Women of the Forest

by Robert Francis Murphy, Yolanda Murphy, Robert Murphy

Book Overview

When it originally appeared, this groundbreaking ethnography was one of the first works to focus on gender in anthropology. The thirtieth anniversary edition of Women of the Forest reconfirms the book's importance for contemporary studies on gender and life in the Amazon. The book covers Yolanda and Robert Murphy's year of fieldwork among the Munduruc people of Brazil in 1952. The Murphy's ethnographic analysis takes into account the historical,...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0231132336
• ISBN13: 9780231132336
• Release Date: December 2004
• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Length: 262 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.7" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

Women of the Forest

I found this book to be a rather insiteful and refreshing look at a culture from a woman's standpoint. Another reviewer of this book complained that the details of the women's daily life was dull and that the lack of the man's viewpoint left little to learn of the culture. I completely disagree. Traditionally, anthropology focuses on the lives of men when studying any culture leaving women to automatically seem umimportant and mundane. In studying the Mundurucu, the Murphey's realized that the women of the village were the real backbone. Yes, men provided the most coveted village luxury of meat, but little else. The women provided the staple of village nutrition, almost singlehandedly raised children, and furthermore, the Murphey's detected that the women of the village understood the importance of their role while allowing the men to believe themsevles in control. This idea gives the reader a much deeper understanding of the culture rather than just from the point of view of the male sex. The above mentioned reviewer also complained that Yolanda Murphey seems to have written the majority of the book: while this opinion cannot be proved of disproved here, I would refer this reviwer to the section of the book where the Murphey's discuss the overall advantage any female anthropologist has in the field. They found that Yolanda was readily accepted by the women of the village simply because she wasn't a man, furthermore, Yolanda was more accepted by the men in the village than her husband because she was seen as an outsider rather than as a woman whereas her husband was a man to them who did not have the hunting skills needed to be accepted by them. No wonder then, that Yolanda would be able to provide a more insightful outlook on the Mundurucu cluture! Overall, the book was anything but mundane and gave a refreshing view of anthropolocigal research. The tactic of viewing the culture from a woman's point of view gave a new meaning to the ideas that fuel the culture.