David Graeber

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David Graeber speaks at Maagdenhuis occupation, University of Amsterdam, March 2015. Photo: Guido van Nispen. (Source)

David Rolfe Graeber (12 February 1961, New York City – 2 September 2020, Venice, Italy) was an American anthropologist, anarchist activist and author known for his books Debt: The First 5000 Years (2011), The Utopia of Rules (2015) and Bullshit Jobs: A Theory (2018). He worked at the Anthropology department at Yale (1998-2005), as reader in social anthropology at Goldsmiths, University of London (2007-2013), and afterwards, until his death, as a professor of anthropology at the London School of Economics.

Biography[edit]

Sourced from David Graeber's official website (2020).

"I was born and raised in New York, the child of Kenneth Graeber, a plate stripper (offset photolithography), originally from Kansas, who had fought with the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War, and Ruth (Rubinstein) Graeber, born in Poland, a garment worker and home-maker who had been the female lead in the 1930s Labor Stage musical, Pins & Needles.

Brought up in the Penn South Coops in Chelsea, I attended local public schools, PS 11, and IS 70, was discovered by some Maya archaeologists because of an odd hobby I had developed of translating Maya hieroglyphics, received a scholarship to attend a fancy boarding school for three years (Phillips Academy at Andover), before returning to state school, at SUNY Purchase, where I graduated with a BA in Anthropology in 1984.

From there I went on to University of Chicago. I lived in Chicago for over a decade, apart from two years (between 1989 and 1991) during which I was doing anthropological fieldwork in highland Madagascar, received a PhD in 1996, and then held a series of academic jobs. These included some graduate teaching at Chicago, though admittedly not much, a year at Haverford, a year of unemployment including a visiting scholar status and one course at NYU, and a junior faculty position at Yale. In 2004, the Yale department voted not to continue my contract, before I could begin the process of coming up for tenure. This was a very unusual procedure where new rules had to be invented for my case (i.e., no student or outside reviews were allowed.) Yale gave no reason for its decision other than dissatisfaction with my scholarship but some felt it might not have been entirely irrelevant that I was by this time quite active in the Global Justice Movement and other anarchist-inspired projects.

After Yale I found myself unemployable in my own country, but for some mysterious reason, being avidly shopped pretty much everywhere else. I ended up at Goldsmiths, University of London, from 2007-2013, working with inspiring colleagues and wonderful students, and now, as a full professor, at the London School of Economics, where I am surrounded by some of the best and most interesting people one could hope to be around. After living for some years in several countries at once, I’ve finally settled full-time in London.

I told a magazine once that I’ve been an anarchist since I was 16, so I guess that must be true, but I only really became active in any meaningful way after the beginning 2000, when I threw myself into the Alter-Globalization movement and it might be said that all my work since has been exploring the relation between anthropology as an intellectual pursuit, and practical attempts to create a free society, free, at least, of capitalism, patriarchy, and coercive state bureaucracies. As a result I sometimes feel I’ve had to pursue two full-time careers of research and writing, one peer-reviewed, the other not, since in my activist-oriented work I am interested in trying to ask the sort of question those actively engaged in trying to change the world find useful or important, rather than those of funders and those influenced by same. Still, the two strains intertwine and influence one another in endless, and, I hope, creative and mutually reinforcing ways.

The first book I wrote was Lost People, an ethnography of Betafo (Arivonimamo), a community in Madagascar divided between descendants of nobles and slaves, and I still think it’s my best, because it’s really co-written by all the characters (characters in every sense of the term) who inhabit it. It’s an attempt at a truly dialogic ethnography but as a result it’s a bit long so it took forever to publish it - it was effectively written in 1997 but only appeared ten years later (2007).

