Human nature is potentially aggressive and destructive and potentially orderly and constructive. — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
Humanity . . . lies in man's capacity to question the known and imagine the unknown. — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
Human nature is almost unbelievably malleable, responding accurately and contrastingly to contrasting cultural conditions. — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
Leisure and the cultivation of human capacities are inextricably interdependent. — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
We — mankind — stand at the center of an evolutionary crisis, with a new evolutionary device — our consciousness of the… — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
the task of each family is also the task of all humanity. This is to cherish the living, remember those who have… — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
Man's most human characteristic is not his ability to learn, which he shares with many other species, but his ability to teach… — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
We need every human gift and cannot afford to neglect any gift because of artificial barriers of sex or race or class… — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
The way in which each human infant is transformed into the finished adult, into the complicated individual version of his city and… — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
Our humanity rests upon a series of learned behaviors, woven together into patterns that are infinitely fragile and never directly inherited. — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
Ninety-nine percent of the time humans have lived on this planet we've lived in tribes, groups of 12 to 36 people. Only during times of war, or what we have now, which is the psychological equivalent of war, does the nuclear family prevail, because it's the most mobile unit that can ensure the survival of the species. But for the… — Margaret Mead Copy Share
When human beings have been fascinated by the contemplation of their own hearts, the more intricate biological pattern of the female has… — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
...recognize and respect Earth's beautiful systems of balance, between the presence of animals on land, the fish in the sea, birds in… — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
In every human society of which we have any record, there are those who teach and those who learn, for learning a way of life is implicit in all human culture as we know it. But the separation of the teacher's role from the role of all adults who inducted the young into the habitual behavior of the group, was… — Margaret Mead Copy Share
The prophet who fails to present a bearable alternative and yet preaches doom is part of the trap that he postulates. Not only does he picture us caught in a tremendous man-made or God-made trap from which there is no escape, but we must also listen to him day in, day out, describe how the trap is inexorably closing. To… — Margaret Mead Copy Share
The contempt for law and the contempt for the human consequences of lawbreaking go from the bottom to the top of American society. — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
If one cannot state a matter clearly enough so that even an intelligent twelve-year-old can understand it, one should remain within the cloistered walls… — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
Women are scolded both for being mothers and for not being mothers, for wanting to eat their cake and have it too, and for… — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
we came to realize that a civilization which rode roughshod over the way of life of other peoples was incorporating evil in its own… — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
Through a grandmother's voice and hands the end of life is known at the beginning. — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
today's children are the first generation to grow up in a world that has the power to destroy itself. — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
We are now at a point where we must educate our children in what no one knew yesterday, and prepare our schools for what… — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
Humanity . . . lies in man's capacity to question the known and imagine the unknown. — Margaret Mead Copy Share Image
