a3 2 American Anthropologist [63, 19611

(1) Resistance and defense are not derivative, but basic concepts for psychoanaly- sis. For proof, Dr. English might consult the corpus of Freud’s works, from the very early Project and the letters to Fliess, to such later books as Inhibition, Symptom and Anxiety, and the Outline of Psychoanalysis. But Dr. English has not only omitted two basic concepts, he has included one which is derivative, symbolism, which is a n outcome of, and thus secondary to displacement, which he does not mention.

(2) It might be wise to quote more fully the Englishs’ definition of the ego: “ tha t aspect of the psyche which is conscious, and most in touch with external reality.” Be- cause this definition implies that the ego is wholly conscious, it errs. The standard psychoanalytic usage of the term includes unconscious aspects, as well as conscious ones. I refer Dr. English to A. Freud’s Ego and the Mechanisms of Defense and to S . Freud’s Ego and the Id for further clarification. The point is not whether I know that the id is unconscious, but whether Dr. English is aware of the unconscious functions of the ego, and if so, why he has failed to include them in his definition of the ego. Surely Dr. Eng- lish must be aware that the fact that the id is unconscious does not mean that the ego is wholly conscious. Dr. English has confused structure with system. I must plead ig- norance of the term id-ego. Would Dr. English indicate which analysts use this term, and where they do so?

(3) Dr. English seems to be confused about which terms I refer to. I commented on his definition of defense mechanism, not of defense. He refers to what he has written about defense, a definition of another term. It is true that this is a matter only of a word, but then, we are dealing with a dictionary. And a more correct statement about defenses does not justify an erroneous definition of defense mechanism, and his is wrong since it omits the fact that the defense mechanisms are unconscious.

SIDNEY AXELRAD Queens College

SCIENTIFIC METHOD IN MONOGRAPHS ON RELIGION Sir:

I n the AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST (61:1147) D. B. Shimkin has reviewed my book, Die primitiven Seelenvorstellungen der nordeurasischen Volker, Eine religionsethno- graphische und religionsphanomenotogische Untersuchung. He arrives a t a rather peculiar final judgment of my treatise (in striking contrast to the positive opinions expressed in the corresponding European journals), which, according to him is “a theological brief rather than a scientific treatise.” At the same time, however, he is obliged to acknowl- edge that “Paulson unquestionably brings together much factual evidence of ‘soul dual- ism’ in northern Eurasia.” I should here like to ask whether the collection and arrange- ment of “much factual evidence” in support of one’s main thesis or theory is not “scien- tific”? Or is i t unscientific if one “also engages in extensive interpretations to make obscure and heterogeneous observations fit theory”? Has Mr. Shimkin himself never met, in the course of his own ethnological research, with “obscure and heterogeneous ob- servations” that he has been obliged to analyze and interpret? I cannot help having discovered in the course of my investigations many “secondary origins” that, in their nature, were a help to me to “explain inconvenient contradictions’’ in the notions of the soul discussed by me. But it is not quite correct that, as Shimkin asserts, “the author is especially eager to deny autochthony to monistic conceptions.” I n many places (Paulson pp. 211 ff., 245 ff., 315 ff.) I have conceded such an origin to the monistic conceptions of the soul which I have found in my material. That “the general

Letters to the Editor 833

burden of the study is a polemic against the views of W. Schmidt and A. F. Anisimov” (Lev, the monotheistic and materialistic theories) is a n impossible claim, as I have dis- cussed these views on only 6 pages (pp. 214-19) in a dissertation of over 400 pages!

That “soul dualism rests upon a n elemental concept (Elementurgedunke) of man- kind” I have at the end of my treatise (p. 372) ventured to assert, not on the strength of my own results in northern Eurasia alone, but as a conspectus of painstaking and very detailed investigations in different parts of the world by many researchers (e.g., Anker- mann for Africa, Hultkrantz for North America, and Arbman for various parts of the world; cf. also Lowie 19483348f.; Boas 1940:596-607). On p. 371 I have not with a single word mentioned western Asia as the region in which soul monism originated, as Shimkin asserts. What is there spoken of is the role played by the great world religions (Buddhism, Christianity, Islam) in the distribution of soul monism. On the basis of a large number of works by other investigators I have tried to locate the origin of soul monism in the old Eurasian high cultures, from India to the Mediterranean countries, western Asia of course included. As regards North America, Hultkrantz has in his work (1953) stressed the role played by Central America.

Finally, a few words concerning my “two other weaknesses,” according to Shimkin. I find that “classifications of ideas on human souls” are “meaningful” also in a context like that described by Anisimov for the western Tungus (Evenki) where he speaks of “concepts identifying parts and wholes, individuals and clans or species, and the actual, the fetishistic and the mythical” (Shimkin). From the same Tungus the same investi- gator has in another connection described also very sharp classifications of ideas of the human souls (Anisimov 1958:56 ff.). Shimkin is determined to “see no unity in the par- ticular grouping of peoples examined” by me and finds it “culture-historical nonsense” to treat all peoples belonging geographically to northern Eurasia in one connection. But my work is not a culture-historical study, it is a study in the phenomenology of re- ligion, as I have made sufficiently clear (e.g., pp. 11 ff., 212ff.). I n my introduction (pp. 14 ff.) I have also referred the reader to earlier works (inter alia, by the great Finnish researcher Uno Harva [Holmberg], Gustav Rank a.0.) which, like my own treatise, move precisely within the above mentioned geographical boundaries.

I am sorry, but I cannot accept Mr. Shimkin’s criticism of my work. IVAR PAULSON University of Stockholm

REFERENCES CITED

ANISIMOV, A. F. 1949 1958 Religija evenkov . . . Moscow & Leningrad.

Boas, Franz 1940 Race, language, and culture. New York, Macmillan.

HULTKRANTZ, AKE 1953 Conceptions of the soul among North American Indians. The Ethnographical

Museum of Sweden, Stockholm, Monograph series, Publication No. 1. LOWIE, ROBERT H.

1948 Primitive religion. New York, Liveright. PAULSON, IVAR

1958 Die primitiven Seelenvorstellungen der nordeurasischen Volker. Eine religionsethno- graphische and religionsphiinomenologische Untersuchung. The Ethnographical Museum of Sweden, Stockholm, Monograph Series, Publication No. 5.

(The western Tungus) Sbornik Muz. Antro. i Etno. 12:160-94.

LESLIE SPIER

SKERWOOD I.. WASI~RURN SAMUEL K. LOTHROP