The first to be published was Toward an Anthropological Theory of Value (2001), in part my homage to one of my most inspiring teachers at Chicago, Terry Turner. Later, when another inspiring former mentor, Marshall Sahlins, put out a pamphlet series and asked me to contribute a volume, I wrote a tiny little book called Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology, which has doomed me ever since to be referred to as “the anarchist anthropologist” (despite the fact that the book largely argues that anarchist anthropology doesn’t and probably couldn’t really exist. Please don’t do that. You don’t call people “the social democrat anthropologist” do you?) I also wrote a vast ethnography of Direct Action (called Direct Action: an Ethnography) which hardly anyone ever reads, a collection of largely academic essays called Possibilities, an edited volume called Constituent Imagination with Stevphen Shukaitis, a book of political essays called Revolutions in Reverse, and a book on debt called Debt: the First 5000 Years which virtually everyone seems to have read. This was followed by the Democracy Project (which I actually wanted to call “As If We Were Already Free”), the Utopia of Rules (which I wanted to call “Three Essays on Bureaucracy”), On Kings (a collection co-written with Marshall Sahlins), and Bullshit Jobs: A Theory. I am currently working with the archaeologist David Wengrow on a whole series of works completely re-imagining the whole question of “the origins of social inequality,” starting with the way the question is framed to begin with. After that, who knows?

I’ve continued to be actively engaged in social movements of one sort or another, insofar as I actually can, living in exile with a full-time job. I was involved in the initial meetings that helped set up Occupy Wall Street, for instance, and have been working with the Kurdish Freedom Movement in various capacities as well.

Oh, and since this is a matter of some historical contention: no, I didn’t personally come up with the slogan “We are the 99%.” I did first suggest that we call ourselves the 99%. Then two Spanish indignados and a Greek anarchist added the “we” and later a food-not-bombs veteran put the “are” between them. And they say you can’t create something worthwhile by committee! I’d include their names but considering the way Police Intelligence has been coming after early OWS organisers, maybe it would be better not to."

Works[edit]

Books[edit]

