The Theory of Social Structure

178 Pages·1957·9.767 MB·English

by  Siegfried Frederick Nadel

Routledge Library Editions
THE THEORY OF
SOCIAL STRUCTURE
ANTHROPOLOGY AND ETHNOGRAPHY
Routledge Library Editions
Anthropology and Ethnography
THEORY OF ANTHROPOLOGY
In 10 Volumes
I Political Systems and the Distribution of Power
Banton
II Marxist Analyses and Social Anthropology Bloch
III Marxism and Anthropology Bloch
IV The Observation of Savage Peoples Degerando
V Primitive Law Past and Present Diamond
VI Anthropology and the Greeks Humphreys
VII Theory in Anthropology Manners &
Kaplan
VIII The Theory of Social Structure Nadel
IX Readings in Early Anthropology Slotkin
X Classification and Human Evolution Washburn
THE THEORY OF
SOCIAL STRUCTURE
S F NADEL
O Routledge
Taylor & Francis Croup
LONDON AND NEW YORK
First published in 1957
Reprinted in 2004 by
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Transferred to Digital Printing 2009
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Anthropology and Ethnography.
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The Theory of Social Structure
ISBN 0-415-32556-0 (set)
ISBN 0-415-33066-1
ISBN 9-781-13655-033-1 (ebk)
Miniset: Theory of Anthropology
Series: Routledge Library Editions - Anthropology and Ethnography
Publisher’s Note
The publisher has gone to great lengths to ensure the quality of this reprint
but points out that some imperfections in the original may be apparent.
THE THEORY OF
SOCIAL STRUCTURE
by
S. F. NADEL
LATE PROFESSOR OF ANTHROPOLOGY
IN THE AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY
WITH A MEMOIR BY
MEYER FORTES
WILLIAM WYSE PROFESSOR OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY
IN THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE
COHEN & W EST LTD
30 PERCY STREET LONDON W. I
1
FIRST PUBLISHED 957
COPYRIGHT
PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY
BILLING AND SONS LIMITED, GUILDFORD AND LONDON
PREFACE
This book is in essence the somewhat enlarged version of a
series of lectures which I gave, with the same title, at the London
.1
School of Economics during the Lent Term of 1955 am greatly
indebted to the Director of the School, Sir Alexander Carr-
Saunders, for having invited me to do so. My greatest debt is to
Professor Raymond Firth, with whom the idea of the lectures
(and of their subject) originated. I owe a further debt, for many
helpful comments and criticisms, to him as well as to other
friends: Miss Elizabeth Bott, Dr. Phyllis Kaberry, Dr. J. A.
Barnes, Mr. M. Freedman, and Professor I. Schapera. They
will, I think, find most of the points they raised reflected in this
final version of the lectures. If this is not true of every point it is
not for want of attention on my part but because I felt, rightly
or wrongly, that I could do justice to the issues concerned in my
own fashion.
S. F. N.
,
Canberra
January 1956.
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CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
Preface v
Memoir ix
I Preliminaries i
II Problems of Role Analysis 20
III Conformity and Deviance 45
IV The Coherence of Role Systems 63
V Degrees of Abstraction 97
VI Structure, Time and Reality 125
VII Conclusions: Structure and Function 153