Overview

Michael Jackson has spent much of his career elaborating his rich conception of lifeworlds, mining his ethnographic and personal experience for insights into how our subjective and social lives are mutually constituted.   In How Lifeworlds Work, Jackson draws on years of ethnographic fieldwork in West Africa to highlight the dynamic quality of human relationships and reinvigorate the study of kinship and ritual. How, he asks, do we manage the perpetual process of accommodation between social norms and personal emotions, impulses, and desires? How are these two dimensions of lived reality joined, and how are the dual imperatives of individual expression and collective viability managed? Drawing on the pragmatist tradition, psychology, and phenomenology, Jackson offers an unforgettable, beautifully written account of how we make, unmake, and remake, our lifeworlds. 

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9780226491967

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Reviews

Jackson produces an empirically and conceptually dense account which only a seasoned anthropologist would be able to produce.--Anthropological Forum Jackson is one of the most important voices in the field of anthropology. In a world where hyperbolic claims are becoming the norm of academic writing, How Lifeworlds Work, with its classic elegance and clarity, is a gem to be widely shared and savored. It will contribute richly to pedagogy in a deep sense. --Veena Das, Johns Hopkins University How Lifeworlds Work is an intellectually compelling and beautifully written book that weaves together a lifetime of rich ethnography and philosophical reflection. Jackson captures the quality of life in an African society like no one else. --Michael Lambek, University of Toronto, Scarborough

Jackson produces an empirically and conceptually dense account which only a seasoned anthropologist would be able to produce.-- Anthropological Forum Jackson is one of the most important voices in the field of anthropology. In a world where hyperbolic claims are becoming the norm of academic writing, How Lifeworlds Work, with its classic elegance and clarity, is a gem to be widely shared and savored. It will contribute richly to pedagogy in a deep sense. -- Veena Das, Johns Hopkins University How Lifeworlds Work is an intellectually compelling and beautifully written book that weaves together a lifetime of rich ethnography and philosophical reflection. Jackson captures the quality of life in an African society like no one else. -- Michael Lambek, University of Toronto, Scarborough

Author Information

Michael Jackson is Distinguished Professor of World Religions at Harvard Divinity School.

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