[lbo-talk] Blue Dogs cashing in

c b cb31450 at gmail.com
Wed Aug 12 11:23:00 PDT 2009


Jeff and Alan,

Isn't it pretty clear that Geertz holds that non-human species don't have culture, that humans are the only species with culture and meaning ? I'm not talking about your arguments here, but rather Geertz's position.

Charles

Jeffrey Fisher thanks, alan. yes, i've seen that page before, mainly in trying to think about how to present geertz to students (which i do in religion classes fairlyregularly). everything you're saying here makes perfectly good sense to me, i'm happy to say, and i hope i gave no impression that it wouldn't. what i'm thinking about is whether we can say with geertz that there is a difference of degree (of complexity, as you say) rather than a difference in kind (duality) -- a distinction as opposed to a dichotomy, as putnam would say -- between human and animal "culture." that is, that many if not all animals have at least some rudimentary form of culture if we understand culture as geertz does, but that the webs of complexity become, well, webbier, or more complex, for humans than for animals, because of the complexity of the symbols and symbol systems. and then we have not given definitions of either culture or humanity that render one exclusively the terrain of the other.

fwiw, i've always thought his definition of religion, despite its drawbacks, actually constitutes a really helpful model of religious change, or, that is to say, of the ways religions change. students find it disturbing in no small part because it makes such sense, i think.

i mainly hope i am not speaking nonsense and making all cultural anthropologists everywhere wish i would leave it alone. :)

j



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