1st Edition

Feuding and Warfare Selected Works of Keith F. Otterbein

Edited By Keith F. Otterbein Copyright 1994
    250 Pages
    by Routledge

    250 Pages
    by Routledge

    Originally published in 1994, the late Keith F. Otterbein’s scholarship had followed an overall design since 1962, when he began conducting comparative studies of warfare using both ethnographic and cross-cultural methods. Through a conceptual framework derived from systems theory, he made signal contributions to our understanding of the role of warfare in human social evolution. He formulated a Fraternal Interest Group theory, utilizing it to explain not only feuding and warfare but also rape and capital punishment. Believing that armed combat is learned behaviour, he posed questions about its learning process that had yet to be answered. He acted as a major synthesizer of the growing literature on warfare and led attempts among anthropologists to apply their knowledge of war and peace to current events. This volume will serve both as a useful introduction to the anthropology of war and as a needed compendium of Professor Otterbein’s ideas.

    Foreword.  Acknowledgements.  Preface.  The Evolution of War  1. Why the Iroquois Won: An Analysis of Iroquois Military Tactics  2. Huron vs. Iroquois: A Case Study in Inter-Tribal Warfare  3. The Evolution of Zulu Warfare  4. The Evolution of War (Selections)  Fraternal Interest Group Theory  5. Higi Armed Combat  6. Cross-Cultural Studies of Armed Combat  7. A Cross-Cultural Study of Rape  8. Feuding – Dispute Resolution or Dispute Continuation?  9. Confrontation Theory: Capital Punishment in Tribes  Overviews  10. The Anthropology of War  11. Convergence in the Anthropological Study of Warfare  12. The Dilemma of Disarming  13. A Unified Theory of Feuding and Warfare.  Index.

    Biography

    Keith F. Otterbein