Each of the two "new" paradigms for ecological anthropology, ecosystems analysis and ethnoecology, explores only one pair of phenomena relevant to cultural ecology, environment and action, and environment and belief respectively. This study argues that ecological analysis is weakened by the exclusion of any one of those three orders of phenomena as objects of study. A detailed analysis of cognitive and behavioral data on the resource management of Waswanipi Cree hunters shows how religious beliefs incorporate both cultural logics and realistic models of environmental relationships; and, how action informed by those beliefs can effectively manage hunting, animal populations, human population distributions, and subsistence. Beliefs are formulated as recipes that apply to diverse situations so that actions informed by these are responsive to changing conditions. Decisions concerning / alternative goals, situations and strategies are shown to be socially located with the men who are the "owners" of hunting territories. / *Abstract only previously published in Dissertation Abstracts International, Vol. 40, No. 9, page 5100-A, 1980. UMI
Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.43592 |
Date | January 1978 |
Creators | Feit, Harvey A. |
Publisher | McGill University |
Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
Language | English |
Detected Language | English |
Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
Format | application/pdf |
Coverage | Doctor of Philosophy (Department of Anthropology) |
Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
Relation | alephsysno: 000079261, proquestno: AAI8325651, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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