The Elementary Forms of Religious Life (Oxford World's Classics) [Paperback]

Emile Durkheim (Author), Mark S. Cladis (Editor), Carol Cosman (Translator)

Book Description

Series: Oxford World's Classics | Publication Date: June 15, 2008

In The Elementary Forms of Religious Life (1912), Emile Durkheim sets himself the task of discovering the enduring source of human social identity. He investigates what he considered to be the simplest form of documented religion - totemism among the Aborigines of Australia. For Durkheim, studying Aboriginal religion was a way 'to yield an understanding of the religious nature of man, by showing us an essential and permanent aspect of humanity'. The need and capacity of men and women to relate to one another socially lies at the heart of Durkheim's exploration, in which religion embodies the beliefs that shape our moral universe. The Elementary Forms has been applauded and debated by sociologists, anthropologists, ethnographers, philosophers, and theologians, and continues to speak to new generations about the intriguing origin and nature of religion and society. This new, lightly abridged edition provides an excellent introduction to Durkheim's ideas.

About the Series: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the broadest spectrum of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, voluminous notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Editorial Reviews

Language Notes

Text: English (translation)
Original Language: French --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Carol Cosman has translated works by Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Balzac and Yasmina Reza Mark Cladis is the author of A Communitarian Defense of Liberalim: Emile Durkheim and Contemporary Social Theory (Stanford, 1992) and editor of Durkheim and Foucault: Perspectives on Education and Punishment (1999).

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 416 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA; abridged edition edition (June 15, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0199540128
• ISBN-13: 978-0199540129
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 4.8 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.9 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,848 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #19 in Books > Religion & Spirituality > Religious Studies > Sociology

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

60 of 63 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Elements of Religious Life - Durkheim, June 12, 2000

By 

Victoria Bowhill - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Elementary Forms of Religious Life (Paperback)

This book is a sociological text written by Durkheim. One of the forefathers of Sociology, he believed that to study sociology you must identify social phenomena and then trace it to its origins to see how it came about. This for Durkheim was the only way to understand society.

In this book he examines the origins of religion. He explains that religion develops from the collective feelings of security we gain from living in a group, and these feelings are very powerful and important to us. However, early tribes passed these feelings onto which ever object they were close to at the time of experiencing the emotions, or the most frequent object in their area. The object could include a plant, vegetable or an animal, which would then be represented in a carving of stone or wood and then worshipped. This for Durkheim is the beginning of totemism, the first religion.

He follows on to discuss how our first religion gave us an understanding of the world around us, our conception of space and time. For Durkheim 'the framework of our intelligence' is made up of the concepts of space, time, numbers and our existence, and they were born 'in religion'.

Durkheim's writing is suprisingly easy to read and very enjoyable. His examination of early societies gives much insight into their lives and how they understood the world to be. For anybody studying Durkheim, this book is a good topic area to concentrate on. However, for anybody interested in theology or in early societies, it is a fascinating read. I read this book as part of my degree course and, although I borrowed it from the library, even after my course has ended I am now buying my own copy to reread.

I recommend this book to a wide range of readers, not only those interested in sociology. Read it, you'll be suprised!

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Abridged... why?, February 6, 2010

By 

T. Cushman "East Coast Prof" (Boston) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Elementary Forms of Religious Life (Oxford World's Classics) (Paperback)

I, too am disappointed that the new edition is abridged. One reviewer noted that only about 30 pages were taken out, but for serious readers, students, and teachers, it is important to have the book exactly as Durkheim wrote it. I am a professor of sociology and I suppose this edition would be OK for teaching (the introduction is fantastic), but for my own scholarship, I could not depend on it
because I am unsure what has been excised and the rationale. This is not just the idle complaint of a pedant - this is one of the most important books in the history of modern social thought and there is no excuse for abridging it, especially when the cover DOES NOT note that it is abridged. In a classic, every word counts.

17 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars WARNING: THIS EDITION IS ABRIDGED, June 1, 2008

By 

Caraculiambro (La Mancha and environs) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Elementary Forms of Religious Life (Oxford World's Classics) (Paperback)

Durkheim's "Elementary Forms of the Religious Life" is one of the deepest books I've ever read, but I will leave others to speak of that.

I would like to complain about this particular edition, the "Oxford's World Classics" edition. (This review has apparently been published elsewhere. The edition I'm talking about is a yellow-and-red "Oxford's World's Classics" paperback with a black-and-white photo of Durkheim looking off to his left.)

I have long been looking to replace my worn-out edition, and thought this offering (published 2001) would answer nicely. (Is it just me, or has this book been plagued with editions that have flimsy binding?)

Unfortunately, Amazon buries an important piece of information in its "Editorial Reviews" section: this edition is abridged.

Now, it's lightly abridged. The original, which I have a hand, is only slightly longer than what you're getting here.

Which is what puzzles me: why did they bother to abridge this at all? Printing the entire text would only have added about 30 pages to the thing. The lines they have disincluded seem, at least upon my examination, no more irrelevant or abstruse than what they've decided to include.

Puzzling.

There are some good things about this edition, though. There are explanatory footnotes at the end of the text: useful glosses, not those "textual comparison" kind. (The footnotes on the bottom of each page are Durkheim's own.) There is a 29-page introduction. There is also an ethnographic map of Australia. But the biggest plus for me is that the (paperback) binding is super-sturdy and promises to last through many reads.

This is the translation by Carol Cosman, done in 2001 specifically for this edition.