The Theory Of Social Structure
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears
Pages: Good
At the crossroads of social science and structural theory, S. F. Nadel's The Theory of Social Structure stands as one of the most rigorous and systematically argued works in the history of anthropology. Published posthumously, this landmark text presents a bold attempt to construct a formal, scientific framework for understanding how human societies are organised, asking not merely what social structures look like, but what they fundamentally are. Nadel argues with analytical precision that social structure is not a metaphor or a convenient abstraction, but a definable, observable reality composed of roles, relationships, and the networks that bind them — a thesis that was groundbreaking at the time of its publication and remains intellectually provocative today. Nadel's prose is disciplined and exacting, reflecting the mind of a scholar equally at home in philosophy, music, and fieldwork across Africa and the Middle East — a rare intellectual breadth that lends the text an unusual depth. A memoir by Meyer Fortes, William Wyse Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Cambridge, accompanies the work, situating Nadel's contribution within the broader arc of twentieth-century social thought and paying tribute to a career cut tragically short. For students of anthropology, sociology, and social theory alike, this volume poses a question that still demands an answer: can the tangled web of human society ever be truly mapped?
Author: S. F. Nadel
Format: Hardback
Published: 1957, Melbourne University Press in association with The Australian National University
Genre: Anthropology
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears
Pages: Good
At the crossroads of social science and structural theory, S. F. Nadel's The Theory of Social Structure stands as one of the most rigorous and systematically argued works in the history of anthropology. Published posthumously, this landmark text presents a bold attempt to construct a formal, scientific framework for understanding how human societies are organised, asking not merely what social structures look like, but what they fundamentally are. Nadel argues with analytical precision that social structure is not a metaphor or a convenient abstraction, but a definable, observable reality composed of roles, relationships, and the networks that bind them — a thesis that was groundbreaking at the time of its publication and remains intellectually provocative today. Nadel's prose is disciplined and exacting, reflecting the mind of a scholar equally at home in philosophy, music, and fieldwork across Africa and the Middle East — a rare intellectual breadth that lends the text an unusual depth. A memoir by Meyer Fortes, William Wyse Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Cambridge, accompanies the work, situating Nadel's contribution within the broader arc of twentieth-century social thought and paying tribute to a career cut tragically short. For students of anthropology, sociology, and social theory alike, this volume poses a question that still demands an answer: can the tangled web of human society ever be truly mapped?