Hildred Geertz – författare

This work constitutes the first book-length examination of Balinese kinship in English and an important theoretical analysis of the central ethnographic concept of "kinship system." Hildred and Clifford Geertz's findings challenge the prevailing anthropological notion of a kinship system as an autonomous set of institutionalized social relationships. Their research in Bali suggests that kinship cannot be studied in isolation but must be perceived as a symbolic subsystem governed by ideas and beliefs unique to each culture.

Translated from the original Dutch by Agnes Louise Symmers and originally published by Alfred A. Knopf, this collection of letters was written by the daughter of a Javanese civil servant in the Dutch colonial government. She had been permitted the unusual privilege of attending a Dutch elementary school, but then returned home to seclusion during her adolescence, as was the Indonesian custom for women. The letters provide a fascinating picture of the life and spirit of the time during the period when Java was undergoing intimate contact with Western civilization. Through her writings she became a spokesman for the liberation and education of women, as well as an advocate for Indonesian nationalist aspirations. Co-published with the Asia Society.