Yet when you come to examine it the original affluent society was none other than the hunter's - in which all the people's material wants were easily satisfied. Ambitiously tackling the nature of economic life and how to study it comparatively, Stone Age Economics includes six studies that reflect the author's ideas on revising traditional views of hunter-gatherer and so-called primitive societies, revealing them to be the original affluent society. Some ethnographers testify to the contrary that the food quest is so successful that half the time the people seem not to know what to do with themselves. The "original affluent society" is a theory which states hunter-gatherers were the original affluent society. Such "material plenty" depends partly upon the ease of production, and that upon the simplicity of technology and democracy of property. The Original Affluent Society If economics is the dismal science, the study of hunting and gathering economies must be its most advanced branch. Walter C. Neale, Science "This book is subversive to so many of the fundamental assumptions of Western technological society that it is a wonder it was permitted to be published. “Stone Age Economics is the most important book in the field of economic anthropology produced by an American cultural anthropologist since M. J. Herskovits published The Economic Life of Primitive Peoples in 1940.” —Scott Cook, Comparative Studies in Society and History “Sahlins’ forays into economic anthropology are full of interest.” Book Description. Hunter-gatherers consume less energy per capita per year than any other group of human beings. The Original Affluent Society By Marshall Sahlins, David Graeber By the common understanding, an affluent society is one in which all the people's material wants are easily satisfied. Selected pages. s . Stone Age Economics is a classic study of anthropological economics, first published in 1974. By the common understanding, an affluent society is one in which all the people's material wants are easily satisfied. ", Registered in England & Wales No. Ambitiously tackling the nature of economic life and how to study it comparatively, the book includes six studies which reflect the author's ideas on revising traditional views of the hunter-gatherer and so-called primitive societies, revealing them to be the original affluent society. Since its first publication over forty years ago Marshall Sahlins's Stone Age Economics has established itself as a classic of modern anthropology and arguably one of the founding works of anthropological economics. As Marshall Sahlins stated in the first edition, "It has been inspired by the possibility of 'anthropological economics,' a perspective indebted rather to the nature of the primitive economies than to the categories of a bourgeois science." Stone Age Economics is a classic study of anthropological economics, first published in 1974. the hunter pulls the lowest grades in thermodynamics-less energy / In this best section of the book, Sahlins reframes the entire notion of affluence, turning from our ... Read full review. Marshall Sahlins. Stone Age Economics is a classic study of anthropological economics, first published in 1974. If economics is the dismal science, the study of hunting and gathering Almost universally committed to the proposition that life was hard in the paleolithic, our textbooks compete to convey a sense of impending doom, leaving one to wonder not only how hunters managed to live, but whether, after all, this was living? This theory was first stated by Marshall Sahlins at a symposium entitled "Man the Hunter" in 1966. capita/year than any other mode of production. 1 The Original Affluent Society 2 The Domestic Mode of Production: The Structure of Underproduction 41 3 The Domestic Mode of Production: Intensification of Production 101 4 The Spirit of the Gift 149 ... Stone Age Economics , " . these pages. economies must be its most advanced branch. In the nonsubsistence sphere, the people's wants are generally easily satisfied. all, this was living? Ambitiously tackling the nature of economic life and how to study it comparatively, the book includes six studies which reflect the author's ideas on revising traditional views of the hunter-gatherer and so-called primitive societies, revealing them to be the original affluent society. The exception evokes a source of ethnographic misconceptions: the anthropology of hunters is largely an anachronistic study of ex-savages—an inquest into the corpse of one society, Sir George Grey once said, presided over by members of another. Since its first publication over forty years ago Marshall Sahlins's Stone Age Economics has established itself as a classic of modern anthropology and arguably one of the founding works of anthropological economics. His technical incompetence is said to enjoin continuous Ambitiously tackling the nature of economic life and how to study it comparatively, the book includes six studies which reflect the author's ideas on revising traditional views of the hunter-gatherer and so-called primitive societies, revealing them to be the original affluent society. The specter of starvation stalks the stalker through economic development he is condemned to play the role of bad example: the so-called "subsistence economy.