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The Anthropology of Pre-Capitalist Societies pp 109–147Cite as

Engendered Structures: Some Problems in the Analysis of Reproduction

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Part of the book series: Critical Social Studies

Abstract

The feminist contribution to anthropology over the last fifteen years has been to put women back into the picture, and it has provided an important antidote to the prevailing androcentrism that envisaged society as almost exclusively concerned with relations between men, male groups and institutions. However an almost inevitable result of this development has been to treat women as a universal category, and thence to look beneath the surface variety in their situation in all the myriad historical and contemporary societies known to us, for an underlying reason for the universal features of women’s existence.

This article is a substantially rewritten version of a previous one, ‘Conceptualising Women’ (Critique of Anthropology, no. 9/10, 1977), which we wrote with Felicity Edholm. Due to various circumstances she was not able to share in writing this version but was a full participant in previous discussion. We would like to acknowledge and thank her for her many ideas and suggestions. Thanks also to Carmen Diana Deere, Geoff Lamb, Rayna Reiter, Anne Whitehead, and the Subordination of Women workshop for critical comments.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Anthropology, Goldsmiths’ College, University of London, UK

    Olivia Harris

  2. Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK

    Kate Young

Authors
  1. Olivia Harris
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  2. Kate Young
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Anthropology, University College, London, UK

    Joel S. Kahn

  2. Department of Sociology, Goldsmiths’ College, UK

    Josep R. Llobera

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© 1981 Olivia Harris and Kate Young

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Harris, O., Young, K. (1981). Engendered Structures: Some Problems in the Analysis of Reproduction. In: Kahn, J.S., Llobera, J.R. (eds) The Anthropology of Pre-Capitalist Societies. Critical Social Studies. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-16632-9_5

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