Re: No TP: Commentary on “The Dawn of Everything”

[Mark Kohut]

I am not reading anything substantive about it until I have read it.....I
am still hunting for members to read it together....

On Tue, Dec 7, 2021 at 5:39 PM David Elliott via Pynchon-l <
pynchon-l at waste.org> wrote:

>  Thanks for commenting. I shared hoping to get some feedback.I plan on
> reading it early next year after finishing some other books. It will
> probably take a long time for me to get through it since I will be checking
> some of the sources and reading other material on some of the periods
> covered.
>     On Tuesday, December 7, 2021, 02:45:08 PM EST, Joseph Tracy <
> brook7 at sover.net> wrote:
>
>  Just finished the book and am re-listening to the early part in question.
> Not really troubled by Bell's critique for several reasons.
> First is the new testament quote or the idea that Judaism was egalitarian.
> That this is what he came up with to exemplify an important western ideal
> of egalitarianism is tellingly weak.The OT is the story of a ‘chosen
> people’ who make war on the inhabitants of what is now called Israel based
> on the visionary promise of Yawheh to Abraham. They were supposedly slaves
> in Egypt and when they, according to the  story, kill off most of
> Cannanites these conquered people are made slaves as is fitting for pagans.
> The NT verse from Paul is pretty qualified if you read more of Paul where
> he exhorts slaves to obey their masters and everyone to yield obedience to
> any earthly ruler since all rulers are appointed by God. He also disallows
> woment to teach men.  The hierarchical structures of the religion that
> emerged historically and its connections to empires and nations was well
> embedded by the time of Rousseau.
>
> Also the authors moved away from a book about the origins of inequality
> because how do we understand the meaning of equality: social sharing of
> food and resources, identical personalities and habits,  equal rights for
> all or for some? They move to other more measurable qualities to make
> socetal distinctions.
>
> As to Rousseau’s private life the only thing the authors actually imply is
> that Rousseau had servants. I don’t know or care what his exact court
> ambitions were, but doubt the athors just made shit up about Rousseau.
>
> The argument over how Lahontan got his version of Kandiaronk is left open
> by Wegner and Graeber. They take a position but also tell us that the
> position taken by Bell is the more common academic position.
>
> The main points made by Kandiaronk can be found in other Native American
> intellectuals. And I had encountered all Kandiaronk’s arguments  before
> hearing about Kandiaronk in this volume.
>
> The main value and use of the material drawn from historic and
> ethnographic information on the tribal peoples of the Americas and
> elsewhere is to show that their variety of social arrangements was not
> merely an accident of culture but a product of thoughtful exchange within
> these communities, and that they often had lively traditions of debate
> about decisions and self governance.  There are many supporting materials
> for this. The authors show the range of societies from hierarchical empires
> to large non-hierarchical cities and that they do not happen in a linear
> progression.
>
> ANYWAY. The core ideas of the book do not rest  or depend on Bell's
> academic question. The core has to do with the diversity of prehistoric
> social arrangements which are indicated by archeological digs over the last
> 50 years. These archeological findings combined with the diversity among
> historic precolonial cultures bring into question the idea of a linear
> progression of human development  and that  has powerful implications for a
> worldview which rests heavily on the idea that  current global social
> arrangements are  the inevitable apex of a natural progression. It is
> heavily footnoted, so readers can look at source materials.
>
>
>
>
> On Dec 7, 2021, at 10:34 AM, David Elliott via Pynchon-l <
> pynchon-l at waste.org> wrote:
> >
> > There was a mention on the list of David Graeber and David Wengrow’s The
> Dawn of Everything: ​​A New History of Humanity.
> > I haven’t yet read it. This critique focuses on the authors’ approach to
> the French Enlightenment.
> >
> https://www.persuasion.community/p/a-flawed-history-of-humanity?fbclid=IwAR3HN_zhNXGnxbGd4HCG8do3ML28QveplW60lANW6OFdR3jeY1wcEBljdfs
> >
> > --
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>
>
>
>
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