Tribal thought and culture : essays in honour of Surajit Chandra Sinha

This illuminating Festschrift is a collection of thirteen essays on tribes, written by a group of highly committed specialists in Anthropology, Sociology, Economics, Philosophy and Psychology. The four sections of the book are: implicit philosophy and worldview; tribal aesthetics and science; biological, psychological interpretations; and the changing, the unchanging tribes. There is also a critical and appreciative evaluation of Surajit Sinha's views on tribes and Indian civilization. Reflecting upon these essays the Editor explores new grounds of thought: tribe a 'perfect form' of culture; tribal epistemology considering neither man nor god unique; tribal practice taking primacy over thought; no gap between tribal knowledge and existence; tribal cultures changing within limits of unalterable form; cosmmological conflict in the changing tribes; and many other fascinating ideas and concepts that make the unconventional conclusion: tribe. not the other'.

First of its kind, this book on philosophical anthropology of tribes makes the reader think of the strength and pervasiveness of a great category of people which has for long time been misinterpreted and misrepresented as prelogical and precultural. Tribal Thought and Culture is a book for wide-ranging specialists and students. interested in cosmology and changing worldview, myths and traditions, music, medicine, survival-crisis, value-pattern, and dynamics of social, religious and economic transformation of the timeless people.