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Louis Dumont's concept of hierarchy continues to inspire social scientists. Using it as their starting point, the contributors to this volume introduce both fresh empirical material and new theoretical considerations. On the basis of diverse ethnographic contexts in Oceania, Asia, and the Middle East they challenge some current conceptions of hierarchical formations and reassess former debates - of post-colonial and neo-colonial agendas, ideas of "democratization" and "globalization," and expanding market economies - both with regard to new theoretical issues and the new world situation.
"This welcome volume collects 12 essays addressing problems in the analysis of sociocultural values and sociocultural hierarchy, in dialogue with ideas of Dumont." · American Ethnologist
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1. Hierarchy and Its Alternatives: An Introduction to Movements of Totalization and Detotalization
Knut M. Rio and Olaf H. Smedal
Chapter 2. Conversion, Hierarchy, and Cultural Change: Value and Syncretism in the Globalization of Pentecostal and Charismatic Christianity
Joel Robbins
Chapter 3. Gender and Value: Conceptualizing Social Forms on Ambrym, Vanuatu
Annelin Eriksen
Chapter 4. Can a Hierarchical Religion Survive without Its Center? Caodaism, Colonialism, and Exile
Janet Hoskins
Chapter 5. The Headless State in Inner Asia: Reconsidering Kinship Society and the Discourse of Tribalism
David Sneath
Chapter 6. The Perfect Sovereign: The Sacralized Power of the Ottoman Sultan
Kjetil Fosshagen
Chapter 7. Marriage, Rank, and Politics in Hawaii
Valerio Valeri
Chapter 8. Polynesian Conceptions of Sociality: A Dynamic Field of Hierarchical Encompassment
Ingjerd Hoëm
Chapter 9. On the Value of the Beast or the Limit of Money: Notes on the Meaning of Marriage Prestations among the Ngadha, Central Flores (Indonesia)
Olaf H. Smedal
Chapter 10. Hierarchy Is not Inequality-in Polynesia, for Instance
Serge Tcherkézoff
Chapter 11. Hierarchy and Power: A Comparative Attempt under Asymmetrical Lines
André Iteanu
Afterword: On Dumont's Relentless Comparativism
Frederick H. Damon
Notes on Contributors
Index