The First Institutional Spheres in Human Societies - Seth Abrutyn, Jonathan Turner

The First Institutional Spheres in Human Societies

Evolution and Adaptations from Foraging to the Threshold of Modernity
Buch | Softcover
472 Seiten
2022
Routledge (Verlag)
978-1-032-12408-7 (ISBN)
49,85 inkl. MwSt
This book expands a foundational definition of the institution, one which locates them as the basic building blocks of human societies – as structural and cultural machines for survival that make it possible to pass precious knowledge from one generation to the next, ensuring the survival of our species.
Few concepts are as central to sociology as institutions. Yet, like so many sociological concepts, institutions remain vaguely defined. This book expands a foundational definition of the institution, one which locates them as the basic building blocks of human societies—as structural and cultural machines for survival that make it possible to pass precious knowledge from one generation to the next, ensuring the survival of our species. The book extends this classic tradition by, first, applying advances in biological evolution, neuroscience, and primatology to explain the origins of human societies and, in particular, the first institutional sphere: kinship. The authors incorporate insights from natural sciences often marginalized in sociology, while highlighting the limitations of purely biogenetic, Darwinian explanations. Secondly, they build a vivid conceptual model of institutions and their central dynamics as the book charts the chronological evolution of kinship, polity, religion, law, and economy, discussing the biological evidence for the ubiquity of these institutions as evolutionary adaptations themselves.

Seth Abrutyn is Associate Professor in the Sociology Department at the University of British Columbia. His research straddles two primary streams: the evolution of human institutions, like religion or polity, and the role place and place-based culture play in shaping adolescent mental health and suicide. His work has won several national awards, and can be found in outlets like American Sociological Review, Sociological Theory, and American Journal of Public Health. Jonathan H. Turner was named the 38th University Professor in the history of the University of California system. He is primarily a general sociological theorist. He has authored or coauthored 43 books, and edited nine additional books. This book on the first human institutions is his fourth book on this topic, focusing on the origin of human institutional systems and their evolution to the structural and culture base necessary for modernity.

Introduction






On the Origins of Human Capacities



Selection as the Force Driving Institutional Evolution



Building Human Institutions



The Dynamics of Institutional Autonomy



The First Human Institution: The Evolution of the Nuclear Family and Kinship





The Elaboration of Kinship



The Emergence of Polity in Human Societies



The Increasing Autonomy of Polity



The Emergence of Religion



Religious Evolution and Religious Autonomy



The Emergence of Economy



The Emergence of Law



Legal Autonomy and the Expanding Institutional Infrastructure



Institutional Evolution To The Brink of Modernity



Institutional Evolution and Stratification



The Evolved Institutional Order and the West

Bibliography

Erscheinungsdatum
Reihe/Serie Evolutionary Analysis in the Social Sciences
Zusatzinfo 13 Tables, black and white; 22 Line drawings, black and white; 1 Halftones, black and white; 23 Illustrations, black and white
Verlagsort London
Sprache englisch
Maße 152 x 229 mm
Gewicht 399 g
Themenwelt Sozialwissenschaften Ethnologie
Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie Allgemeines / Lexika
Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie Makrosoziologie
ISBN-10 1-032-12408-3 / 1032124083
ISBN-13 978-1-032-12408-7 / 9781032124087
Zustand Neuware
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