Tribal Wisdom
David Maybury-Lewis

David Maybury Lewis (1992) wonders if we, as Americans, by having systematically chosen to dismiss as 'odd', 'weird', and not the 'right' way to live; in our views of foreign tribal cultures, have been hoisted by our own petard. By using his definition of a tribal society (for which there really is no one single way of life): "small-scale, pre-industrial societies that live in comparative isolation and manage their affairs without central authority such as the state", (p 6) he questions whether cultural roads industrialized "modern" societies have chosen have caused the serious social problems we suffer today. We are the modernists, defined by myself as the opposite of tribal/traditional society.
The article is easy to follow, articulate, and I related well to its theories. Maybe the fact that I related too well causes me to wonder a bit at the objectivity behind Maybury-Lewis' thinking. He did well to provide a structured compare and......

Join Now to view the rest of this term paper!
Members: Login to view this research paper.

Title: Critique: Tribal Wisdom
Approximate Word Count: 897
Approximate Pages: 4 (250 words per double-spaced page)

With the Term Papers Lab Membership Pass, you get instant access to every essay on this site, including this essay on Critique: Tribal Wisdom, for as long as you remain a member.

Other essays sites charge almost $100 for a single term paper. At Term Papers Lab, you can get instant access to over 100,000 research papers for as little as $29.95!