ASEBL Journal – Volume 10 Issue 1, January 2014
Jared Diamond. The World until Yesterday: What Can We Learn from Traditional
Societies? NY: Viking, 2012. 512 pgs. $36US Hardcover. ISBN: 978-0670024810
There is a long history, dating at least back to Tacitus’ Germania, of authors
examining more traditional societies and detailing laudable traits from them that their
own more technologically advanced societies should emulate. As its title suggests,
Jared Diamond’s The World until Yesterday: What Can We Learn from Traditional
Societies? fits squarely within this tradition. It highlights differences between
traditional and modern societies in areas ranging from conflict resolution and what
Diamond terms “constructive paranoia” to child rearing and nutrition. In the process,
it details – with varying levels of success – aspects of traditional societies that people
living in the industrialized world should incorporate into our own lives and suggests
ways that 6