Philippe Descola
French anthropologist who compared ontologies in Amazonian societies beyond nature-culture dualism.
Most quoted
"Perspectivism is the idea that different beings perceive the world from their own unique point of view, but that these perspectives are mutually intelligible."
— from Par-delà nature et culture, 2005
"The human condition is not defined by a universal essence, but by the diversity of ways in which humans relate to their environment and to other beings."
— from L'écologie des autres, 2013
"The Amazonian forest is not just a collection of trees and animals; it is a complex web of relations between different kinds of beings."
— from La Nature domestique, 1986
All quotes by Philippe Descola (103)
In interviews, I've said: Anthropology saved me from the solitude of my own culture.
Speech excerpt: Let us build bridges between ontologies, not walls.
On fieldwork: It's like falling in love with an alien world.
Joke: Why did the anthropologist cross the river? To get to the other ontology.
From correspondence: Dear colleague, the Achuar remind us that peace is woven from dreams.
Professional: The four ontologies—animism, totemism, analogism, naturalism—frame our comparative lens.
Life's profundity: We are all hybrids of multiple worlds.
Political observation: Environmental crises demand ontological pluralism.
Witty: Culture without nature is like a spear without a point—ineffective.
Key from work: Interiority and physicality define personhood differently across societies.
Interview quote: My greatest discovery? That humans are not the center of the universe.
Personal: Aging in anthropology means revisiting old fields with new eyes.
On art: Ethnographic writing is poetry disguised as science.
Famous saying: Ontologies are the invisible architectures of being.
Speech: We must deconstruct the nature/culture divide to rebuild ecology.
From letters: The rain in Ecuador washes away illusions of superiority.
Professional: Animism offers a model for sustainable relations with the earth.
Humor: If Lévi-Strauss is the father, I'm the rebellious son of structuralism.
Wisdom: True understanding comes from inhabiting another's perspective.
Key passage: The world is not given; it is made through collective imaginings.
Contemporaries of Philippe Descola
Other Anthropologys born within 50 years of Philippe Descola (1949).