[D66] Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States

[R.O.]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_the_Grain:_A_Deep_History_of_the_Earliest_States


  /Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States/

 From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Against_the_Grain.jpg>
First edition (publ. Yale University Press 
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yale_University_Press>)

/*Against The Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States*/ is a 2017 
book by James C. Scott <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_C._Scott> 
that sets out to undermine what he calls the "standard civilizational 
narrative" that suggests humans chose to live settled lives based on 
intensive agriculture because this made people safer and more 
prosperous.^[1] 
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_the_Grain:_A_Deep_History_of_the_Earliest_States#cite_note-1> 
Instead, he argues, people had to be forced to live in the early states 
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_state>, which were 
hierarchical, beset by malnutrition and disease, and often based on 
slavery <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavery>. The book has been 
praised for re-opening some of the biggest questions in human 
history.^[2] 
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_the_Grain:_A_Deep_History_of_the_Earliest_States#cite_note-2> 
A review in /Science/ <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_(journal)> 
concludes that the book's thesis "is fascinating and represents an 
alternative, nuanced, if somewhat speculative, scenario on how civilized 
society came into being."^[3] 
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Against_the_Grain:_A_Deep_History_of_the_Earliest_States#cite_note-3>


Shablovsky, S. (2017). /The perils of permanence. Science, 357(6350), 
459–459./ doi:10.1126/science.aao0427
url to share this paper:
sci-hub.se/10.1126/science.aao0427 
<https://sci-hub.se/10.1126/science.aao0427>


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