Gell studies the Muria, one of the largest of the Gond tribes of central India, analyzing the spatial framework of their society, and the politics of marriage exchange. She offers a detailed account--through personal case histories--of the Ghotul, a village dormitory for adolescents of both sexes, and the complex dilemmas faced by youth on the threshold of adulthood. The text is a revised version of Gell's doctoral thesis. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Unstructuring Chinese Society is a culmination of long term field work and archival research that challenges existing theories of social organisation and cultural change. The book makes new sense of historical contradictions, political conflicts and deep seated social transformations that have underlined the experience of colonial rule and the practices of local institutions in Hong Kong over the past century. By focusing on the ongoing interactions of discourse, practices and global-local relations in cultural terms, Unstructuring Chinese Society puts forth a fresh perspective in the field of historical anthropology, while addressing ongoing critical concerns in postcolonial theory and our understanding of tradition and modernity.

Heady draws on both participant observation and interviews with older informants to trace the effects of recent exogenous technological and institutional changes, and the way local people have responded to them. His findings relate to such themes of recent history as nationalism, regionalism and anti-clericalism; and contribute to the theoretical debate on the relevance of structuralist anthropology to European societies.

Contributed articles in honor of S.N. Ratha, former professor at Sambalpur University, Orissa.

An intriguing exploration of the role and significance of the body in the world of a Pacific Islands People, the Lelet of New Ireland (Papua New Guinea). In vivid ethnographic detail, the monograph captures the fluidity and complexity of Lelet conceptions of corporeality and their significance to identity as they encounter the influences of modernity, in the form of colonialism, Christianity and cash-cropping. The author examines the importance of the body to constructions of identity and difference, and its role in the constitution of place and space. The book provides a richly detailed ethnographic study of magical belief and the body whilst paying particular attention to the polyvalent meanings of bodily images and metaphors as they are used in numerous contexts of magic.