Why Nothing Works: The Anthropology of Daily Life (Touchstone Books (Paperback)) by Marvin Harris (PDF)

Description

This book is about cults, crime, and shoddy goods, and the shrinking dollar. It’s about porno parlors, and sex shops, and men kissing in the streets. It’s about daughters shaking up, women on the rampage, marriages postponed, divorces on the rise, and no one having kids. It’s about old ladies getting mugged and raped, people shoved in front of trains, and shoot-outs at gas pumps. And letters that take weeks to get delivered, waiters who throw food at you, rude sales help, and computers that bill you for things you never bought. It’s about broken benches, waterless fountains, cracked windows, dirty toilets, crater-filled roads, graffiti-covered buildings, slashed paintings, toppled statues, stolen books. It’s about shoelaces that break in a week, bulbs that keep burning out, pens that won’t write, cars that rust, stamps that don’t stick, stitches that don’t hold, buttons that pop off, zippers that jam, planes that lose their engines, reactors that leak, dams that burst, roofs that collapse… It’s about astrologers, shamans, exorcists, witches, and angels in space suits… It’s about a lot of other things that are new and strange in America today. —from the Introduction

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: About the Author Marvin Harris is the author of sixteen books, among them Cows, Pigs, Wars and Witches; Cannibals and Kings; and The Sacred Cow and the Abominable Pig. He was previously chairman of the Anthropology Department at Colombia University and Graduate Research Professor of Anthropology at the University of Florida. Harris passed away in October of 2001, shortly after retiring.

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐This is a superb book by one of the most perceptive anthropologists in the world. It’s a pity he’s not still with us.In this book he walks us through the ever-increasing craziness of hyper-Capitalism and the way we’re being turned not only into work units, but consumer units who have no choice but to accept and pay for whatever disservice the Capitalist hegemons feel like foisting on us.You’ll either be depressed or angry when you finish reading. I’d hope for angry, because unless we get together, dig in our heels, and purposefully change things the mess will only get worse until everything collapses from elite greed.

⭐Rather dated, somewhat overtaken by events. Also very oriented to the USA and its problems as the author sees them. Some chapters read as anti-consumerism rants rather than objective analysis and criticism (however justified emotionally). More obviously of the author’s opinions than his other works I have read

⭐I bought this as a replacement for my copy which has been lost. It is a very good explanation of how we as a society have gotten to the point we are at now. It is a pity that Marvin Harris passed away before he could update it to reflect the 1990’s and 2000’s.

⭐Mostly just complaining. Outdated, so maybe of historical value.

⭐I read “Why Nothing Works” quite a few years ago. I seem to remember that Harris blamed the rise in crime then happening to women moving into the workforce. According to Harris, women were pushing white men into other jobs, and that movement was pushing black men out of the workforce. As a result, black males were venting their frustration by committing crimes. At the end of that chapter, Harris gave American women a blunt choice: stay home like a good little housewife, or go out and be mugged or raped.Some of his other insights were interesting, but the above theory really stuck in my craw. And when the crime rate plummeted in the ’90s, when more women were in the workforce than ever before, it was proven completely wrong. It’s the people who commit crimes that are responsible for them. Punishing such people, not blaming women, is what made the streets safer.I wonder if the reviewer above who claimed this book does not blame blacks or women for America’s problems read the same book that I did.

⭐superb

⭐Der Autor beobachtet, wie die Neigung dahin geht, immer weniger zu arbeiten, die Arbeit stattdessen zu verwalten, die andere tun. Die Dienstleistungsgesellschaft liefert nicht, was sie verspricht, immer weniger davon, weil die persönliche Verantwortung abnimmt.

⭐

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