Eric Wolf -Introduction to Europe and the People Without History Essay

Précis – Introduction to Europe and the People without History – Eric Wolf
The main purpose of this article is to demonstrate that the people who have been recording history have only been including what is important to them and leaving out information which may be important to other people. “History is written by the victors” is a quote typically attributed to Winston Churchill and best exemplifies this thought.   Historians and even anthropologists what have been the “winners” or people at the upper levels of a hierarchy have been those who have traditionally recorded history.   Because of this, Wolf argues, we have missed the interconnection of everyone including those who have been oppressed or as less fortunate.   Since we have missed the ways in which all of these people and events are tied together we have essentially missed the entirety of social relations.   Wolf states “Since social relations are conceived as relations between individuals, interaction between individuals becomes the prime cause of social life.”   In anthropology the goal should be holism and since pieces are missing then holism cannot be established.   Wolf asserts that we do not understand the ideas of nation, society and culture because we are not looking at them as a whole.   We are missing certain aspects by not knowing about all people and all of the cultures.   We are only seeing what the “victors” have wanted us to see or remember.   Wolf believes that the concepts of nation, society and culture need to be studied anthropologically by looking at the processes cultures have used instead of just looking at the people.   When we look at history we must look at the entire history.   We cannot look at just one group but all groups which have had contact with them.   In order to do this, Wolf argues that we need to turn to Marx and his belief that there was no universal history and that material relationships will tell us more about these cultures.   Through the use of modernization theory we are...