ENGLISH

The Egalitarians - Human and Chimpanzee: An Anthropological View of Social Organization

By Margaret Power

Book information

Year
1991
ISBN
0521400163, 9780521400169
LCC
GN365.9 .P68 1991
Open Library ID
OL1886826M
Language
english
Format
PDF
Filesize
8 MB (8035826 bytes)
Pages
312\311
Time added
2011-06-04 13:46:07

Description

This innovative book challenges the perceived view, based largely on long observation of artificially fed chimpanzees in Gombe and Mahale National Parks, Tanzania, of the normal social behavior of chimpanzees as aggressive, dominance seeking, and fiercely territorial. In polar opposition, all reports from naturalistic (nonfeeding) field studies are of nonaggressive chimpanzees living peacefully on home ranges in fluid, open, nonhierarchical groups. This research has been largely ignored and downgraded by most of the scientific community. By utilizing the data from these studies, the author is able to construct a model of an egalitarian form of social organization, based on a role relationship of mutual dependence among many charismatic chimpanzees of both sexes and other more dependent members. This highly and necessarily positive mututal dependence system is characteristic of both undisturbed chimpanzees and humans who live or lived by the "immediate-return" foraging system.

Similar books