  • Toward an Anthropological Theory of Value: The False Coin of Our Own Dreams, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, Nov 2001, xiii+337 pp. Author. (English)
    • 가치이론에대한인류학적접근-교환과가치, 사회의재구성, Seoul: Greenbee Publishing, 2009. (Korean)
    • Die falsche Münze unserer Träume, Berlin: Diaphanes, 2013. (German)
    • Hacia una teoría antropológica del valor, Buenos Aires: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 2014. (Spanish)
    • Değer teorisi. Antropolojik Bir Giriş, Ankara: Sel Publishing, 2015. (Turkish)
    • Deger Teorisi-Antropolojik Bir Giris, Sel Yayıncılık, 2017, 416 pp. (Turkish)
    • La fausse monnaie de nos rêves. Vers une théorie anthropologique de la valeur, trans. Morgane Iserte, Paris: Les liens qui libèrent, 2022, 456 pp. Publisher. (French)
    • Kachiron: jinruigaku kara no sōgōteki shiza no kōchiku [価値論: 人類学からの総合的視座の構築], Tokyo: Ibunsha (以文社), 2022, 575 pp. (Japanese)
    • Die falsche Münze unserer Träume. Wert, Tausch und menschliches Handeln, trns. Michaela Grabinger, Sven Koch, Andrea Stumpf and Gabriele Werbeck, Zürich: Diaphanes, 2023, 448 pp. Publisher. (German)
  • Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology, Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press, Apr 2004, 118 pp. Author. Publisher. (English)
    • Pour une anthropologie anarchiste, trans. Karine Peschard, Montréal: Lux, 2006, 166 pp. (French)
    • Frammenti di antropologia anarchica, Milan: Elèuthera, 2006. (Italian)
    • アナーキスト人類学のための断章, Tokyo: Ibunsha, 2006, 200 pp. [1] (Japanese)
    • Frei von Herrschaft: Fragmente einer anarchistischen Anthropologie, trans. Werner Petermann, Wuppertal: Hammer, 2008, 254 pp; repr. in Graeber, Einen Westen hat es nie gegeben & Fragmente einer anarchistischen Anthropologie, forew. Ayga Qubukgu, Münster: Unrast, 2022. TOC. (German)
    • Απόσπασμα μιας αναρχικής ανθρωπολογίας, Athens: Black Pepper, 2007. (Greek)
    • Fragmentos de antropología anarquista, trans. Ambar Sewell, Barcelona: Virus, 2011. Excerpt. (Spanish)
    • Anarsist Bir Antropolojiden Parçalar, Istanbul: Butek Bogazici, 2013. (Turkish)
    • Fragmenty anarchistické antropologie, trans. Martin Ritter, Prague: tranzit.cz, 2013, 104 pp. Review: Profant (Sociální studia). [2] (Czech)
    • Fragmenti anarhistične antropologije, Ljubljana: cf., 2014. (Slovenian)
    • 无政府主义人类学碎片, Beijing: Gaungxi Normal University Press, 2014. (Chinese)
    • Fragmentos de antropología anarquista y otros textos, Mexico: Ediciones la Sociale, 2015. (Spanish)
    • Brudstykker af en anarkistisk antropologi, trans. Mai Corlin and Rasmus Graff, Copenhagen: OVO, 2016, 119 pp. (Danish)
    • trans., Seoul, 2016. (Korean)
    • Fragmenty antropologii anarchistycznej, trans. Maciej Hojak, Poznań: Oficyna Wydawnicza Bractwa Trojka, 2021, 77 pp. (Polish)
    • Fragmente einer anarchistischen Anthropologie & Einen Westen hat es nie gegeben, trans. Werner Petermann, Münster: Unrast, Oct 2022, 204 pp. Publisher. (German)
  • Possibilities: Essays on Hierarchy, Rebellion and Desire, Oakland, CA: AK Press, Nov 2007, 417 pp. Author. (English)
    • Sto lykófos ton protoporión: I anádysi ton sýnchronon koinonikón kinimáton [Στο λυκόφως των πρωτοποριών: Η ανάδυση των σύγχρονων κοινωνικών κινημάτων], trans. Spyros Kourouklis [Σπύρος Κουρούκλης] and Lida Mantzourani [Λήδα Μαντζουράνη], Athens: Stasei Ekpiptontes [Στάσει Εκπίπτοντες], 2012, 265 pp. (Greek)
    • Critica della democrazia occidentale. Nuovi movimenti, crisi dello stato, democrazia diretta, pref. Stefano Boni, trans. Arturo Potassa Cravani, Milan: Elèuthera, 2012, 119 pp; new ed., 2019, 123 pp. Trans. of ch. 11: "There Never Was a West". (Italian)
