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The Colonizer's Model of the World:

geographical diffusionism and eurocentric history
Front Cover
11 Reviews
Guilford Press, 1993 - Social Science - 246 pages
This book challenges one of the most pervasive and powerful beliefs of our time concerning world history and world geography. This is the doctrine of European diffusionism, the belief that the rise of Europe to modernity and world dominance is due to some unique European quality of race, environment, culture, mind, or spirit, and that progress for the rest of the world results from the diffusion of European civilization. J.M. Blaut persuasively argues that this doctrine is not grounded in the facts of history and geography, but in the ideology of colonialism. It is the world model which Europeans constructed to explain, justify, and assist their colonial expansion.

The book first defines the Eurocentric diffusionist model of the world as one that invents a permanent world core, an "Inside," in which cultural evolution is natural and continuous, and a permanent periphery, and "Outside," in which cultural evolution is mainly an effect of the diffusion of ideas, commodities, settlers, and political control from the core. The ethnohistory of the doctrine is traced from its 16th-century origins, through its efflorescence in the period of classical colonialism, to its present form in theories of economic development, modernization, and new world order. Blaut demonstrates that most "Western" scholarship is to some extent diffusionist and based implicitly in the idea that the world has one permanent center from which culture-changing ideas tend to emanate. Eurocentric diffusionism has shaped our attitudes concerning race and the environment, psychology and society, technology and politics.
  

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Review: The Colonizer's Model of the World: Geographical Diffusionism and Eurocentric History

User Review  - Misha - Goodreads

I am reading Blout. The introduction totally sucked. I had to skip through a large portion of it and was about to tell you all how badly Blout blows. He was squarely in the middle of the narrative ... Read full review

Review: The Colonizer's Model of the World: Geographical Diffusionism and Eurocentric History

User Review  - Hans - Goodreads

this is a good book to read if you want a more well-founded reason to scoff at people who say "asiatic despotism" Read full review

All 11 reviews »

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Selected pages

Contents

History Inside Out
1
The Tunnel of Time
3
Eurocentric Diffusionism
8
Diffusionism
11
The Colonizers Model
17
Origins
18
Classical Diffusionism
21
Modern Diffusionism
26
Society
119
Church
123
Class
124
Family
128
Notes
135
Before 1492
152
Medieval Landscapes
153
Protocapitalism in Africa Asia and Europe
165

World Models And Worldly Interests
30
Diffusionism as a Belief System
41
Notes
43
The Myth of the European Miracle
50
Mythmakers and Critics
52
Modernization as History
53
The Critique
54
The Countercritique
58
The Myth
59
Biology
61
Demography
66
Environment
69
Arid Despotic Asia
80
Temperate Europe
90
Rationality
94
The Rationality Doctrine
95
Rationality and the European Miracle
102
Technology
108
Notes
173
After 1492
179
Why America Was Conquered by Europeans and Not by Africans or Asians
180
Why the Conquest Was Successful
183
Europe in 1492
186
Colonialism and the Rise of Europe 14921688
187
Precious Metals
189
Plantations
191
Effects
193
Colonialism and Capitalism in the Seventeenth Century
198
The Centration of Capitalism
201
Notes
206
Conclusion
214
Notes
215
Bibliography
217
Index
237
Copyright

Other editions - View all

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No preview available - 1993
View all »

Common terms and phrases

accepted accumulation Africa America ancient argue argument Asia Asian assert Baechler basic belief system Blaut Brenner C. L. R. James capitalist causal centers Chapter China Chinese civilizations claim classical colonial critique crucial cultural diffusion diffusionism diffusionist discussed doctrine Eastern Hemisphere economic elite empirical environment ethnoscience Eurocentric Europe Europe's European family European miracle explain extra-European fact farmers farming feudal geography historians human ideas important India Industrial Revolution innovation invented irrigation Jones labor land mainly Malthusian Mann Marx Marxists matter Max Weber medieval Medieval Technology Michael Mann Middle Ages mode of production modern myth natural nineteenth century non-Europe notion Oriental despotism pattern peasant perhaps period plantation political population primitive progress proposition protocapitalist racism rationality regions rise of capitalism rise of Europe scholars shifting agriculture sixteenth century slave trade social societies soils superiority textbooks theory traditional tropical unique urban Weber West Western world history

