Review

In the course of the seventeenth century, ideas concerning the beliefs of Canadian Indians underwent a slow process of modification. Chroniclers at the beginning of the century, influenced by those who, the century before, had flatly declared a number of Indian nations to be “faithless, kingless and lawless,”; continued to describe them pejoratively. However, as they gradually came to see that the Indians were not irreligious, their declarations grew increasingly contradictory. An attentive reading of documents left by missionaries and explorers reveals that towards the middle of the seventeenth century — at a time when, in Europe, conceptions of witchcraft and religion were changing — the observation of American facts became more nuanced. The discovery of a “false religion”; launched the debate as to whether or not the Indians had preserved a secret sentiment of God.

Were the Indians monotheistic or polytheistic? At the beginning of the twentienth century, Paul Radinwasto take up the question and propose a tertium quid — namely that the Indians had practised monolatry or henotheism.     

Review

Grundriss der Germanischen Philologie, hrsg. von H. Paul. Vol. II, Part II, Section 6: Uebersicht über die aus mündlicher Ueberiieferung geschöpften Sammlungen der Volkspocsie (a) Skandinavische Volkspoesic, von A. Lundell. By A. Nutt.     

Review

Sri Lankan Fishermen: Rural Capitalism and Peasant Society. By Paul Alexander Second revised and enlarged edition. New Delhi: Sterling Publishers, 1995. Pp. xiv+306, biblio, index.     

Review

Margaret Mead and Samoa. The Making and Unmaking of an Anthropological Myth. By Derek Freeman. Australian National University Press, 1983. Pp. xvii + 379.     

Review

Critically Modern: alternatives, alterities, anthropologies Edited by Bruce Knauft Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2002. Pp. 344 Price: US4 54.95 (Cloth); US$21.95 (Paper)     

Review

Key Issues in Hunter-Gatherer Research Edited by E.S. Burch Jr. and L.J. Ellanna. Oxford; Berg, 1994. Pp. x + 534     

Review

Visayan Vignettes: Ethnographic Traces of a Philippine Island By Jean Paul Dumont The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 1992, pp. 226+xxii, maps and illustrations     

Review

Book reviewed in this article: Al-Kuwait: Dirasa fi aliyat al-dawla al-qutriyah wal-sultah wal-mujtama', Shafiq Ghabra Min tada'iyat ihtilal al-Kuwait, Shafiq Ghabra     

Review

Customs of respect: the traditional basis of Fijian communal politics. By John Nation. Monograph 14, Development Studies Centre, Australian National University, 1978. Pp. xx + 168.     

Review

Minangkabau Social Formations.: By Joel S. Kahn. Cambridge University Press 1980. Price £UK15.00.     

Review

Footprints on Malekula. By Margaret Gardiner. Salamander Press, Edinburgh, 1984. Pp. xviii + 75.     

Review

Book reviewed in this article: Muhammad and the Origins of Islam, F.E. Peters Islamic Thought: 23 Years: A Study of the Prophetic Career of Mohammad ^cAli Dashti, F.R.C. Bagley, translator