms (both, Texas State Univ.), contains 43 articles published between 1860 and 2016, and is divided into five roughly chronological parts that chart this expanding field's diverse interests. The collection is distinguished by two valuable features. First, the editors include an introductory essay for each section, with contemporary biographical references, to contextualize the authors within the field as a whole and in a social sense more broadly as well. Secondly, and most importantly, in addition to including their essays' original endnotes, the contributing authors also provide a running commentary on each piece in the form of updated footnotes to explain difficult, abstract concepts and to emphasize those points they feel make the piece in question important to the development of theory. Designed as a reader for introductory classes in anthropology, this collection will find a ready audience in colleges and universities offering programs in this field. Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through graduate students.
