Luke Eric Lassiter

This is one of many textbooks for my Anthropology 101 course. The book was not only an enlightening text, but also a very engaging one. The text overviews some of the basic concepts of anthropology (ethnography, kinships, gender issues, religion) and seeks to explain them from an anthropological perspective. Unlike previous texts, this book includes a glossary and seeks to define what may be confusing terms within the text itself in a contextual manner. i.e. instead of taking time out of the book to explain the word, the word is just incorporated into a sentence and then the text continues. This is helpful because it sidesteps textbooks general problems of making the reader feel stupid.

Moreover, the text takes a truly open view of the world itself. Other viewpoints are explained with the writer admitting his own bias more often than not. He doesn't take a fool-proof view of the world (i.e. everything is relative) but by the same token, does explain why such a view is helpful. All in all, I feel that I learned a lot from this book - particularly the religion section with its use of David J. Hufford's view of "tradition of disbelief" in regards to religious ethnocentrism. I eagerly anticipate reading the rest of the texts for this course.… (mehr)