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The Dawn of Everything by Davids Graeber and Wengrow immediately became my favorite nonfiction book when i read it. (my memories of it are especially infused with gratitude since it was my main reading material in rehab, and was plenty thick, dense and imaginative enough to give my mind stuff to chew on while somewhat gritting my teeth through the process of sobering up.) i always want to recommend it to friends, but it is so huge in size and scope, and so densely with information and ideas, that it's always a hard sell. i struggle to even really talk about it in any cursory way because there is just so much in it.

so i am stoked to have heard this episode from one of my fav podcasts, SRSLY WRONG, where the Wrong Boys interview David Wengrow (RIP Graeber) such that they kind of provide a chill, accessible overview of the book's ideas. and of course, i love the light comedy sketches interspersed throughout, too.

these ideas are so important to me that i want to take a moment, with my newly-refreshed memory of the book, to write down some of the most important, foundational bits.

3 essential freedoms

1. freedom to leave, to move to to a different place or group with the reasonable expectation of finding acceptance and hospitality elsewhere.
2. freedom to disobey, to refuse arbitrary orders and authority with the reasonable expectation of being taken seriously, discussed with, and not ostracized or met with violence due to doing so.
3. freedom to change society, to negotiate for different social arrangements and/or to move freely between differing social forms; the fundamental understanding that social change is not only possible, but an inherent function of being human.

3 ways to domination

1. control of information, using secrecy and privileged knowledge to restrict awareness from those not in power.
2. control of violence, using force or sanctioning the use of force by specific groups in order to enforce arbitrary orders and authority.
3. charisma, using heroic and/or demagogical manipulation to manufacture consent of those being controlled, cutting off rational debate or reasonable dissent.

paradigm nuggets

• "equality" has never really existed; no "state of nature" or "fall from grace"
• "inequality" isn't an inevitable product of population size, technological complexity, or level of urban/social organization
• societies of any size or type can intentionally work to preserve the 3 essential freedoms, and/or suppress the 3 ways to domination.
• human history is not a linear development, but a "carnival parade" of playful, fluid engagement with countless social forms
• "schismogenesis" (neighbors defining themselves through cultural and economic distinction vs one another) happens, and is a generative feature of humanity (as opposed to all societies inevitably converging toward some inevitable political conclusion, ie industrialization, capitlism etc)
• ideas from Turtle Island indigenous societies (ie Wendat leader Kandiaronk) on social welfare, gender rights, environmental stewardship etc were more advanced than those of colonial-era Europeans, were brought back to Europe, and played a role in sparking the Enlightenment--democratic ideals are not a "Western" invention
• definitively "human" brains appeared ~~200,000 years ago; we should think of our ancestors not as automatons who did nothing much until agriculture was strongly adopted (~12,000 years ago), but as our intellectual peers who lived complex, intentional, experimental social lives all along.