Marvin Harris

There are very important and practical issues raised by following this alternative route which says, let's look to material conditions, to the…

— Marvin Harris

I think that by following the route that I have tried to outline, one gets into a much more interesting and productive…

— Marvin Harris

Ethnography literally means 'a portrait of a people.' An ethnography is a written description of a particular culture - the customs, beliefs,…

— Marvin Harris

When a woman gives birth to a child, the child needs to be able to digest the mother's milk; but when this…

— Marvin Harris

Unfortunately, the food industry has not yet faced this situation and begun taking measures to avoid exploiting our weakness for not knowing…

— Marvin Harris

“The availability of domesticated animal species played an important role in the prohibition of cannibalism and the development of religions of love…

— Marvin Harris

The commandment 'Thou shalt not kill' does not say it's O.K. to kill some people and not others.

— Marvin Harris

Pigs prefer to wallow in clean mud, but if nothing else is available, they will frequently wallow in their own urine, giving…

— Marvin Harris

The general proposition is that the resources that will be utilized are the ones that contribute most to the overall efficiency of…

— Marvin Harris

But with the Industrial Revolution and introduction of various industrial techniques for purifying sugar, we have a situation in which what we…

— Marvin Harris

In many ways the rise of the state was the descent of the world from freedom to slavery

— Marvin Harris

Here you do have forests, where pigs could be raised by letting them root about in the forests for a good part…

— Marvin Harris

If I can bring some light to bear on problems like that, I feel that people will be enlightened not only on…

— Marvin Harris

“I hold it perniciously false to teach that all cultural forms are equally probable and that by mere force of will an…

— Marvin Harris

“Many humanists and artists recoil from the proposition that cultural evolution has hitherto been shaped by unconscious impersonal forces. The determined nature…

— Marvin Harris

I don't see how you can write anything of value if you don't offend someone.

— Marvin Harris

The answer has to be sought in the material conditions of the production and utilization of cattle in India compared with the…

— Marvin Harris

Food, like sex, is one of the principal kinds of human activity that engage people when they wonder about how to account…

— Marvin Harris

I don't know of any cases where as a result of religious precepts a population have found themselves enjoying less food than…

— Marvin Harris

Hindus and Westerners alike see in the meat-eating taboos of India a triumph of morals over appetite. This is a dangerous misrepresentation…

— Marvin Harris

Every theory presented as a scientific concept is just that; it's a theory that tries to explain more about the world than…

— Marvin Harris

Now we are in a situation in which for a significant part of the industrial world too much could become a danger,…

— Marvin Harris

Like most North Americans, I'd been raised on the notion that milk is the first food, and everybody must like it because…

— Marvin Harris

“Counter-culture celebrates the supposedly natural life of primitive peoples. Its members wear beads, headbands, body paint, and colorful tattered clothing; they yearn…

— Marvin Harris

Yes, a general principle that comes out of research behind Good to Eat is that there are no world religions that have…

— Marvin Harris