Chagnon's ethnography, Yanomamö: The Fierce People was published in 1968 and later published in more than five editions and is commonly used as a text in university-level introductory anthropology classes, making it the all-time bestselling anthropological text.
As Chagnon described it, Yanomamö society produced fierceness, because that behavior furthered male reproductive success. According to Chagnon, the success of men in violent interaction and even killing, was directly related to how many wives and children they had. At the level of the villages, the war-like populations expanded at the expense of their neighbors. Chagnon's positing of a link between reproductive success and violence cast doubt on the sociocultural perspective that cultures are constructed from human experience. An enduring controversy over Chagnon's work has been described as a microcosm of the conflict between biological and sociocultural anthropology. [excerpted from the Wikipedia article on Napoleon Chagnon]
Author(s): Napoleon A. Chagnon
Series: Case studies in cultural anthropology
Edition: 3rd edition
Publisher: Holt, Rinehart and Winston
Year: 1983
Language: English
Pages: xvi + 224; illustrations, maps
Foreword v
Preface to the Third Edition ix
Prologue 1
The Killing of Ruwdhiwd, 1
1. Doing Fieldwork among the Yanomamo 4
Vignette, 4
Collecting the Data in the Field, 7
The First Day: The Longest One, 9; How Did They Accept You?, 10;
Life in the Jungle: Oatmeal, Peanut Butter, and Bugs, 12; Collecting
Yqnomamo Genealogies and Reproductive Histories, 18: Enter Rerebawa:
Inmarried Tough Guy, 21; Kqobaiva: The Bisaasi-teri Headman
Volunteers To Help Me, 24
Beyond the Bisaasi-teri and into the Remote Villages, 30
The Scientific Problem That Emerged, 30
2. Cultural Ecology 42
The Physical Environment, 42
Trails and Travel, 43; Technology, 45; Hallucinogenic Drugs, 49;
Shelter, 52
Hunting, Gathering, and Gardening, 56
Wild Foods, 56; Vegetable Foods, 57; Gardening, 59; Other Garden
Products, 63; Slash-and-Burn Farming, 67
The Cultural Ecology of Settlement Pattern, 68
Micro Movements of Villages and Gardens, 68; Macro Movements of
Villages and Gardens, 70; Population and Village Dispersal over Time, 77
The Great Protein Debate: Yanomamo Data and Anthropological
Theory, 81
3. Myth and Cosmos 90
The Spiritual Environment, 90
The Cosmos, 90; Myths: The Beginning of Time and the No Badabo,
92;Jaguar Myths, 95; The Twins Omawd and Yoaiva, 101; The Soul,
103; Endocannibalism, 105; Shamans and Hekura, 706
4. Social Organization and Demography 110
Introduction, 110
Daily Social Life, 111
Male-Female Division, 111; Child-Adult Division, 114; Daily Activities,
116; Status Differences and Activities, 120
Social Structure, 124
An "Ideal" Model of Yanomamo Society, 127
The Demographic Basis of Social Behavior, 131
Polygyny, Genealogical Structures, and Close Kinship, 134; Kinship
Rules, Reproduction, and Rule Breaking, 142
5. Political Alliances, Trading, and Feasting 146
General Features of Alliances, 146
Trading and Feasting in Alliance Formation, 149
Historical Background to a Particular Feast, 152
The Feast, 156
The Chest-Pounding Duel, 1 64
6. Yanomamo Warfare 170
Levels of Violence, 110
The Raid and Nomohoni, 1 75
A Specific War, 177
7. The Beginning of Western Acculturation 190
Introduction, 190
Yanomamo Glimpses of Us, 1 92
The Beginning of Tourism and Change, 198
My Adventure with Ebene: A "Religious Experience", 206
Balancing the Image of Fierceness, 213
Glossary 215
References Cited 217
Ethnographic Films on the Yanomamo 221
Index 223
