Revision:Nature of Peasant Communities

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Peasants produce much of the subsistence and are self-contained.

They produce foodstuffs and other goods which flow into urban centres. They thus participate economically as producers and consumers into wider economic systems (ties with international markets).

The peasant community:

• Kulaks- Own land and exploit the farm wage labour of others
• Middle Class- Independent small holders of land
• Serfs- Landless tenants

Peasant Studies - Broadened Perspectives

Peasants were wary of other cultures, they were suspicious and have resisted many attempts to incorporate them into "normal" society. Families competed with each other for everything; even friendship and love. They are preoccupied with health and fitness.

They are also traditional and value morality.

Machismo, honour and prestige are key aspects of the culture.

All the peasant characteristics are assumed to be the outcome of them having to cope with centuries of exploration (by anthropologists).

There are multi-community peasant communities.

Social Organisation of Peasantry

Patrilineage - group of descent deriving from males.

Fictive Kinship

Distrust

Struggle for status

Dyadic contracts: exchanges of goods and services between two individuals bound into relationships in different spheres of life (similar to contracts).

The peasant household head and his wife lead a two-sided existence economically:

• subsistence cultivators
• contribute to an outside economy in the form of agricultural surpluses.

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