The Categorical Impulse

Essays on the Anthropology of Classifying Behavior

Roy Ellen

• Publisher: Berghahn Books
• Year: 2008
• Print ISBN: 9781845451554, 9781845450175
• eBook ISBN: 9780857455703
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Anthropology
• Index: Social Sciences

Classification, as an object of recent anthropological scrutiny came to prominence during the 1960s, exemplified in the British (constructionist) tradition by the writings of Mary Douglas, and in the American ethno-semantics (cognitive) tradition by the likes of Harold Conklin and Brent Berlin. At the time, these approaches seemed by turns to contradict each other, or even to exist in parallel universes. However, over the last 30 years we have witnessed both a renewed interest in classification studies as well as a cross-fertilization of these once antagonistic approaches.

These essays by one of leading scholars in this field bring together a body of influential and inter-linked work which attempts to bridge the divide between cultural and cognitive studies of classification, and which develops a more embedded and processual approach. In particular, the essays focus on people's categorization of natural kinds as a means through which to obtain an understanding of how classifying behavior in general works, engaging with the ideas of both anthropologists and psychologists. The theoretical background is set out in an entirely new and substantial introduction, which also provides a comprehensive and systematic review of developments in cognitive and social anthropology since 1960 as these have impacted on classification studies. In short, it constitutes a useful and approachable introduction to its subject.

Table of contents

• The Categorical Impulse
• Contents
• Preface
• List of Figures
• List of Tables
• CHAPTER 1. Introduction
• CHAPTER 2. Anthropological Studies of Classification (1996)
• CHAPTER 3. Classifying in its Social Context (1979)
• CHAPTER 4. Variable Constructs in Nuaulu Zoological Classification (1975)
• CHAPTER 5. Anatomical Classification and the Semiotics of the Body (1977)
• CHAPTER 6. Grass, Grerb or Weed? The Ethnography of a Plant Life-form (1991)
• CHAPTER 7. Palms and the Prototypicality of Trees (1998)
• CHAPTER 8. The Inedible and the Uneatable (1998)
• CHAPTER 9. Fetishism: A Cognitive Approach (1988)
• CHAPTER 10. The Cognitive Geometry of Nature: A Contextual Approach (1996)
• Bibliography
• Index