Anthropology, multiple modernities and the axial age debate

2010/12/01 by Bjørn Thomassen · 1 citation
Social Sciences · Mathematics · #Weber, Simmel, Sociological Theory #Anthropological Studies and Insights #Social and Cultural Dynamics #Modernity #Sociology #Epistemology #Anthropology #Social theory #Context (archaeology) #Forcing (mathematics) #Geography #Philosophy #Mathematics

paper · doi:10.1177/1463499610386659

openalex publication_date 2010/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/21

Abstract

This article suggests a need to link the anthropological debate of multiple modernities more closely to Weberian social theory, elaborated among others by Shmul Eisenstadt and Eric Voegelin. This implies readdressing the question concerning the anthropological contribution to the understanding of modernity, forcing a link to historical-social theory. In this context, the article discusses the growing axial age debate in social theory, which was indeed an important background to the very idea of ‘multiple modernities’.

Citations

• The Consequences of Literacy
• The axial age: the emergence of transcendental visions and the rise of clerics

Cited by

• Axial Age [wikipedia]

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• what is axial about the axial age?
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