Women of the forest
By: Yolanda Murphy and Robert F. Murphy ; with a new foreword edited by R. Brian Ferguson.
Contributors: Murphy, Robert Francis, 1924-
Edition: 30th anniversary ed.
Series: Columbia classics in anthropology
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Published: 2004
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 262
Subjects: Munduruku women.; Munduruku Indians -- Social life and customs.
Description: When it originally appeared, this groundbreaking ethnography was one of the first works to focus on gender in anthropology. The thirtieth anniversary edition of Women of the Forest reconfirms the book's importance for contemporary studies on gender and life in the Amazon. The book covers Yolanda and Robert Murphy's year of fieldwork among the Mundurucu people of Brazil in 1952. The Murphy's ethnographic analysis takes into account the historical, ecological, and cultural setting of the Mundurucu, including the mythology surrounding women, women's work and household life, marriage and child rearing, the effects of social change on the female role, sexual antagonism, and the means by which women compensate for their low social position. The new foreword - written collectively by renowned anthropologists who were all students of the Murphys -- is both a tribute to the Murphys and a critical reflection on the continued relevance of their work today.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [259]-260) and index.