Metaphor in comparative studies, or, the folklore of anthropology: Frazer, Malinowski, Trobriand, and us

Abstract

This article looks at the nineteenth-century preconception that ‘primitives’ ignore fatherhood—how it crept into ethnographic reports, made its way into anthropological theory, and sparked debates for the best part of a century. The discussion looks at the influential work of James Frazer and Sidney Hartland—at how these authors relied on folk metaphors to reason about the ignorance of ‘primitives’—and exposes Bronislaw Malinowski’s place in that tradition. Beyond revisiting Trobriand ethnography, this article argues that knowledge in anthropology and folkloristics is inherently metaphorical. The article makes a case for heeding metaphors across cultures, including in scholarly models, as a tool for understanding the varieties of human thinking.