Chaco Culture National Historical Park, 2005

Ivan Karp reviewed books and films for major journals in anthropology, African studies, and museum studies. The works reviewed covered a wide range of topics, from social theory and social organization, to museums, to religion, philosophy and history.

1990s

1994  The Bushman Myth: The Making of a Namibian Underclass by Robert J. Gordon. Conflict and Change Series. Scott Whiteford and William Derman, series eds. Boulder, CO. and Oxford: Westview Press, 1992. American Ethnologist 24(4): 961.

1993a The Surreptitious Speech: Presence Africaine and the Politics of Otherness,  1947-1987 by V.Y. Mudimbe, ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992. American Anthropologist 95(4): 1043-1044.

1993b In My Father's House: Africa in the Philosophy of Culture by Kwame Anthony Appiah. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992. American Anthropologist 95(3): 766-7. 

1992 The Pastoral Son and the Spirit of Patriarchy by Michael Meeker. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1989. Anthropological Quarterly 65(4): 200-201.

1991 Film Review: Spirits of Defiance: The Mangbetu People of Zaire, produced and directed by Jeremy Marre. BBC Series; Under the Sun. 1989. American Anthropologist 93(2): 520-521. 

1990 Primitive Art in Civilized Places by Sally Price. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1989. Museum News (July/August) 69(4): 65-66.

1980s

1985 Against the Tranquility of Axioms by Rodney Needham. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984. American Ethnologist 12(3): 555-556.

1984 Colonial Evangelism: A Socio-Historical Study of an East African Mission at the Grassroots by T.O. Beidelman. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1982. American Ethnologist 11(1): 215-216.

1983a Human Spirits: A Cultural Account of Trance in Mayotte by Michael Lambek. Cambridge Studies in Cultural Analysis. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1981. American Ethnologist 10(3): 620-621.

1983b Teso in Transition: The Political Economy of Peasant and Class in East Africa by Joan Vincent. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982. Man, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 18(3): 630-631.

1982a Warfare among East African Herders ed. by Katsuyoshi Fukui and David Turton. (Senri Ethnological Studies 3) Osaka: National Museum of Japan, 1979. American Ethnologist 9(1): 203-4.

1982b Space, Time and Culture among the Iraqw of Tanzania by Robert Thornton. New York: Academic Press, 1980. African Studies Review 24(4): 223-225.

1982c An African Aristocracy: Rank among the Swazi by Hilda Kuper. New York: Africana Publishing Company, 1980. Africana Journal (1982): 251-253.

1981 On the Frontier of Change by William Arens. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1979; and Savannah Town, Rural Ties and Urban Opportunities in Northern Kenya by Anders Hjort. Stockholm: University of Stockholm, 1979. African Economic History 10: 220-222.

1980 Age, Generation and Time: Some features of East African Age Organizations, edited by P.T.W. Baxter and Uri Almagor. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1978; and Sex and Age as Principles of Social Organization edited by J.S. LaFontaine. A.S.A. Monographs in Social Anthropology 17. New York: Academic Press 1978. American Anthropologist 82(1): 156-157.

1970s

1977 Symbol and Sentiments, edited by I.M. Lewis. New York: Academic Press. Ars Semiotica 2(2): 223-226.

1976a Remarks and Inventions: Skeptical Essays about Kinship by Rodney Needham. London: Tavistock, 1974. American Anthropologist 78(1): 152-153.

1976b African Religions: Symbol, Ritual and Community by Benjamin Ray. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1976. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 16(2) 212-213.

1974a Bangwa Kinship and Marriage by Robert Brain. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1972. American Anthropologist 76(1): 137-138.

1974b The Historical Study of African Religions edited by T.O. Ranger and Isaria Kimambo. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972. American Anthropologist 76(2): 429-431.

* All downloadable papers are used here with permission. Please do not recirculate them, but feel free to direct others to this website.