THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE INVERTED: RHETORICAL STRATEGIES IN THE PORTRAYAL OF CULTURES IN RUTH BENEDICT'S PATTERNS OF CULTURE AND MARGARET MEAD'S SEX AND TEMPERAMENT IN THREE PRIMITIVE SOCIETIES

Authors

Phillip GuddemiFollow

Abstract

Patterns of Culture and Sex and Temperament in Three Primitive Societies, published a year apart, have a startlingly parallel structure. Discussions of anthropological method open both; the question of the individual and deviance closes both. The triad of cultures in each book is arranged in the order of "the good, the bad, and the inverted." The first culture emphasizes cooperation and nurturance, the second competition and discord. The third culture in each inverts some feature of Western society, either in the economic realm (Kwakiutl) or in that of gendered personality (Tchambuli). Cultural inversion places Ruth Benedict and Margaret Mead in a rhetorical tradition of social critique. Nevertheless, the cultural relativism shown by these contrasts is not philosophically "strong" relativism and does not rely on a "blank slate" view of human nature. Specifically, the concept of temperament includes, not excludes, biology; culture selects the expression of temperament. While not all in the books may be universally accepted today, their approach repays a second look.

Recommended Citation

Guddemi, Phillip (2005) "THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE INVERTED: RHETORICAL STRATEGIES IN THE PORTRAYAL OF CULTURES IN RUTH BENEDICT'S PATTERNS OF CULTURE AND MARGARET MEAD'S SEX AND TEMPERAMENT IN THREE PRIMITIVE SOCIETIES," Pacific Studies Journal: Vol. 28: No. 2, Article 7.
Available at: https://digitalcollections.byuh.edu/pacific-studies-journal/vol28/iss2/7