Payback

The Logic of Retribution in Melanesian Religions

By: G. W. Trompf

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Hardcover | 12 September 1994

At a Glance

Hardcover
568 Pages

Dimensions(cm)
16.4 x 24.2 x 3.8

Hardcover

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Near to the heart of the human predicament are impulses to avenge - what most of us will recognize to be negative, counterproductive reactions against others who pose a threat. By contrast, nothing re-establishes our faith in humanity more than extraordinary acts of concession, such as peace-making, generosity and sacrifice. In this ambitious study, the first monograph on religion and 'the logic of retribution' ever written, Garry Trompf shows how various aspects of 'payback', both negative and positive, provide the best indices to an understanding of Melanesian views of life. The book explores the reasons why people 'pay back' and opens up a whole new dimension in the cross-cultural study of human consciousness. The author conducts his readers through the most complex anthropological pageant on earth, illustrating his arguments from western New Guinea to Fiji.

Industry Reviews

"In this fascinating book, Trompf brings to fruition fifteen years of unstinting research on religion in the southwest Pacific region...Trompf's breadth of erudition and vision...is bound to stir fresh and stimulating debate, not only because it interprets the world of Melanesian retributive logics but also because it takes on the task of changing them." History of Religions "Trompf pointedly rebukes materialist theories of human behavior and also notions of primitive irrationality...The volume combines an extraordinary, even numbing, assortment of ethnographic detail with a simple, unitary, explanatory premise." Lamont Lindstrom, The Contemporary Pacific

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You Can Find This Book In

Non-Fiction Religion & Beliefs Aspects of Religion for Non-Christians Theology History Regional & National History Australasian & Pacific History Society & Culture Social Groups Social & Cultural Aspects of Religious Groups Alternative Belief Systems Religion

Comparative Religion Biographies & True Stories Biographies Historical, Political and Military Biographies

Preface
Abbreviations
Preliminaries: the theory of retributive logic
Tradition
Revenge
Reciprocity
Integrating and explaining significant events
'Cargo Cultism'
Reprisal
Redemption
Wishing and explaining the extraordinary
Modernization
Recrimination in modern guises
Making money and modernizing reciprocities
Money, morals, meaning: old logics, new retributions
Conclusions and Recommendations
Bibliography
Index of Melanesian cultures
General index
Table of Contents provided by Publisher. All Rights Reserved.

Payback

The Logic of Retribution in Melanesian Religions

At a Glance

Hardcover

Industry Reviews

Shipping

How to return your order

Defective items

You Can Find This Book In

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