[Book Reviews]

Abstract

PART of this stimulating essay on primitive jurisprudence was delivered by Dr. Malinowski as a lecture at the Royal Institution and published in extended form in our columns (NATURE, Feb. 6, 1926, Supplement, p. 9). It is scarcely necessary, therefore, to do more than direct attention to its publication in book form, and to say that in the added matter the author has amplified his main contention that much of the general theory of the older school of anthropology fails to stand the test to which it can be submitted by the field-worker. In the present instance, in the field of primitive jurisprudence, Dr. Malinowski. with his acutely critical power of analysis, is able to show from his experience among the Trobrianders that the idea of group dominance is inadequate as a sanction of law and order in primitive society.

Crime and Custom in Savage Society.

By Dr. Bronislaw Malinowski. (International Library of Psychology, Philosophy and Scientific Method.) Pp. xii + 132 + 6 plates. (London: Kegan Paul and Co., Ltd.; New York: Harcourt, Brace and Co., Inc., 1926.) 5s. net.