The United States on the eve of the Second World War was still a society largely isolated from the world. Facing enemies with unfamiliar cultural traditions, the U.S. government turned to anthropologists for insight. The result was a research effort that continued long after the war, aimed, in the words of Margaret Mead, at analyzing the cultural regularities in the characters of individuals who are members of societies that are inaccessible to direct observation. In 1953, Margaret Mead and Rhoda Metraux produced The Study of Culture at a Distance, a compilation of research from this period. This remarkable work, long unavailable, presents a rich and complex methodology for the study of cultures through literature, film, informant interviews, focus groups, and projective techniques. The book also provides fascinating insights into such diverse cultures as China, Thailand, Italy, Syria, France, Germany, Russia, Romania, and Great Britain, and includes some highly original analysis such as that of the Soviet style of chess, a study of Jean Cocteau's classic film La Belle et la Bete, and the cultural interpretations of Rorschach tests administered to Chinese subjects.
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More About the Author
William O. Beeman is Professor and Chair of the Department of Anthropology, University of Minnesota and Past-President of the Middle East Section of the American Anthropological Association. He was formerly Professor of Anthropology and Director of Middle East Studies at Brown University. Best known as a Middle East Specialist for more than 30 years, he has also worked in Central Asia, the Caucasus, Japan, China and South Asia. Recognized for special expertise in Iranian culture, he is the author or editor of more than 100 scholarly articles, 500 opinion pieces and 14 books, including Language, Status and Power in Iran, and The "Great Satan" vs. the "Mad Mullahs": How the United States and Iran Demonize Each Other. His forthcoming book from Mazda Press is Iranian Performance Forms: Keys to Iranian Culture. He has served as consultant to the United States State Department, the Department of Defense, the United Nations and the United States Congress. A frequent commentator on national and international radio and television, his written opinion pieces have also appeared in major newspapers throughout the world. He is also a professional opera singer (bass), and collaborated with stage director, Daniel Helfgot, on The Third Line: The Opera Performer as Interpreter.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
I couldn't believe this was written 50 years ago,
By Michael O'Keefe (Boston, MA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Study of Culture at a Distance (Margaret Mead--Researching Western Contemporary Cultures, V. 1) (Paperback)
This is an amazing forgotten book. Anyone who wants to understand how to analyze culture through film and literature should read this and see how the masters did it. Cultural studies types really need this book to understand something about methodology. Who would have ever thought that Mead wrote about France and Russia! It just goes to show you that just when we think we have made intellectual progress people like Mead and Metraux surface and prove that we are just reinventing the wheel.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
What a surprise! A fascinating book1,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Study of Culture at a Distance (Margaret Mead--Researching Western Contemporary Cultures, V. 1) (Paperback)
Anyone who thinks that Margaret Mead only concerned herself with adolescents in Samoa is in for a surprise. This book shows how much anyone concerned with MODERN culture is in Mead's debt. This book, written in 1953 was decades ahead of the crowd in understanding complex societies, and in formulating research methods. Fully 120 (!) researchers working under Mead's leadership investigated China, France, Eastern European Jewish Culture, Russia and Germany. They had astonishingly penetrating, fascinating insights into these and a dozen other societies documented in this study. Their analysis of film, poetry, and psychological literature for these societies is without parallel, and amazing for the 1950's. This book is a treasure. My gratitude to the publisher (Berghahn Books) for republishing it!
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