An Anthropology of Everyday Life |
West of the Thirties |
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| Written in 1992, An Anthropology of Everyday Life is a remarkably candid and personal book, in which Edward T. Hall tells the story of the first fifty years of his fascinating life. Although his life began auspiciously when he was virtually abandoned by his parents to the care of others, his early exposure to diverse cultures started him on his path toward decoding the deeper, hidden layers of human behavior. By the time he was in his early twenties, he had lived in Missouri, New Mexico, France, Germany and on Indian Reservations in the Southwest. Working for the State Department under President Truman, he trained foreign service officers who were being sent to undeveloped countries. Edward Hall’s message to them – that there were profound disparities in the attitudes of different cultures toward time, space and relationships – was considered almost heretical at the time. Today, his books are required reading for those entering the Peace Corps. | “From the moment I set foot on the reservation, it was as though someone had turned on a switch in my head. I was transported out of myself through Lewis Carroll’s looking glass to a distant, unfamiliar time and place – a world without boundaries, a world apart, cut off from the outside as much as the surface of a habitable moon would be. Despite the strangeness, I felt safe, protected by an invisible shield from the outside world and the people in it. Deep inside I knew that my fate and this country were linked in some ineffable way.” – Edward T. Hall
From 1933 to 1937, famed anthropologist Edward T. Hall lived and worked on the Navajo and Hopi reservations in Arizona. West of the Thirties is the story of Edward as a young man discovering his way in what might have been another century and another world, a frontier where four cultures – Navajo, Hopi, Hispanic and Anglo – clashed. |