The Dawn of Everything

A New History of Humanity

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  • 4.4 (10 ratings) ·
  • 121 Want to read
  • 12 Currently reading
  • 16 Have read

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Last edited by raybb
February 7, 2023 | History

The Dawn of Everything

A New History of Humanity

  • 4.4 (10 ratings) ·
  • 121 Want to read
  • 12 Currently reading
  • 16 Have read

The renowned activist and public intellectual David Graeber teams up with the professor of comparative archaeology David Wengrow to deliver a trailblazing account of human history, challenging our most fundamental assumptions about social evolution—from the development of agriculture and cities to the emergence of "the state," political violence, and social inequality—and revealing new possibilities for human emancipation

For generations, our remote ancestors have been cast as primitive and childlike—either free and equal innocents, or thuggish and warlike. Civilization, we are told, could be achieved only by sacrificing those original freedoms or, alternatively, by taming our baser instincts. David Graeber and David Wengrow show how such theories first emerged in the eighteenth century as a conservative reaction to powerful critiques of European society posed by Indigenous observers and intellectuals. Revisiting this encounter has startling implications for how we make sense of human history today, including the origins of farming, property, cities, democracy, slavery, and civilization itself.

Drawing on pathbreaking research in archaeology and anthropology, the authors show how history becomes a far more interesting place once we learn to throw off our conceptual shackles and perceive what’s really there. If humans did not spend 95 percent of their evolutionary past in tiny bands of hunter-gatherers, what were they doing all that time? If agriculture, and cities, did not mean a plunge into hierarchy and domination, then what kinds of social and economic organization did they lead to? What was really happening during the periods that we usually describe as the emergence of "the state"? The answers are often unexpected, and suggest that the course of human history may be less set in stone, and more full of playful, hopeful possibilities, than we tend to assume.

The Dawn of Everything fundamentally transforms our understanding of the human past and offers a path toward imagining new forms of freedom, new ways of organizing society. This is a monumental book of formidable intellectual range, animated by curiosity, moral vision, and a faith in the power of direct action.

Publish Date
Language
English
Pages
704

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Edition Availability
Cover of: Amanecer de Todo
Amanecer de Todo
2023, Editorial Planeta, S. A.
in Spanish
Cover of: Au commencement était...
Au commencement était...: Une nouvelle histoire de l'humanité
2023, Les Liens Qui Libèrent
in French
Cover of: The Dawn of Everything
The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity
Nov 08, 2022, Picador
paperback
Cover of: Zorii tuturor lucrurilor
Zorii tuturor lucrurilor: O nouă istorie a omenirii
2022, Polirom
Paperback in Romanian
Cover of: El amanecer de todo
El amanecer de todo: Una nueva historia de la humanidad
Oct 11, 2022, Editorial Ariel
hardcover
Cover of: Dawn of Everything
Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity
2022, Penguin Books, Limited
in English
Cover of: Anfänge
Anfänge: Eine neue Geschichte der Menschheit
2022, Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung
Paperback in German - Sonderausgabe
Cover of: Anfänge
Anfänge: Eine neue Geschichte der Menschheit
Jan 29, 2022, Klett-Cotta Verlag
hardcover
Cover of: The Dawn of Everything
The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity
2021-11-09, Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Hardcover in English
Cover of: The Dawn of Everything
The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity
Apr 15, 2021, Signal
hardcover
Cover of: Dawn of Everything
Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity
2021, Penguin Books, Limited
in English
Cover of: Dawn of Everything
Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity
2021, Farrar, Straus & Giroux
in English
Cover of: The Dawn of Everything
The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity
2021, Penguin Books
E-Book in English

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Book Details


First Sentence

"Most of human history is irreparably lost to us."

Edition Notes

Source title: The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity

Classifications

Library of Congress
CB19.G69 2021

The Physical Object

Format
Hardcover
Number of pages
704

ID Numbers

Open Library
OL32732512M
ISBN 10
0374157359
ISBN 13
9780374157357
Wikidata
Q109769508

Links outside Open Library

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History

Download catalog record: RDF / JSON / OPDS | Wikipedia citation
February 7, 2023 Edited by raybb merge authors
January 14, 2023 Edited by ImportBot import existing book
August 16, 2022 Edited by upup4617 added 1st sentence
March 29, 2022 Edited by WikidataBot [sync_edition_olids] add wikidata identifier
July 4, 2021 Created by ImportBot Imported from amazon.com record