The History of Western Social Theory, by Alan MacFarlane, Cambridge University

These lec­tures were pre­sent­ed by Alan Mac­Far­lane in Novem­ber 2001 in the Depart­ment of Social Anthro­pol­o­gy, Uni­ver­si­ty of Cam­bridge. They were part of a course on the­o­ry and meth­ods in anthro­pol­o­gy designed for sec­ond year social anthro­pol­o­gy under­grad­u­ates. Above, watch Lec­ture 1: A Map of Social The­o­ries, 1000–2000. The remain­ing lec­tures fol­low below:

Lec­ture 2: The Baron de Mon­tesquieu (1689–1755)

Lec­ture 3: Adam Smith (1723–1790)

Lec­ture 4: Alex­is de Toc­queville (1805–1859)

Lec­ture 5: Karl Marx (1818–1883)

Lec­ture 6: Emile Durkheim (1858–1917)

Lec­ture 7: Max Weber (1864–1920)

Lec­ture 8: Ernest Gell­ner (1925–1995)

Lec­ture 9: F.W.Maitland (1850–1906)

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