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University of California Press

Law in Culture and Society

by Laura Nader (Editor)
Paperback eBook
Price: $38.95 / £33.00
Publication Date: Apr 1997
Edition: 1st Edition
Title Details:
Rights: World
Pages: 460
ISBN: 9780520208339
Trim Size: 6 x 9
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About the Book

As conflict resolution becomes increasingly important to urban and rural peoples around the globe, the value of this classic anthology of studies of process, structure, comparison, and perception of the law is acclaimed by policy makers as well as anthropologists throughout the world. The case studies include evidence from Africa, Europe, the Americas, and Oceania, and they reflect the important shift from a concern with what law is to what law does.


As conflict resolution becomes increasingly important to urban and rural peoples around the globe, the value of this classic anthology of studies of process, structure, comparison, and perception of the law is acclaimed by policy makers as well as anthrop

About the Author

Laura Nader is Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley. Her books include No Access to Law: Alternatives in the American Justice System, Harmony Ideology: Justice and Control in a Zapotec Mountain Village, and Naked Science.

Table of Contents

Preface to the Paperback Edition
Preface
Introduction, Laura Nader

PART I CASE STUDIES OF LAW IN NON-WESTERN SOCIETIES
Introduction, P.H. GULLIVER 
Dispute Settlement Without Courts: The N Dendeuli of Southern Tanzania, 
P. H. Gulliver 
Styles of Court Procedure: To Make the Balance, 
Laura Nader  Keresan Pueblo Law, E. Adamson Hoebel 
Law at the Village Level: The Cottica Djuka of Surinam, 
Andre J.F.Kobben 
Ontology of the Judicial Thought of the Kahre of Northern Togo,
Raymond Verdier 
Struck by Speech: The Yakan Concept of Litigation, 
Charles 0. Frake 

PART II LAW AND INNOVATION IN NON-WESTERN SOCIETIES
Introduction, JAMES L. GIBBS, JR. 
Law and Personality: Signposts for a New Direction, 
James L. Gibbs, Jr. 
Structural Change and Primitive Law: Consequences of a Papuan Legal Case, 
Leopold Pospisil 
Uniformity and Variation in Chief-Made Law: A Tswana Case Study
Isaac Schapera 
Constitutional Ambiguities and the British Administration of Royal Careers Among the 
Bemba of Zambia
Richard P. Werbner 

PART III CASE STUDIES OF LAW IN WESTERN SOCIETIES
Introduction, VILHELM AUBERT 
Law as a Way of Resolving Conflicts: The Case of a Small Industrialized Society
VILHELM AUBERT 
The Offer of a Free Home: A Case Study in the Family Law of the Poor
Herma H. Kay 
Cases, Courts, and Congestion
Gresham M. Sykes 

PART IV COMPARATIVE STUDIES
Introduction, SALLY FALK MOORE 
Concepts in the Comparative Study of Tribal Law
Max Gluckman 
Descent and Legal Position
Sally Falk Moore 
Ethnography and Comparison in Legal Anthropology 
Paul Bohannan 

Bibliography 
Contributors 
Index 

Reviews

"A classic collection in the anthropology of law. While some exceptionally good descriptive work is presented, the volume is particularly valuable in providing a range of thoughtful, engaged, and empirically grounded theoretical explorations of issues in the comparative study of law and conflict."—Donald Brenneis, author of Dangerous Words