Sello de la Universidad Catolica Bolivariana.

The revolutionary experiences of Cantonese peasant villagers are documented in the first comprehensive analysis of rural Chinese society by foreign anthropologists since the Revolution of 1949.

From the dusty workshops of village potters to the pristine assembly lines of modern factories; from the makers of pottery to the producers of porcelain in selected areas of Mexico and Denmark, the authors observed, interviewed, and photographed ceramic artists at their work. The result is a story of persistence, inspiration, collaboration and intrigue, success and failure, along with individual eccentricities in the process of making ceramic art for an international market. The story is not only that of the potters wheel, but of the wheel of time over which the lowly village potter evolves as professional artist who eventually, in some instances, rejects making corporate porcelain in favor of returning to clay and kiln. The Mexican communities are near Guadalajara. The Danish settings include the towns of Naestved, Srring, the island of Bornholm and, in Copenhagen, the porcelain giants Royal Copenhagen and Bing and Grndahl contrasting large scale corporations with small pottery factories. Researched in the 1970s, the abandoned manuscript, recently rediscovered, appears here as written then with current material added to inform and update the historical ethnography, providing a rare opportunity to follow up on people and predictions, after thirty years, to identify change, decay and fulfillment.

This Is An Unusual Exploration Into India S Timeless Civilization By An Enthropologist Who Has Devoted Six Years To Extensive Survey Of The Peasant Potters Of More Than Half Of India. The Author Of This Book , Writes Professor N.K. Bose , Has Applied Some Methods In The Study Of Indian Culture Which&. Have Not Been Used By Any Other Student Of Cultural Anthropology In This Country. His Method Of Correlation Of Material Culture With The Total Cultural System Marks A Departure From The Conventional Studies Of Cultural Processes. He Has Suggested New Methods Of Reconstructing History, And His Data On Contemporary Pottery Making Afford A Reassessment Of Indian Archaeological Materials.The Author S Extensive Experience With Inter-Disciplinary Inquiry Yields Insight. From A Detailed Analysis Of The Ethnographic Data On Pottery Making, He Makes Some Significant Observations: There Is Continuity In Potter-Craft Tradition In India, Traceable From The Pre-Historic Times. The Survival Of The Ethnic Groups Of Potters, Well Within Their Respective Technological Zones Of Pre-Historic Pottery Making, Makes The Aryanization Of India Doubtful. Different Regions Of India Have Evolved Their Own Indigenous Cultures Providing Extreme Diversity To The Material Base Of Indian Society-Their Unity Lies In The Basic Philosophy Of Life, In The Higher Forms Of Culture. To An Average Indian, The Diversity Of Cultures-Food, Dress, Language, Worship-Does Not Really Matter, So Long As He Believes That Every Way Of Life Has Its Own Contribution To Humanity, And That Before The Inexorable Law Of Nature, Every Being Has An Equal Right To Survive Through The Full Course Of Its Cosmic Life. This Idealization Of Diversity Has Helped India Develop A Tradition Of Tolerance, Which Is The Soul Of Her Civilization.Apart From Its Contribution To Anthropology, The Book Will Be Of Particular Interest To Historians Of Culture And Philosophers Of Social History

The concept of ?peasant? has been constructed from residual images of pre-industrial European and colonial rural society. Spurred by Romantic sensibilities and modern nationalist imaginations, the images the word peasant brings to mind are anachronisms that do not reflect the ways in which rural people live today. In this path-breaking book, Michael Kearney shows how the concept has been outdistanced by contemporary history. He situates the peasantry within the current social context of the transnational and post?Cold War nation-state and clears the way for alternative theoretical views.Reconceptualizing the Peasantry looks at rural society in general and considers the problematic distinction between rural and urban. Most definitions of and debates about peasants have focused on their presumed social, economic, cultural, and political characteristics, but Kearney articulates the way in which peasants define themselves in a rapidly changing world. In the process, he develops ethnographic and political forms of representation that correspond to contemporary postpeasant identities. Moving beyond a reconsideration of peasantry, the book situates anthropology in global context, showing how the discipline reconstructs itself and its subjects according to changing circumstances.