Mary Douglas

<p><strong>This handy, concise book covers the life of Mary Douglas, one of the most important anthropologists of the second half of the 20th century.</strong></p><p>Her work focused on how human groups classify one another, and how they resolve the anomalies that then arise. Classification, she argued, emerges from practices of social life, and is a factor in all deep and intractable human disputes.</p><p>This biography offers an introduction to how her distinctive approach developed across a long and productive career and how it applies to current pressing issues of social conflict and planetary survival.</p><p>From the Preface:</p><p>The influence of Professor Dame Mary Douglas (1921-2007) upon each of the social sciences and many of the disciplines in the humanities is vast. The list of her works is also vast, and this presents a problem of choice for the many readers who want to get a general idea of what she wrote and its significance, but who are somewhat baffled about where to begin. Our book offers a short overview and suggests why her key writings remain significant today.</p>