Research Catalog

Title

Lineages of modernity : a history of humanity from the Stone Age to Homo Americanus / Emmanuel Todd ; translated by Andrew Brown.

Author

Todd, Emmanuel, 1951-

Publication

Cambridge : Medford, MA : Polity Press, [2019]

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Additional Authors

Brown, Andrew (Literary translator)

Description

xx, 427 pages : illustrations, maps; 24 cm

Summary

In most developed countries there is a palpable sense of confusion about the contemporary state of the world. Much that was taken for granted a decade or two ago is being questioned, and there is a widespread urge to try and understand how we reached our present situation, and where we are heading. In this major new book, the leading sociologist, historical anthropologist and demographer Emmanuel Todd sheds fresh light on our current predicament by reconstructing the historical dynamics of human societies from the Stone Age to the present. Eschewing the tendency to attribute special causal significance to the economy, Todd develops an anthropological account of history, focusing on the long-term dynamics of family systems and their links to religion and ideology - what he sees as the slow-moving, unconscious level of society, in contrast to the conscious level of the economy and politics. He also analyses the dramatic changes brought about by the spread of education. This enables him to explain the different historical trajectories of the advanced nations and the growing divergence between them, a divergence that can be observed in such phenomena as the rise of the Anglosphere in the modern period, the paradox of a Homo americanus who is both innovative and archaic, the startling electoral success of Donald Trump, the lack of realism in the will to power shown by Germany and China, the emergence of stable authoritarian democracy in Russia, the new introversion of Japan and the recent turbulent developments in Europe, including Brexit. This magisterial account of human history brings into sharp focus the massive transformations taking place in the world today and shows that these transformations have less to do with the supposedly homogenizing effects of globalization and the various reactions to it than with an ethnic diversity that is deeply rooted in the long history of human evolution.

Uniform Title

Où en sommes-nous? English

Alternative Title

Où en sommes-nous?

Subjects

• Social structure
• Democracy > Social aspects
• History
• Families
• Civilization > History
• Ethnohistory

Genre/Form

History.

Note

• Originally published in French as "Où en sommes-nous? Une esquisse de l'histoire humaine" by Éditions du Seuil, 2017.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references and index.

Language (note)

• Translated from the French.

Contents

Introduction: the differentiation of family structures and the inverse model of history -- 1. The Differentiation of Family Systems: Eurasia -- 2. The Differentiation of Family Systems: Indian America and Africa -- 3. Homo Sapiens -- 4. Judaism and Early Christianity: Family and Literacy -- 5. Germany, Protestantism and Universal Literacy -- 6. The Great European Mental Transformation -- 7. Educational Take-off and Economic Development -- 8. Secularization and the Crisis of Transition -- 9. The English Matrix of Globalization -- 10. Homo Americanus -- 11. Democracy Is Always Primitive -- 12. Democracy Undermined by Higher Education -- 13. A Crisis in Black and White -- 14. Donald Trump as Will and Representation -- 15 The Memory of Places -- 16. Stem-Family Societies: Germany and Japan -- 17. The Metamorphosis of Europe -- 18. Communitarian Societies: Russia and China -- Envoi -- Postscript: The Future of Liberal Democracy.

Call Number

JFE 19-5817

ISBN

• 9781509534470
• 1509534474

LCCN

• 2018037566
• 40029256355

OCLC

1055567878

Author

Todd, Emmanuel, 1951- author.

Title

Lineages of modernity : a history of humanity from the Stone Age to Homo Americanus / Emmanuel Todd ; translated by Andrew Brown.

Publisher

Cambridge : Medford, MA : Polity Press, [2019]

Type of Content

text

Type of Medium

unmediated

Type of Carrier

volume

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Language

Translated from the French.

Added Author

Brown, Andrew (Literary translator), translator.

Other Form:

Online version: Todd, Emmanuel, 1951- author. Lineages of modernity Cambridge : Medford, MA : Polity Press, [2019] 9781509534494 (DLC) 2018046524

Other Standard Identifier

40029256355

Research Call Number

JFE 19-5817