Light At The Edge Of The World (2002) - Plot & Excerpts
Wade Davis uses words well. I still haven't forgotten the "cloak of conformity" that he describes falling over the indigenous people he writes about. He takes us to Tibet, Australia, the Inuit lands, the Amazon, Africa, and Indonesia. He has friends in these places, people that trust him and his good intentions. He calls the the world an ethnosphere--a sphere of people groups, amazing in in its diversity. I learned a lot from this book--about the despair and demoralization of so many robbed of their cultures. And about the hope and work and faith of those fighting to preserve those same cultures. There is so much to learn from the ancient wisdom, so much for us to learn. Davis doesn't advocate for people to be left in the Stone Age. He knows that's impossible. But he fights for the right of these people to be in control of their own transition--not into our world--but into a world where they can incorporate parts of the surrounding cultures into their own and reject what they don't want. He's found examples of people doing just that. It's isn't a choice of 100% old ways or 100% new ways, but just acknowledging that cultures are always evolving and changing and it's the members of those cultures that should control how, not outside governments, corportations, or missionaries. The arrogance and ignorance of the Europeans who made initial contact with these people is astounding, but not surprising. So often they were perceived as savages to be enslaved, civilized, eduacated. Non-humans to be obliterated. The ancient wisdom was not ignored--that would require an initial awareness of the wisdom and a consious decision to ignore it. The "civilized" white people weren't capable of even that. The book does end with hope. Much has been lost, but much has been preserved, resurrected, strengthened.I'm glad I read this book.
Davis is a compelling writer, and reading this book did make me want to go to more cool places and do more cool things, but i never feel like i ended up going where he was trying to take me. It seemed like he was at his most effective when speaking in broad generalities (It's bad when the government destroys the ecological milieu of a given culture! People with good intentions can do bad things!), but it seemed like when he dealt with very specific cases (Person X had effect Y on culture Z) he presented accounts of the interactions that weren't particularly fair, or that posited a strict outside-inside binary that didn't allow for differing opinions about the contact by those inside the culture under consideration (or that suggested, despite his claim of the importance of self-determinism in cultural adaptation, that those who chose to embrace the contact and leave behind a more traditional lifestyle had made a less valid decision), or that didn't allow for the outside/globalized culture contacting the indigenous culture to consist of differing, mutually antagonistic groups. Finally, i understand the natural limitations that present to a male anthropologist, but i would very much have liked to have heard more female voices--it seemed likely that all (or, at the very least, most) of the cultures discussed were very much male-dominated. It seems that hearing some female voices commenting on the loss of a male-dominated culture would present a different reading experience from hearing a bunch of male voices bemoaning the loss of a male-dominated culture. And hey, look, i just wrote a review that makes me look like an ethnocentric indigenous culture-hater. Sigh.
What do You think about Light At The Edge Of The World (2002)?
what I learned from this book...that the world is full of many different cultures and ethnicity, that our "white-man, christian, know-it-all" attitudes will be our destruction...that unless we learn to respect others fully, their language, customs, their right to live as they choose and to practice their own versions of religion, the loss will be ours...I found this book to be extremely moving, well-thought out and balanced. The author is an ethnobotanist and anthropologist as well as a photographer and story-teller...as the world becomes "smaller" and we are brought together through the marvels of technology, how important it becomes to respect the past as we hurtle to the future, or what becomes of us as we become "outdated"...if we do not honor that which comes before us, then our destiny will be the same...
—Susan
OK, this one was not exactly the light summer read I was going to start with, but it has been on my list for a long time. It is a journey worth taking. Davis presents a variety of cultures across the globe and he challenges the reader to think about the many ways of being human. It's an accessible read, flowing well between anecdotes on each culture, and full of interesting facts (e.g. coca leaves had more calcium than any other plant and are a treatment for altitude sickness). A reminder to listen to everyone's story and measure progress/success with more than just a technological ruler. Definitely a good read. (and now I can give your book back Monique :)
—D
A colleague at work loaned me this book. Ethnobotanist Wade Davis presents studies of several traditional cultures and the dangers they face. Some very interesting facts tucked in here. For example there are more than 2000 (!) spoken languages in New Guinea alone, but with 500 spoken by less than 500 people. Around the globe it's estimated that about every two weeks a language is lost, often before it has even been studied in detail. The book features beautiful photography by the author, an Explorer in Residence at National Geographic.
—David
