La genèse des différences ethniques : du concept aux données empiriques

Abstract

Jean Cuisenier, The genesis of ethnie differences: from concept to empirical data. A large comparative international survey about cultural development was achieved in 1975-1982 by a team of Soviet, East-European and West-European scholars, including the author of this paper. An interrogation arises from the conceptual framework and the results of this survey: how did Soviet anthropologists ask their theoretical questioas, what concepts did they manage, how did they treat the empirical data? Actually, where Soviets think in terms of "interaction between national cultures," there, Occidentals think in terms of "relations between hegemonic and subaltern cultures." Where they intend to manifest ethnic essences and to explain by ethnogenesis their specific features, there. Occidentals find opposite legitimacy and national movements. By these ways, it appears that the Soviet anthropologists, facing up to empirical data, did not avoid giving new theoretical basis to