Page:American Anthropologist NS vol. 22.djvu/55

 GOLDENWEISER] A NEW APPROACH TO HISTORY 43

idea-systems, the camel with its terminology fitting into the same pigeonhole, in one case, as the seal with its terminological deriva- tives does in the other. Nor is it at all clear why fishing, cattle- raising and farming should determine different idea-systems, ex- cept in a sense much more restricted than that implied in the author's formulation. Instances substantiating this statement are as familiar to the author as they are to the present writer.

The author's argument in the last chapter on " Methods and Results" is, perhaps, less striking and daring, but his reasoning is in closer touch with concrete fact and his analysis is often impressive. Turning to a general characterization of the nature and mechanisms of civilization, the author asks, with Bagehot: "If fixity is an in- variable ingredient in early civilization, how then did any civiliza- tion become unfixed?" (pp. 130-1). The task then is, first, to disclose the processes which work for stagnation, then those that bring about change. For purposes of such an analysis the author takes man for granted, leaving the problem of his physical history to the biologist, and also postulates a general psychological com- parability of mankind. That the latter postulate is but a working hypothesis, of this the author is well aware; it is for him a "methodo- logical assumption set up for purposes of a particular investigation" (p. 136). The pages devoted to an analysis of the working of social inertia, conservatism, tradition, will stand careful perusal (pp. 138-140). They close with this pertinent and timely remark: "While, then, educative discipline tends to preserve what has been acquired, it presents a very real obstacle to further advance" (p. 140). Fixity, however, is not all, for were culture nothing but a method of preserving the past, progress would be impossible. "Under actual conditions," writes Dr. Teggart, "this fixity of ideas is never complete, and in all human groups there may be ob- served in operation certain processes through which idea-systems are being slowly but continuously modified" (p. 141). In dealing with these changes the author displays what seems exaggerated caution and fearfulness, one perceives how deeply stirred his spirit must be by the unique significance of the history-moulding episodes at the termini of migrations. Scant justice is done, there-

�� �