    • La démocratie aux marges, pref. Alain Caillé, trans. Philippe Chanial, Paris: Flammarion, 2014, 123 pp. Trans. of ch. 11: "There Never Was a West". (French)
    • Des fins du capitalisme, Paris: Payot, 2014. Partial trans. (French)
    • Ganeungseongdeul, Seoul: Geurinbi, 2016, 672 pp. (Korean)
    • Minshu shugi no hiseiyō kigen ni tsuite: aida no kūkan no minshu shugi [民主主義の非西洋起源について: 「あいだ」の空間の民主主義], trans. Daisuke Kataoka, Tokyo: Ibunsha, 2020, 192 pp. Based on French edition (La démocratie aux marges). Incl. trans. of ch. 11: "There Never Was a West". [3] (Japanese)
    • El estado contra la democracia, trans. David Muñoz Mateos, Madrid: Errata naturae, 2021, 138 pp. Trans. of La démocratie aux marges. (Spanish)
    • Possibilités: essais sur la hiérarchie, la rébellion et le désir, pref. Martin Rueff, trans. Maxime Rovere, Paris: Rivages, May 2023, 220 pp. Publisher. (French)
  • Κίνημα, βία, τέχνηκαιεπανάσταση, ed. & trans. Spyros Koyroykis [Σπύρος Κουρούκλης], Athens: Stasei Ekpiptontes [Στάσει Εκπίπτοντες], 2009. Essays written between 2004 and 2010 reflecting on practice within the Direct Action Network and other anarchist-inspired groups. (Greek)
    • Revolutions in Reverse: Essays on Politics, Violence, Art and Imagination, Minor Compositions, Sep 2011. Author. (English)
    • Kampf dem Kamikaze-Kapitalismus. Es gibt Alternativen zum herrschenden System, Munich: Pantheon, 2012, 160 pp. (German)
    • La rivoluzione che viene. Come ripartire dopo la fine del capitalismo, San Cesario di Lecce: Manni, 2012, 179 pp. (Italian)
    • Tersine devrimler: siyaset, şiddet, sanat ve hayalgücü üzerine denemeler, Istanbul: Everest Yayınları, 2014, 133 pp. (Turkish)
    • Revoluce naopak: eseje o politice, násilí, umění a představivosti, trans. Jaroslava Kočová, Olomouc: Broken Books, 2014, 146 pp. (Czech)
    • Revolusjoner i revers: essay om politikk, vold og fantasi, trans. Lars Holm-Hansen, forew. Thomas Hylland Eriksen, Oslo: Cappelen Damm, 2018, 180 pp. (Norwegian)
    • Révolutions à l'envers: essais sur la politique, la violence, l'art et l'imagination, trans. Vassily Pigounides, Paris: Rivages, May 2024, 130 pp. Publisher. (French)
  • Debt: The First 5,000 Years, Brooklyn, NY: Melville House, Jul 2011, PDF; upd. & exp.ed., 2014. Author. (English)
    • Schulden: die ersten 5000 Jahre, trans. Ursel Schäfer, Hans Freundl and Stephan Gebauer, Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 2012, 536 pp. (German)
    • Debito. I primi 5000 anni, trans. Alberto Prunetti, Milan: Il Saggiatore, 2012. (Italian)
    • Schuld: de eerste 5000 jaar, trans. Peter van Huizen, et al., Amsterdam: Business Contact, 2012, 623 pp. (Dutch)
    • Buchae, cheot 5,000 nyeon ui yeoksa [부채, 첫 5,000년의 역사 : 인류학자가 고쳐 쓴 경제의 역사], trans. Myeongjin Jeong (정명진), Seoul: Boogle Books (부글북스), 2012; repr., 2021, 704 pp. (Korean)
    • En deuda: una historia alternativa de la economía, trans. Joan Andreano Weyland, Barcelona: Ariel, 2012, 714 pp, EPUB. (Spanish)
    • Zhai: di 1 ge 5000 nian [债: 第一个5000年], trans. Tan Sun and Ziyun Dong, Beijing: China Citic Press (Zhong xin chu ban she), 2012. (Chinese)
    • Skuld. De första 5000 åren, Stockholm: Diadalos, 2012. (Swedish)
    • Dluh: prvních 5000 let, trans. Lenka Beranová, Brno: BizBooks, 2012, 416 pp. (Czech)
    • Zhai de li shi: cong wen ming de chu shi dao quan qiu fu zhai shi dai [债的历史: 从文明的初始到全球负债时代], trans. Yuxing Luo and Xiaoqin Lin, Taipei: Cite Publishing (Shang zhou chu ban), 2013, 532 pp; 2nd ed., 2018. (Chinese)
