Culture: A Problem That Cannot Be SolvedFrench historian Alexis de Tocqueville observed that the conflict between the ideals of individualism and community defines American culture. In this groundbreaking new work, anthropologist Charles Nuckolls discovers that every culture consists of such paradoxes, thus making culture a problem that cannot be solved. He does, however, find much creative tension in these unresolvable opposites. |
From inside the book
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... usually defines it as a system of meaningful contrasts . This is the problem . It does not address the motivational causes or consequences of such contrasts . It is almost as if the opposition is intrinsically motivating or becomes so ...
... usually goes by the name rationalist . The contradictory Enlightenment epistemologies of empiricism and rationalism constitute opposed perspec- tives on the origin and organization of knowledge that we find repeated , again and again ...
... usually centers on this issue because Freud's con- jecture cannot be substantiated or confirmed . Moreover , the notion that human beings maintain a collective memory of the deed , with its accom- panying sentiment of guilt transmitted ...
... usually don't last too long because the tensions are too great . The one exception I know personally is a south Indian man considered a witch by his friends and neighbors . The role of witch combines cultural values usually kept ...
... Usually , they succeed only for a while . The synthesis they represent is unstable — like any dialectical synthesis — and eventually it breaks down into its constituents , thus de- stroying the personality of compromise identity . It is ...
Contents
3 | |
41 | |
Value Dialectics and the Construction of a Regional Identity Max Weber in Oklahoma | 74 |
The Allocation of Value to Gender and the Cultural History of Psychiatric Diagnosis | 108 |
Cultural Ambivalence and the Knowledge Structures of Modern American Psychiatry | 161 |
The Narrative Reproduction of Values in Psychiatric Training and Practice | 202 |
Dialectical Values and Cultural Paradox | 270 |
Bibliography | 279 |
Index | 293 |