star.matrix at verizon.net wrote:
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> there is not much of a correlation between incest or inbreeding and
> congential disorders like being a "village idiot" or whatever. iow, this is
> largely a myth.
I think this is true -- and "village idiot," moreover, carries a rather different force than Marx's "idiocy of rural life." The former is a statement about the (apparently inherent) nature of individuals, while the latter, which almost certainly invokes the original greek sense of "idiotes," is (whether or not true) a historical and social analysis, not a reflection on individuals.
Raymone Williams in one or more of his essays expressed irritation at Marx's phrase, and cited (without particularly developing the point) the great peasant revolutons (China, Vietnam) of the 20th century as refuting it. But if you read any of the many fairly detailed accounts of revolutionary activity in China or Vietnam (Hinton's _Fanshen_ is probably the most illustrious) you see how central a part of that activity was precisely the breaking through of that "idiocy of rural life."
Can anyone suggest a synonym for "inbred" (for application to such contexts as an inbred intellectual tradition, etc) that does carry the negative force but not the false biological implications of the term?
Carrol