Giving Life, Giving Death

<DIV>Although women alone have the ability to bring children into the world, modern Western thought tends to discount this female prerogative. In <I>Giving Life, Giving Death,</I> Lucien Scubla argues that structural anthropology sees women as objects of exchange that facilitate alliance-building rather than as vectors of continuity between generations. Examining the work of L&eacute;vi-Strauss, Freud, and Girard, as well as ethnographic and clinical data, <I>Giving Life, Giving Death</I> seeks to explain why, in constructing their master theories, our greatest thinkers have consistently marginalized the cultural and biological fact of maternity. In the spirit of Freud&rsquo;s Totem and Taboo, Scubla constructs an anthropology that posits a common source for family and religion. His wide-ranging study explores how rituals unite violence and the sacred and intertwine the giving of death and the giving of life.<BR /> &#160;</DIV>