BOOK REVIEWS
221
Professor Jack M. Potter's essay on land and lineage in traditional China draws heavily on the data collected for his Hong Kong study, Capitalism and the Chinese Peasant (1968). He sets himself the problem of trying to account for differences in the distribution of strong lineage organization in various parts of China, of lineage structure Type Z, as described and formulated by Professor Freedman. The hypothesised factors favourable to the development of a strong lineage are given by Professor Potter as a rich agricultural environment, frontier conditions, the absence of strong governmental control, and commercial development; all present, he concludes, in the New Territories of Hong Kong, where the Ping Shan Tang lineage flourished. He also argues that in all areas lineage organization would tend to be weaker under strong dynasties and stronger in inter-regnal periods or under weak dynasties. Professor Potter affirms that the four variables 'can form a set of inter-related hypotheses that, if validated by further research, would allow us to predict when and where strong lineage organization tended to appear in Traditional China'. But I should also think that strong lineages must depend very much on the quality of the personnel contained within them; for some human groups do seem to produce a more adroit leadership for a longer period of time than others. An institutionalization of virtue, as it were, may take place in some groups (lineages) more readily than in others.* And the task of plotting the frequency of powerful lineages in China has scarcely begun, so far as I know.
The study of Chinese society by Western scholars has been mainly androcentric in its selection of problems, thus reflecting Chinese views of their own social universe; but both Professor Freedman and Professor Arthur P. Wolf in their respective papers pay attention to the ambivalent and ambiguous status held by women in Chinese society. Professor Freedman's essay on ritual aspects of Chinese kinship and marriage discusses, among other matters, the problem of 'how is a woman to reconcile her duties as wife and daughter-in-law with those she has as sister and daughter?' The rites of marriage, he argues, "are not to be taken as simple statements capable of being given clear and unambiguous meanings by those who participate in them. Rites, as symbolic
* Dialect groupings may constitute another variable that has not yet been examined.
BOOK REVIEWS
221
Professor Jack M. Potter's essay on land and lineage in tradi- tional China draws heavily on the data collected for his Hong Kong study, Capitalism and the Chinese Peasant (1968). He sets himself the problem of trying to account for differences in the dis- tribution of strong lineage organization in various parts of China, of lineage structure Type Z, as described and formulated by Pro- fessor Freedman. The hypothesised factors favourable to the development of a strong lineage are given by Professor Potter as a rich agricultural environment, frontier conditions, the absence of strong governmental control, and commercial development; all pre- sent, he concludes, in the New Territories of Hong Kong, where the Ping Shan Tang lineage flourished. He also argues that in all areas lineage organization would tend to be weaker under strong dynasties and stronger in inter-regnal periods or under weak dy- nasties. Professor Potter affirms that the four variables 'can form a set of inter-related hypotheses that, if validated by further research, would allow us to predict when and where strong lineage organiza- tion tended to appear in Traditional China'. But I should also think that strong lineages must depend very much on the quality of the personnel contained within them; for some human groups do seem to produce a more adroit leadership for a longer period of time than others. An institionalization of virtue, as it were, may take place in some groups (lineages) more readily than in others.* And the task of plotting the frequency of powerful lineages in China has scarcely begun, so far as I know.
The study of Chinese society by Western scholars has been mainly androcentric in its selection of problems, thus reflecting Chinese views of their own social universe; but both Professor Freedman and Professor Arthur P. Wolf in their respective papers pay attention to the ambivalent and ambiguous status held by women in Chinese society. Professor Freedman's essay on ritual aspects of Chinese kinship and marriage discusses, among other matters, the problem of 'how is a woman to reconcile her duties as wife and daughter-in-law with those she has as sister and daughter?' The rites of marriage, he argues, "are not to be taken as simple statements capable of being given clear and unambiguous meanings by those who participate in them. Rites, as symbolic
* Dialect groupings may constitute another variable that has not yet been examined.
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