Theories of Specific Difference of Primitive Mentality.— Grown on the soil of the sociological school, but laying more stress on the purely psychological side, other theories seek to account for savage belief and custom by the alleged specific character of mental structure in primitive man. Basing their conclusions on a number of interesting but probably exaggerated and distorted statements by such observers as Cushing and Dennett, and on a mass of obviously immature and superficial accounts by mission aries and other amateurs, the writers of this school aver that the savage is prelogical and mystical, impervious to experience, living in a world of "dim participations" (Crawley, Levy-Bruhl, Vierkandt, Danzel, H. Werner, Graebner). These views have but limited currency among theoretical anthropologists, whose position has been well expounded by Carveth Read. Modern field-workers, equally competent to speak about the savage from first-hand knowledge and to deal with problems of comparative psychology and epistemology through training, have one and all criticised .adversely these points of view (Boas, Rivers, Radin, Kroeber).
None the less, by posing the problem of primitive knowledge and mentality, by stirring up opinion and forcing anthropologists to make up their minds, the writers of this school, above all M. Levy-Bruhl, have made valuable contribution to Science.
Two factors contribute toward the development of the func tional point of view. The modern specialist field-worker soon recognises that in order to see the facts of savage life, it is necessary to understand the nature of the cultural process. De scription cannot be separated from explanation, since in the words of a great physicist, "explanation is nothing but condensed description." Every observer should ruthlessly banish from his work conjecture, preconceived assumptions and hypothetical schemes, but not theory.
The field-worker who lives among savages soon discards the antiquarian outlook. He sees every implement constantly used; every custom backed up by strong feeling and cogent ideas; every detail of social organisation active and effective. He perceives, above all, that culture, provides primitive man with the means of satisfying his wants, and of mastering his surroundings. The
functional view of culture lays down the principle that in every type of civilisation, every custom, material object, idea and belief fulfils some vital function, has some task to accomplish, represents an indispensable part within a working whole.
The better a custom is understood, the clearer it becomes that it does not sit loosely, within its context, that it is not a simply detachable unit like a petrifact in a rock, but that it is organically connected with the rest of the culture. A "super stition" is always a powerful mental force, whether as a restraint, or as an incentive to action. Magic, again, in many of its forms, is an indispensable economic force. Sorcery plays a conspicuous part in the political organisation and the legal arrangements of most tribes. Religion, through the moral integration of the group, invariably provides the basis of a tribal constitution. This mutual relation of customs, aspects and institutions; the work which they do for each other; the function which they fulfil within the whole scheme of culture—this it is that interests the exponent of the functional method.
This method insists, therefore, not only on the dynamic nature of culture, but also upon its organic unity. Culture must not be treated as a loose agglomeration of customs, as a heap of anthro pological curiosities, but as a connected living whole. The func tional method protests against the tearing away of a custom, in stitution or aspect from its cultural context. "Magic," "canni balism," "sociology," "religion," "pottery," "mother-in-law taboos," "marriage," and many other such labels, have given rise to the water-tight compartment method of collecting evidence in the field, of writing it up, and of dealing with anthropological theory.
The functional view of anthropology refuses to regard cul tural process as a mere natural growth—through the biological simile of evolution. It refuses also to see in it a simple shifting of disconnected items from place to place—through the mechani cal simile of diffusion. The functional method insists on the recognition of the process of culture as a process sui generis, which must be studied by special methods, without borrowing from physics, biology or the limbo of untrammelled conjecture; culture is alive, it is dynamic, all its elements are interconnected, and each fulfils a specific function in the integral scheme. The discovery of cultural functions makes it possible for this method to lay down the laws of the functional correlations of anthro pology.