Universals of Human Thought

This book, focusing on Africa, attempts to identify substantive universals that underlie the social diversity across cultures.

Preface; Michael Ogbolu Okonji: African psychologist Herman A. Witkins; Contributors; 1. General introduction: relativism and universals Ernest Gellner; Part I. Perception: 2. Pictorial perception and the problem of universals Gustav Jahoda; 3. Tallensi children's drawings Meyer Fortes; 4. Space and community behaviour: a discussion of the form and function of spatial order in settlements Roland Fletcher; 5. Taxonomic and multi-dimensional representations of reality John Gay; Part II. Cognitive Development: 6. 'Strong' and 'weak' universals: sensori-motor intelligence and concrete operations Pierre Dasen; 7. Psychological differentiation Ogbolu Okonji; 8. Cognitive development, education and social mobility Barbara Lloyd; Part III. Language: 9. Language and learning: some observations on the linguistic determination of cognitive processes Nigel Lemon; 10. The formation of relative clauses Bernard Comrie; 11. Literacy and literature Ruth Finnegan; 12. Review and prospectus Jerome Bruner; Indexes.