Hierarchy: Persistence and Transformation in Social Formations

This collection of 11 exciting new essays develops the concept of hierarchy Louis Dumont created in his study of Indian and European societies. They interrogate unique hierarchical formations and societies at the periphery of the Indo-European region where Dumont focused his studies, looking to the Ottoman Empire, Mongolia, SE Asia, Indonesia and Oceania. They challenge the criticism that Dumont's work merely propagated Orientalism and a totalizing essentialist conception of hierarchy, while upholding the merits of his comparative anthropology, and his treatment of individualism and alternatives to its Western form. The contributors are academics and social anthropologists from Europe and the United States, with a third hailing from University of Bergen in Sweden. Annotation Ac2012 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Knut M. Rio is Associate Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Bergen. He has conducted long-term fieldwork in Vanuatu in the western Pacific and published The Power of Perspective: Social Ontology and Agency on Ambrym Island, Vanuatu (Berghahn Books, 2007).