Constructing Frames of Reference by Lewis Binford, University of California
Press, $75, ISBN 0520223934
I HAD been struggling with this vast book for weeks when—on page 392,
generalisation number 95, proposition 50—the truth finally dawned. The
professionally flattering blurbs from three continents are not mere hype: Lewis
Binford’s Constructing Frames of Reference is a “compelling”,
“significant”, “landmark” work that will “change radically our thinking about
hunter-gatherer and early farming societies”.
As a genus we have a long history living off wild beasts, roots, seeds and
herbs. This ancestry—95 per cent of our own species’ existence—has
left…