Popular passages

Page 234 - SMITH (Philip) Ancient History from the earliest records to the fall of the Western Empire, 3 vols.‎
Appears in 56 books from 1856-1993

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References from web pages

JSTOR: The Colonizer's Model of the World: Geographical ...
BOOK REVIEW The Colonizer's Model of the World: Geographical Diffusionism and Eurocentric History, by jm Blaut. New York: Guilford, 1993. 246 pp. (paper). ...
links.jstor.org/ sici?sici=0021-9347(200207)32%3A6%3C735%3ATCMOTW%3E2.0.CO%3B2-V

The Colonizer's Model of the World
The myth that Europe leaped ahead in the year 1492 by a miracle
www.bookstove.com/ Non-fiction/ The-Colonizers-Model-of-the-World.41074

Untitled Document
Jordan Engler Anth 63-01 September 13, 2000. Class Discussion. Blaut, The Colonizer's Model of the World, Chapter 2. Armen's Overview: ...
www.macalester.edu/ ~guneratne/ Courses/ Anth63/ reports/ Blaut2-2000.html

Political Geography : Eight eurocentric historians: jm Blaut; The ...
Quick Search, Title, abstract, keywords, Author, eg js smith. Search tips (Opens new window), Journal/book title, Volume, Issue, Page, Clear all fields ...
linkinghub.elsevier.com/ retrieve/ pii/ S096262980200094X

History of Science and Technology The Colonizer's Model of the ...
Automatic download [Begin manual download]. Downloading the PDF version of: Bulletin of Science Technology Society 16 (12): 77. (102K) ...
bst.sagepub.com/ cgi/ reprint/ 16/ 1-2/ 77-b

James M. Blaut (1927–2000)
IN MEMORIAM. James M. Blaut (1927–2000). Kent Mathewson. *. and David Stea. **. *. Department of Geography and Anthropology, Louisiana State University ...
www.blackwell-synergy.com/ doi/ pdf/ 10.1111/ 1467-8306.93113

James Blaut envisioned "Eight Eurocentric Historians" as the ...
James M. Blaut, “Eight Eurocentric Historians”. "Eight Eurocentric Historians" was the second installment in a trilogy on Eurocentrism. ...
www.columbia.edu/ ~lnp3/ mydocs/ origins/ blaut.htm

Andre Gunder Frank: Macrosociology and the World System Syllabus
GRADUATE SEMINAR PROPOSAL Department of Sociology University of Toronto Sept.- Dec. 1996 Instructor: Andre Gunder Frank ...
www.rrojasdatabank.org/ agfrank/ toronto_seminar.html

POWER AND POVERTY
jmBlaut, The Colonizer's Model of the World: Geographical Diffusionism and Eurocentric. History. 246 pages. $27. Guilford Press 1993. ...
history.fas.nyu.edu/ docs/ IO/ 7287/ V57.0662Ludden.pdf

History 149
History 149. Approaches to World History. MW 8:35-9:50. King 325. David E. Kelley. History and East Asian Studies. Office: Rice 312. X58646. mailto:David. ...
www.oberlin.edu/ history/ Courses/ H149S04.htm

About the author (1993)

J. M. Blaut is professor of geography at the University of Illinois, Chicago. He is the author of three book and numerous articles on the historical and political geography of the Third World.
He was also the Recipient of the Distinguished Scholarship Honors of the Association of American Geographers Honors for 1997.

Bibliographic information

QR code for The Colonizer's Model of the World
TitleThe Colonizer's Model of the World: geographical diffusionism and eurocentric history
Volume 1 of The Colonizer's Model of the World, James Morris Blaut
AuthorJames Morris Blaut
Editionillustrated
PublisherGuilford Press, 1993
ISBN0898623480, 9780898623482
Length246 pages
Subjects › 

History / World
Social Science / Human Geography
  
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