Factions, friends and feasts. Anthropological perspectives on the Mediterranean by Boissevain, Jeremy. Social Anthropology,

GAZTAÑAGA, JULIETA

Social Anthropology

Wiley Blacwell- European Association of Social Anthropologists

Año: 2014 vol. 22 p. 119 - 120

0964-0282

 But what is it new about a volume consisting of essays and introductions to books that have been published before? Many things, of course. On the one hand, this book deals with matters and questions that characterize Boissevain?s work on Mediterranean themes, such as factionalism and patronage, religion and politics, networks of kin, friends and followers, and more recently tourism and its aftermaths. On the other hand, it approaches key aspects concerning social anthropology both as a discipline and a source of critical imagination. Indeed, Factions, Friends and Feasts is the kind of work that only a scholar with an outstanding background could provide. Nurtured by long term ethnographic research and an ongoing commitment with theoretical development, this volume is more than the reunion of chosen bits and pieces. Instead, it transcends the often narrow schema of specialized expertise attached to ethnographic loci, and shows that often the most important debates are simply overlooked.