Society and Knowledge

by Vere Gordon Childe

Originally published in 1956, the well-known archaeologist here takes on the role of philosopher. The author argues that knowledge is a social phenomenon, and that our intellectual life is the product of social reality is the product of different opinions of various societies.

Genres: Sociology

148 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1973

About the author

Vere Gordon Childe, better known as V. Gordon Childe, was an Australian archaeologist and philologist who specialised in the study of European prehistory. A vocal socialist, Childe accepted the socio-economic theory of Marxism and was an early, though unorthodox, proponent of Marxist archaeology. Childe worked for most of his life as an academic in the United Kingdom, initially at the University of Edinburgh, and later at the Institute of Archaeology, London. He also wrote a number of groundbreaking books on the subject of archaeology and prehistory, most notably Man Makes Himself (1936) and What Happened in History (1942).

Reviews

[Nils · Rating 3 out of 5]

A rather reductive little book that treats material things as exclusively the physical manifestations of thought. As was common in mid-twentieth century anthropological discussions, lot of words are brought to bear on what makes "man" unique. Childe's answer to this question is that it is our collective ability to create abstractions of experiences that we can then transmit through language that makes possible not just culture but also the accumulation of knowledge, rather than requiring that all learning be experiential. This formulation — in its human exceptionalism, and its argument against the moral priority of experience over abstraction — is pretty wildly out of fashion today, but for exactly that reason worth considering seriously.