Darwin-L Message Log 8:65 (April 1994)

Academic Discussion on the History and Theory of the Historical Sciences

This is one message from the Archives of Darwin-L (1993–1997), a professional discussion group on the history and theory of the historical sciences.

Note: Additional publications on evolution and the historical sciences by the Darwin-L list owner are available on SSRN.

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<8:65>From fwg1@cornell.edu  Mon Apr 18 12:26:26 1994

Date: Mon, 18 Apr 1994 13:26:18 -0400
To: darwin-l@ukanaix.cc.ukans.edu
From: fwg1@cornell.edu (Frederic W. Gleach)
Subject: Re: _The Doctrine of Survivals_

Bob O'Hara asked about _The doctrine of survivals_.  The full citation is:

Hodgen, Margaret Trabue.  _The doctrine of survivals, a chapter in the
history of scientific method in the study of man_.  London: Allenson, 1936.

I have not read this work, but I regularly use her later work, _Early
anthropology in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries_, in several of my
classes, in which she has the following paragraph referenced to _The
doctrine . . . _:

"It was to refute Archbishop Whately and other degenerationists that Sir
Edward Burnett Tylor wrote his _Primitive culture_ (1871), reconsidered the
problem of similarities, and revived, in his doctrine of survivals, the
earlier concept of "remnants," "remainders," "seeds," "sparks," and
"footprints."  For these and other services he has been called the Father
of Anthropology." [Hodgen 1964:381-82]

Despite the title of this later book, she discusses in it issues in
anthropology (broadly defined) well into the nineteenth century, although
emphasizing the sixteenth and seventeenth, and many darwinists would
probably find it interesting.  Some of my colleagues who did their graduate
work in the 60s remember her earlier works being taught, but I've been able
to collect no details to date.  This may give a start, at least.
        Fred

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                        Frederic W. Gleach   (fwg1@cornell.edu)
                        Anthropology Department, Cornell University
                                        (607) 255-6779

I long ago decided that anything that could be finished in my lifetime was
necessarily too small an affair to engross my full interest.  --Ernest
Dewitt Burton
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