Evolutionisms: Lewis Henry Morgan, Time, and the Question of Sociocultural Evolutionary Theory

It remains true, however, that the legacy of the evolutionary anthropologists and sociologists of the nineteenth century has been largely repudiated by their twentieth century successors. . . . Contemporary social anthropologists do not regard it as their task to collect information about primitive peoples with a view to reconstructing the prehistory of civilization, nor do sociologists try to elicit laws of social evolution.

(J. W. Burrow 1966)

But how do the insiders, the practitioners, represent the autonomy of their craft and their calling to themselves? . . . As anthropologists, we know where to look for the answer. We may expect to find it crystallized in myth and pedigree and accounted for by tradition—that is the process of handing on from generation to generation. And we shall not be surprised to find this sense of in-group identity symbolized in figures of ancestors and heroes and their opponents, the false prophets and faction mongers. I first heard of Lewis H. Morgan as one of those false prophets.

(Meyer Fortes 1969)

Introduction

As Daniel Moses's recent book shows, Lewis Henry Morgan remains an important and enduring figure in the history of sociocultural evolutionary theory and progress in general. His book demonstrates the many ways in which social scientists and social reformers have both used and perhaps abused his framework. One of the reasons that Morgan's name reappears so often is the ambiguity of his many views about the mechanisms of progress. He has been described as an evolutionist (in a biological sense), an idealist, and a materialist. This ambiguity has allowed many to appropriate his work and stress those aspects that best suited their own theories. Unfortunately Morgan, the great systematizer, never actually systematized all of his scattered views on heredity, evolution, the development of human intelligence, and the relative weight that should be placed on unconscious processes or human ingenuity. Although it is always a questionable exercise to attempt to demonstrate that an ambiguous thinker was more systematic than he or she appeared, I hope to show that despite all the fine scholarship on Morgan by, for example, Moses (2009), Marc Swetlitz (1988), Elisabeth Tooker (in Morgan 1997, 1992), Thomas Trautmann (1987), and Adam Kuper (1985), that they have all failed to appreciate the importance that heredity played for Morgan. Swetlitz comes closest to discussing the matter but leaves Morgan ambiguous (1998:esp. 71-76).

For those who sought to use Morgan's work and for those who have examined it, there have been certain central questions: was Morgan a Darwinian (other evolutionary theories have not really been addressed)? What role did unconscious mechanisms such as natural suggestion play? How much were material conditions versus human reform and ingenuity key factors? Like many of the abovementioned scholars, I agree that Morgan recognized both material and ideal causes, and I agree that he was ambiguous about what sort of (biological) evolutionary theory he held. Unlike previous scholars, however, I differ on the importance of heredity and biology in Morgan's work. The crucial tasks are first to examine Morgan in his own context, albeit largely where other scholars have not explored, and second, to unravel the view of human progress presented in his manuscripts, Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity inthe Human Family (1997) and Ancient Society (1963). In Ancient Society Morgan seems to present a human species that arrived on earth fully formed and ready to make progress where natural suggestion, material conditions, or mental advancements were present. Even there Morgan made use of natural selection and, as Darwin would in the Descent ofMan, made numerous references to increase in brain size among particular humans who made the most progress. In Systems and various unpublished remarks, however, Morgan also discussed the formation of peoples, their unique hereditary qualities, and the primary ideas that would either help or retard their capacity to advance. When Morgan spoke of the progress of the human species he referred to human intellect or the human mind, but a consistent reading of his views suggests that he also believed that migration, isolation, and other factors produced unique peoples (not necessarily...