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Peasant Wars of the Twentieth Century

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Wolf's treatment of a so ideological subject, peasant wars, shows all the tallent and capacity of a intellectual who worked mainly in the US, although he was born in Austria. This fact helps us to understand a littlle more of his work as an anthropologist aware of the importance of a renewed history. Eric Wolf left Europe after an experience in the nazi's concentration camp in World War II. In this camp, he met and had classes with Norbert Elias. Some people say this is a fundamental fact on Wolf's career, because, as we can see, the problematic of power undergoes all along his opus. In Peasant Wars, Eric, worried about the US involvement in the Vietnam conflict, tries to understand how peasant people get involved with revolution. In order to understand this fact, Eric studies six cases of peasant revolution in the twentieth century: Mexico, Russia, Nigeria, China, Vietnam and Cuba. As the analysis goes through, we can almost smell the tallent of Eric, because although he were a marxist, the study don't fall in dogmatism. This book is essential to all the people who wants to understande the contemporary world.

Marcos Mota, Department of History, University of Brasilia