This classic four-volume series-from a pioneering ethnographer, first published in 1910-remains a foundational work of comparative mythology and religion for scholars and armchair anthropologists alike. Exploring the interconnections between myth and ritual in how and whom we may marry-as group marriage gave way to individual marriage-questions about religion and social structure became intertwined. In any case, this is a fascinating look at the social underpinnings common to all peoples around the globe. Volume II continues Frazer's ethnographic survey of totemism, here covering totemism in the South Pacific, India, and Africa. Scottish anthropologist SIR JAMES GEORGE FRAZER (1854-1941) also wrote the classic The Golden Bough (1890), Man, God, and Immortality (1927), and Creation and Evolution in Primitive Cosmogonies (1935).

This classic four-volume series-from a pioneering ethnographer, first published in 1910-remains a foundational work of comparative mythology and religion for scholars and armchair anthropologists alike. Exploring the interconnections between myth and ritual in how and whom we may marry-as group marriage gave way to individual marriage-questions about religion and social structure became intertwined. In any case, this is a fascinating look at the social underpinnings common to all peoples around the globe. Volume I features a reprint of Frazer's groundbreaking 1887 work Totemism-covering the religious side of totemism; individual totems; sex totems; and more-as well as additional hard-to-find essays by the author. Then begins Frazer's ethnographic survey of totemism, here covering totemism in Australia. Scottish anthropologist SIR JAMES GEORGE FRAZER (1854-1941) also wrote the classic The Golden Bough (1890), Man, God, and Immortality (1927), and Creation and Evolution in Primitive Cosmogonies (1935).

"As a plain record of a curious form of society which must soon be numbered with the past, the book may continue to possess an interest even when, with the progress of its knowledge, its errors shall have been corrected and its theories perhaps superseded by others which make a nearer approach to truth." Despite having been criticised later, the book at hand is an important and interesting document of its time. It provided the first complete ethnographical summary of totemism and exogamy, dwelling on its religious and social aspects. Totemism is described as a religious and social system in which people or clans regard themselves as related to certain objects. Exogamy, which is often found in conjunction with totemism, is represented as a system which only allows marriage outside of a specific group. On the whole, Frazer's work includes the origins as well as an ethnographical survey of totemism and exogamy in Australian Aboriginal tribes. Sir James George Frazer was a Scottish social anthropologist who contributed mainly to the studies of mythology and comparative religion and was the first to detail the relations between myths and rituals. His work Totemism and Exogamy is also frequently cited by Sigmund Freud in his own study Totem and Taboo.

Routledge is proud to be re-issuing this landmark series in association with the International African Institute. The series, originally published between 1950 and 1977, collected ethnographic information on the peoples of Africa, using all available sources: archives, memoirs and reports as well as anthropological research which, in 1945, had only just begun. Concise, critical and (for its time) accurate, the Ethnographic Survey contains sections as follows: Physical Environment Linguistic Data Demography History & Traditions of Origin Nomenclature Grouping Cultural Features: Religion, Witchcraft, Birth, Initiation, Burial Social & Political Organization: Kinship, Marriage, Inheritance, Slavery, Land Tenure, Warfare & Justice Economy & Trade Domestic Architecture Each of the 50 volumes will be available to buy individually, and these are organized into regional sub-groups: East Central Africa, North-Eastern Africa, Southern Africa, West Central Africa, Western Africa, and Central Africa Belgian Congo. The volumes are supplemented with maps, available to view on routledge.com or available as a pdf from the publishers.