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Freedom and Culture

 

Dorothy Lee

 

In this well-known collection of essays, Lee offers her readers an expedition into various world cultures, an imaginary field trip that reveals different views of autonomy, concepts of the individual in society, and interpretations of personal freedom. Lee brings Wintu, Hopi, Tikopia, Trobriand, and many other cultures into focus, often contrasting them with our social structure, delineating the differences in language patterns, responsibilities as citizens of a community, and the appreciation of individual expression.

 

The point of view of this work, a unique perspective on these contemporary materials, is achieved through Lee’s ability to fuse the anthropologist’s contact with many cultures and a personal concern with the immediate responsibilities of citizenship, homelife, and motherhood. The result is a blending of science and the humanities—a readable, warm, and concrete account of freedom, being, and existence. Lee’s work provides possible alternatives to the social direction often thoughtlessly followed by modern man. Not prescriptive or “angry,” it implicitly challenges the sophistication and stimulates the creative imagination of the reader.

Valuing the Self

 

$15.95 list, 185 pages

10-digit ISBN: 0-88133-303-4

13-digit ISBN: 978-0-88133-303-9

© 1959

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Table of Contents

 

Introduction

1. Individual Autonomy and Social Structure

2. Personal Significance and Group Structure

3. The Joy of Work as Participation

4. Equality of Opportunity as a Cultural Value

5. What Kind of Freedom?

6. Responsibility among the Dakota

7. Are Basic Needs Ultimate?

8. Symbolization and Value

9. Being and Value in a Primitive Culture

10. Codifications of Reality; Lineal and Nonlineal

11. Linguistic Reflection of Wintu Thought

12. The Conception of the Self among the Wintu Indians

13. View of the Self in Greek Culture

14. Cultural Factors in Dietary Choice

15. The Religious Dimension of Human Experience

Epilogue 1988. Autonomy and Community in the Life of Dorothy Lee (Jeffrey Ehrenreich)