Posted in New, Film Theory.
A score of donkeys…gathered about our caravan in the night! The absolutely handsomest cowboy, a man named Jack. Lovely scenes at evening when the horses come to the soakage to drink. More mountains than I ever expected to find; one of them Leichhardt, truly grand. Winsome kiddies in the school. All in all many reasons […]
Posted in New, Civilization, Open Societies & the Culture Cult, For the Record, Africana, Tribalism.
There’s a small problem with Kwame A. Appiah’s The Honor Code — it doesn’t explain why his “moral revolution” against slavery did not take place in Africa itself.
Posted in New, Civilization, For the Record, Notes.
Those funny things in glass cases may have awkward histories. A museum guide sometimes has to euphemize, dissimulate, and deceive…
Posted in New, Tribalism, Filmography.
Roger Sandall In November 2011 the journal Society held a symposium on Chapter Thirteen of Robin Fox’s book The Tribal Imagination — “The Old Adam and the Last Man, Taming the Savage Mind.” My contribution (RS) dealt with some issues arising from the writings of Victor Turner, Durkheim, and Van Gennep. A short excerpt toward […]
Posted in Filmography.
Walbiri Ritual at Gunadjari 1968. A review in The American Anthropologist (1970) by W. E. H. Stanner. The Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies was established by the Commonwealth Government in 1961, with a handsome annual grant, for research into the traditional culture of the Aborigines. It devotes a substantial part of its funds to making […]
Posted in Filmography.
The physical topography of central Australia is familiar — large areas of sandy semi-desert with rocky outcrops, waterholes, and caves. The religious topography of Aboriginal belief may be less well known, yet it can be easily understood since it was in many ways geographically indistinguishable: for each landscape feature there were associated spirit beings, many […]
Victor Turner, Durkheim, Van Gennep In November 2011 the sociological journal Society held a symposium on Chapter Thirteen of Robin Fox’s book The Tribal Imagination — “The Old Adam and the Last Man, Taming the Savage Mind.” My contribution (RS) dealt with some issues arising from the writings of Victor Turner, Durkheim, and Van Gennep. […]
Posted in New, Civilization, Open Societies & the Culture Cult, Tribalism.
There is no “Libyan People”. The phrase should be banned as misleading and purely rhetorical. In places like Libya one’s first allegiance is to family, clan, and tribe…
Posted in New, For the Record, Science.
“There is a history of what one might call the nosology and etiology of error upon which diagnosis and therapy depend…” Sorry. How was that again?
Posted in New, Open Societies & the Culture Cult, People, Tribalism.
Everybody wants out. City dwellers want out to the country, and tourists can’t go far enough searching for exotic locations and wide open skies…
Posted in For the Record, Filmography.
Titles Festivals Walbiri Ritual at Ngama 1966 [Festival dei Popoli, Florence 1967] Djungguan at Yirrkala 1966 The Mulga Seed Ceremony 1967 [Festival dei Popoli, Florence 1968] Emu Ritual at Ruguri 1967 [Venice Film Festival, 1st prize for documentary, 1968] Walbiri Ritual at Gunadjarai 1969 [Australian Film Awards, 1969] Gunabibi: an Aboriginal Fertility Cult 1968 Pintubi […]
Posted in New, People, Tribalism.
What’s with The Arabian Nights? How explain the attraction of the mysteriously medieval East? The djinns? The camels? The alluring houris in their dove-grey veils…
An Australian writer living in Sydney, Roger Sandall is the author of The Culture Cult (2001), a study of romantic primitivism and its effects. His work has appeared in a number of places including Commentary, The American Interest, Encounter, The New Criterion, The American, Sight and Sound, Quadrant, Art International, The New Lugano Review, The Salisbury Review, Merkur, Mankind, Visual Anthropology, and Social Science and Modern Society.