Date: Mon, 20 May 1996 18:02:38 -0600
Subject: Marvin Harris


p.s.  
Rahul, now I know where you got your info on the Yanomamo demanding
sons and such.  I didn't see any of that in the primary sources I've
read, mainly Napoleon Chagnon, so Harris must have got it from
somebody else.  They value daughters a great deal in a way, because
daughters and neices are what a man trades away to another clan in
return for another wife for himself.  Or he promises a girl, perhaps
yet unborn to another man in return for some favor of alliance and
support now.  

It was after CPWW that some other anthros set about specifically to
try to show if there was evidence to corroborate Harris' claim of
widespread female infanticide among non-state foraging and
agricultural societies.  I still don't know of any, other than the
sex ratio among toddler-age kids that Harris was citing in 1972.

Lisa


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