Here is an origin story about origin stories. Once upon a time, we knew where we came from: Adam and Eve, the Garden of Eden, the Fall. Then came modern science, modern doubt. Geology, paleontology: The world grew older very fast. Skulls were discovered, and stone tools. Human origins became a problem and a fascination. Who are we? How did we emerge? And given who we think we may be, how should we live?
In The Invention of Prehistory: Empire, Violence, and Our Obsession With Human Origins, the intellectual historian Stefanos Geroulanos, who teaches at NYU, offers a compendium of the ideas— speculative, scientific, and somewhere in between—that have arisen in response to these and other questions. Beginning with Rousseau and his idyllic state of nature, we learn the genealogy of a familiar set of tropes: the “noble savage,” the “lizard brain,” the “killer ape,” the goddess-worshipping matriarchy. Other concepts may be less familiar: the “primitive communism” of Engels and others, which allegedly existed prior to the rise of patriarchy, private property, and class struggle; Freud’s “primal horde,” commanded by a father whose murder (and ingestion) by his sons, the original band of brothers, inaugurated civilization and its discontents.
この記事は The Atlantic の May 2024 版に掲載されています。
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この記事は The Atlantic の May 2024 版に掲載されています。
7 日間の Magzter GOLD 無料トライアルを開始して、何千もの厳選されたプレミアム ストーリー、8,500 以上の雑誌や新聞にアクセスしてください。
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