Marvin Harris and the foundation of a scientific theory of culture

This thesis is concerned with the historicial and philosophical dimensions of the anthropological endeavor to formulate a scientific framework for the study of the evolution, maintenance and change of socio-cultural systems.

The historical dimension of this topic is concerned with the development of the concept "culture." This development is traced from the initial articulation of the concept by Gustav Klemm in the mid-nineteenth century to the modern definitions formulated by anthropologists and sociologists. It is argued here that the concept, in its modern meaning, was a necessary prerequisite to any scientific understanding of human socio-cultural behavior.

In the philosophical analysis of this topic four issues are examined. First, the nature of culture is explored, and it is argued that culture is an empirical phenomena consisting of both mental and behavioral elements. Second, the relation between culture theory and anthropology is examined. This relationship is shown to be such that culture theory provides the theoretical and conceptual meeting ground of all the sub-disciplines of anthropology. Third, the nature of science and the scientific enterprise is discussed and a minimum set of empiricist criteria is established to demarcate scientific theories and research strategies from nonscientific ones. It is also argued that because of its empirical nature as a phenomenon and its importance to anthropology as a subject, culture must be studied according to canons of scientific investigation and reasoning. Finally, two anthropological research strategies—the functionalist strategy of Bronislaw Malinowski and the cultural materialist stratey of Marvin Harris—that have been claimed to be scientific research strategies are examined. It is demonstrated that functionalism, despite its scientific aspirations, fails to meet the requirements for a scientific research strategy on both substantive and methodological grounds. It is argued that cultural materialism, however, does meet the requirements for a scientific research strategy and that it is capable of generating adequate and test able theories about the evolution, maintenance and change of socio-cultural systems.