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In this volume Ladislav Holy considers the extent to which overridingly Western assumptions have guided anthropological studies of kinship. This is the first introductory text on the subject to consider changes in the conceptualisation of kinship brought about by new reproductive technologies and the growing interest in culturally specific notions of personhood and gender. Holy reveals a growing sensitivity on the part of anthropologists to individual ideas of personhood and gender, and encourages further critical reflection on cultural bias in approaches to the subject. Linking kinship with wider debates in anthropology and the social sciences in a lucid, jargon free study, Anthropological Perspectives on Kinship is an invaluable introduction to current practice for specialists and non-specialists alike

Among the Berti of Northern Darfur (Sudan), as among many Muslim societies, the formal religious practices are predominantly the concern of men, while local, unorthodox customary rituals are performed mainly by women. It is usual to dismiss such local, popular practices as pre-Islamic survivals, but Professor Holy shows that the customary rituals constitute an integral part of the religious system of the Berti. Carefully analysing the symbolic statements made in Berti rituals, Professor Holy demonstrates that the distinction between the two classes of rituals is an expression of the gender relationships characteristic of the society. He also examines the social distribution of knowledge about Islam, and explains the role of the religious schools in sustaining religious ideas. The work is not only an ethnographic study of ritual, belief and gender in an African society. It also makes a significant contribution to current anthropological discussion of the interpretation and meaning of rituals and symbols

The theme of this book is the analysis of the changes that have occurred in the kinship patterns of the Toka of South Zambia as a result of a shift in their form of production from hoe agriculture to ox-drawn ploughing. Dr Holy uses the rich, detailed ethnography that he provides about these changes to confront several theoretical issues of current anthropological interest, as well as to examine the basic methodological problems of anthropological enquiry. Emphasizing the distinction between the conceptual and cognitive world of the actors, and the transactions and events in which they engage, he argues that anthropological explanation has to account not only for structure, but also for the purposeful interaction between actors that generates that structure