    • Dette, 5000 ans d’histoire, Paris: Les Liens qui Libèrent, 2013. (French)
    • Dug: Priv 5000 godina, Zagreb: Fraktura, 2013. (Croatian)
    • Χρέος. Τα πρώτα 5.000 χρόνια, Athens: Stasei Ekpiptontes, 2013. (Greek)
    • Dolg: pervyye 5000 let istorii [Долг: Первые 5000 лет истории], trans. A. Dunayev, Moscow: Ad Marginem, 2015, 528 pp. (Russian)
    • Borç: Ilk 5000 Yil, Istanbul: Everest Yayinlari, 2016. (Turkish)
    • Dívida. Os primeiros 5.000 anos, Rio de Janeiro: Três Estrelas, 2016. (Brazilian Portuguese)
    • Dette: 5000 ans d'histoire, trans. Paul Chemla, Arles: Actes sud, 2016, 667 pp. (French)
    • Fusairon: Kahei to boryoku no gosennen [負債論──貨幣と暴力の5000年], Tokyo: Ibunsha, 2016, 848 pp. Publisher. (Japanese)
    • Dług: pierwsze pięć tysięcy lat, trans. Bartosz Kuźniarz, Warsaw: Wydawnictwo Krytyki Politycznej, 2018, 637 pp; 2nd ed., 2024, 637 pp. Publisher. (Polish)
    • Dolg: prvih 5.000 let dolžništva, trans. Branko Gradišnik, afterw. Franček Drenovec, Ljubljana: Založba /*cf., 2021. (Slovenian)
    • Parāds: pirmie piectūkstoš gadi , trans. Andžela Šuvajeva, Riga: Tērbata, 2024, 525 pp. (Latvian)
  • Inside Occupy, Berlin: Campus, May 2012. (German)
  • Oltre il Poetere e la Burocrazia: L'immaginazione contro la violenza, l'ignoranza e la stupidità, Milan: Eleuthera, May 2013. Contains “Dead Zones of the Imagination” and “On the Phenomenology of Giant Puppets.” (Italian)
  • with Marshall Sahlins, On Kings, Chicago: HAU Books, Nov 2017, xv+536 pp. Publisher. (English)
    • Il potere dei re: tra cosmologia e politica, trans. Piero Vereni, Milan: Cortina, 2019, xxii+629 pp, EPUB. (Italian)
    • Kasat khư̄ (ʻa) rai?: mānutsayawitthayā samrap yaowachon [กษัตริย์คือ (อะ)ไร? : มานุษยวิทยาสำหรับเยาวชน], trans. Kēngkit Kitirīanglāp, Bangkok: Illuminations, 2563 [2020]. (Thai)
    • Über Könige. Versuche einer Archäologie der Souveränität, Berlin: Klaus Wagenbach, 2022, 205 pp. (German)
    • Sur les rois, Bordeaux: Éditions la Tempête, Apr 2023, 620 pp. Publisher. (French)
  • Bullshit Jobs: A Theory, Simon & Schuster, May 2018, 368 pp; Allen Lane/Penguin, May 2018, EPUB, ARG. First published as an essay. Author. (English)
    • Bullshit jobs, trans. Élise Roy, Paris: Les Liens qui libèrent, 2018, 224 pp. (French)
    • Bullshit jobs, trans. Albertine Cerutti, Milan: Garzanti, 2018, 396 pp. (Italian)
    • Trabajos de mierda: una teoría, trans. Iván Barbeitos García, Barcelona: Ariel, 2018, 432 pp. (Spanish)
    • Bullshit Jobs: vom wahren Sinn der Arbeit, trans. Sebastian Vogel, Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 2018, 463 pp. (German)
    • Bullshit jobs: over zinloos werk, waarom het toeneemt en hoe we het kunnen bestrijden, forew. Rutger Bregman, trans. Tracey Droste-Plegt, Amsterdam: Business Contact, 2018, 335 pp. (Dutch)
    • Bullshit jobs: 40%的工作沒意義, 為什麼還搶著做: 論狗屁工作的出現與勞動價值的再思, Taipei: Cite Publishing (Shang zhou chu ban, 城邦出版集團 商周出版), 2019. (Chinese)
    • Feines absurdes: una teoria, trans. Miki, Barcelona: Descontrol, 2019, 423 pp. (Catalan)
    • Praca bez sensu: teoria, trans. Mikołaj Denderski, Warsaw: Wydawnictwo Krytyki Politycznej, 2019, 448 pp. Publisher. (Polish)
    • Bullshit Jobs: ¿Qué sentido tiene tu trabajo para la sociedad?, Ariel México, 2020. (Spanish)
    • Burushitto jobu: kuso dōdemo ii shigoto no riron [ブルシット・ジョブ: クソどうでもいい仕事の理論], Tokyo: Iwanamishoten, 2020, 426 pp. (Japanese)
    • Bullshit munkák, trans. Ottilia Boross, Budapest: Typotex, 2020, 340 pp. (Hungarian)
    • Tırışkadan İşler, Istanbul: Everest Yayınları, 2021. (Turkish)
