ABSTRACT
Many anthropological studies assume or imply that, prior to discovery by western explorers, traders or missionaries, the native people of the nonwestern world had an unchanging way of life, engaging in stable pursuits — gathering wild plants and insects, weaving baskets, worshipping ancestors, exchanging sisters, avoiding mothers-in-law, or performing whatever cultural activities struck the first observer as noteworthy. I consider this view of traditional life both wrong and misleading — all people are constantly changing and adapting to new environmental and social circumstances.
