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Purity and Danger
Abstract
Is cleanliness next to godliness? What does such a concept really mean? Why does it recur as a universal theme across all societies? And what are the implications for the unclean? In Purity and Danger Mary Douglas identifies the concern for purity as a key theme at the heart of every society. In lively and lucid prose she explains its relevance for every reader by revealing its wide-ranging impact on our attitudes to society, values, cosmology and knowledge. This book has been hugely influential in many areas of debate – from religion to social theory. With a specially commissioned preface by the author which assesses the continuing significance of the work, this Routledge Classics edition will ensure that Purity and Danger continues to challenge, question and inspire for many years to come.
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Citations
Cited by
DiMaggio, P. (1997) · Annual Review of Sociology · doi:10.1146/annurev.soc.23.1.263 · Cited by 3,161
Malkki, L. (1992) · Cultural Anthropology · doi:10.1525/can.1992.7.1.02a00030 · Cited by 2,490
The Mindful Body: A Prolegomenon to Future Work in Medical Anthropology
Scheper‐Hughes, N., & Lock, M. M. (1987) · Medical Anthropology Quarterly · doi:10.1525/maq.1987.1.1.02a00020 · Cited by 1,689
The Essential Child: Origins of Essentialism in Everyday Thought
Gelman, S. A. (2003) · doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195154061.001.0001 · Cited by 1,247
gastro‐politics in Hindu South Asia
APPADURAI, A. (1981) · American Ethnologist · doi:10.1525/ae.1981.8.3.02a00050 · Cited by 1,050
Metadata
- Authors
- Douglas, M.
- Venue
- Routledge eBooks
- Publisher
- Routledge
- Published
- 2003-08-29
- OpenAlex
- W4233792883
- Cited by
- 5,078
- References
- 0
- FWCI
- 229.51
- Type
- book
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
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Data sources
Bibliographic data: Semantic Scholar, OpenAlex, Crossref.
Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.
