Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-m6dg7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-09T22:54:28.290Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Darwin and Social Theory

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2022

Kenneth E. Bock
Kenneth E. Bock*
Affiliation:
University of California Berkeley
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

It has been argued repeatedly that the modern study of social and cultural evolution took its inspiration and form from Charles Darwin's Origin of Species and Descent of Man. In 1920, Robert H. Lowie (27; pp. 55–56) observed that it was after evolutionary principles had been accepted in biology that they were applied to social phenomena, and that Lewis Henry Morgan was among the first to make the application. Sir James George Frazer (16; p. 581), at about the same time, dated the birth of anthropology from the promulgation of the evolution theory of Darwin and Wallace in 1859 and maintained that “this conception of evolution … supplies a basis for the modern science of anthropology.” Harry Elmer Barnes (1; pp. 25–26) similarly traced the development of anthropology from the theory of organic evolution and advised the student that he “need not concern himself with the history of method in sociology before the entry of Darwinian concepts.”

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 22 , Issue 2 , April 1955 , pp. 123 - 134
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1955

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. Barnes, Harry Elmer. “The Development of Historical Sociology,” Publications of the American Sociological Society, 16 (1921).Google Scholar
2. Becker, Howard. “Historical Sociology,” Contemporary Social Theory. New York, 1940.Google Scholar
3. Bendyshe, T. “The History of Anthropology,” Memoirs read before the Anthropological Society of London, 1863–64. London, 1867.Google Scholar
4. Bidney, David. “The Problem of Social and Cultural Evolution: A Reply to A. R. Radcliffe-Brown,” American Anthropologist, 49 (1947).10.1525/aa.1947.49.3.02a00230CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
5. Boas, Franz. The Mind of Primitive Man. New York, 1911.Google Scholar
6. Bryson, Gladys. Man and Society. Princeton, 1945.Google Scholar
7. Chinard, Gilbert. L'Exotisme American dans la Littérature Francaise au XVIe Siècle. Paris, 1911.Google Scholar
8. Comte, Auguste. Cours de Philosophie Positive, 4e ed. Paris, 1877.Google Scholar
9. Comte, Auguste. System of Positive Polity. London, 1875-77.Google Scholar
10. Condorcet, . Esquisse d'un Tableau Historique des Progrès de l'Esprit Humain in Oeuvres Complètes. Paris, 1804.Google Scholar
11. Darwin, Charles. The Origin of Species, 6th ed.Google Scholar
12. Darwin, Francis, ed. The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin. New York, 1896.Google Scholar
13. DePauw, Cornelius. Recherches Philosophiques sur les Américains. Berlin, 1770.Google Scholar
14. Ferguson, Adam. An Essay on the History of Civil Society, 8th ed. Philadelphia, 1819.Google Scholar
15. Forster, John Reinhold. Observations made during a Voyage around the World. London, 1778.Google Scholar
16. Frazer, Frazer Sir James, “The Scope and Method of Mental Anthropology,” Science Progress, 16 (1921-22).Google Scholar
17. Goldenweiser, Alexander. Early Civilization. New York, 1922.Google Scholar
18. Goldenweiser, Alexander. “Social Evolution,” Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences.Google Scholar
19. Hale, Sir Matthew. The Primitive Origination of Mankind. London, 1677.Google Scholar
20. Hobbes, Thomas. Leviathan.Google Scholar
21. Home, Henry. Sketches of the History of Man. Edinburgh, 1774.Google Scholar
22. Lafitau, . Moeurs des Sauvages Amériquains, comparées aux Moeurs des Premier Temps. Paris, 1724.Google Scholar
23. Lescarbot, Marc. Nova Francia, a Description of Arcadia [1609], trans. by P. Erondelle. New York, 1928.Google Scholar
24. Locke, John. Of Civil Government.Google Scholar
25. Lovejoy, A. O. and Boas, George. Primitivism and Related Ideas in Antiquity. Baltimore, 1935.Google Scholar
26. Lowie, Robert H. History of Ethnological Theory. New York, 1937.Google Scholar
27. Lowie, Robert H. Primitive Society. New York, 1920.Google Scholar
28. Montagu, M. F. Ashley. “Karl Pearson and the Historical Method in Ethnology,” Isis, 34 (1943).Google Scholar
29. Murray, Hugh. Enquiries Historical and Moral, respecting the Character of Nations and the Progress of Society. Edinburgh, 1808.Google Scholar
30. Penniman, T. K. A Hundred Years of Anthropology. London, 1935.Google Scholar
31. Radcliffe-Brown, A. R. “Evolution, Social or Cultural?” American Anthropologist, 49 (1947).10.1525/aa.1947.49.1.02a00070CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
32. Rice, Stuart A., ed., Methods in Social Science, Chicago, 1931.Google Scholar
33. Robertson, William. The History of America. London, 1777.Google Scholar
34. Spencer, Herbert. Essays: Scientific, Political, Speculative. New York, 1899.Google Scholar
35. Teggart, Frederick J. Theory and Processes of History. Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1941.Google Scholar
36. Turgot, . Oeuvres de Turgot et Documents le Concernants. Paris, 1913.Google Scholar
37. Volney, C. F. Tableau du climat et du Sol des Étals-Unis d'Amérique [1803], in Oeuvres, 2e éd. complète. Paris, 1825.Google Scholar