    • Bullshit jobs đời ngắn lắm, đừng làm việc vô nghĩa!, trans. Trần Hoàng Sơn, Hanoi: Nhà xuất bản Thế Giới, 2021, 386 pp. (Vietnamese)
    • Hao wu yi yi de gong zuo [毫无意义的工作], trans. Yujun Lü (吕宇珺), Beijing: Zhong xin chu ban ji tuan gu fen you xian gong si, 2021, xxviii+375 pp. (Chinese)
    • Bulšihti: teorija, afterw. Blaž. Kosovel, trans. Aleksandra Rekar, Ljubljana: Založba /*cf., 2024, 443 pp. (Slovenian)
  • with David Wengrow, The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, Nov 2021, xii+692 pp.
    • Au commencement était: une nouvelle histoire de l'humanité, trans. Elise Roy, Paris: Les liens qui libèrent, 2021, 752 pp. Publisher. (French)
    • Anfänge: eine neue Geschichte der Menschheit, trans. Helmut Dierlamm, Henning Dedekind and Andreas Thomsen, Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 2022, 672 pp. [5] (German)
    • El amanecer de todo: una nueva historia de la humanidad, trans. Joan Andreano Weyland, Barcelona: Ariel, 2022, 841 pp, EPUB; repr., Ciudad de México: Ariel, 2023. (Spanish)
    • L'alba di tutto: una nuova storia dell'umanità, trans. Roberta Zuppet, Milan: Rizzoli, 2022, 727 pp. (Italian)
    • Början på allt: en ny historia om mänskligheten, trans. Ulrika Junker Miranda, Stockholm: Volante, 2022, 780 pp. Publisher. (Swedish)
    • Altings begyndelse. En ny historie om menneskeheden, trans. Uffe Gardel, Copenhagen: Gads, 2022, 731 pp. Publisher. (Danish)
    • Alussa oli...: ihmiskunnan uusi historia, trans. Anna Tuomikoski, Helsinki: Kustannusosakeyhtiö Teos, 2022, 677 pp. (Finnish)
    • Het begin van alles: een nieuwe geschiedenis van de mensheid, trans. Rogier van Kappel and Bart Gravendaal, Amsterdam: Maven, 2022, 655 pp. (Dutch)
    • Narodziny wszystkiego: nowa historia ludzkości, trans. Robert Filipowski, Poznań: Zysk i S-ka, 2022, 670 pp. Publisher. (Polish)
    • Pričetek vsega: nova zgodovina človeštva, trans. Samo Kuščer, Ljubljana: UMco, 2022, 769 pp. (Slovenian)
    • O despertar de tudo. Uma nova história da humanidade, trans. Claudio Marcondes and Denise Bottmann, Companhia das Letras, Aug 2022, 696 pp. Publisher. (Brazilian Portuguese)
    • Zorii tuturor lucrurilor. O noua istorie a omenirii, Iasi: Polirom, Sep 2022, 544 pp. Publisher. (Romanian)
    • O Princípio de Tudo: uma nova história da humanidade, trans. Paulo Tavares and Sara M. Felício, Lisbon: Bertrand, Nov 2022, 728 pp. Publisher. (Portuguese)
    • Η αυγή των πάντων. Μια καινούρια ιστορία της ανθρωπότητας, trans. Λιθαρής Χριστόδουλος, Διόπτρα, Mar 2023, 784 pp. (Greek)
    • Počiatok všetkého: nová história ľudstva, trans. Pavol Šveda, Bratislava: Tatran, Apr 2023, 671 pp. (Slovak)
    • Banbutsu no reimei: jinruishi o konpon kara kutsugaesu [万物の黎明: 人類史を根本からくつがえす], Tokyo: Kōbunsha (光文社), 2023, 643+55 pp. (Japanese)
    • Úsvit všeho: nová historie lidstva, trans. Viktorie Hanišová, Brno: Jan Melvil, 2024, 648 pp. Publisher. (Czech)
  • with Nika Dubrovsky, Uprisings: An Illustrated Guide to Popular Rebellion, PM Press, May 2022, 128 pp. [6]
  • The Ultimate Hidden Truth of the World..., ed. & intro. Nika Dubrovsky, forew. Rebecca Solnit, Macmillan, Nov 2024, 384 pp. Selected essays and interviews. Publisher.

Selected essays[edit]

Conversations, interviews, debates[edit]

  • Shihonshugi no ato no Sekai—New Anachizimu no Perspective [資本主義後の世界のために (新しいアナーキズムの視座); The World After Capitalism—the Perspective of New Anarchism, Interviews and a Debate with David Graeber], ed. & trans. Sabu Kohso, Tokyo: Ibunsha, Apr 2009, 216 pp. [8] (Japanese)
    • trans. (Korean)

Misc[edit]

Literature[edit]

Links[edit]