hierarchy. Neither assumption necessarily holds. Rather, in order to work, egalitarianism must be fiercely asserted against tendencies toward stratifi- cation. Egalitarian hunter-gatherers do not share just because they are nice people (though they may be); they share because their cultures require shar- ing and because those individuals who do not share are kept in line by humorous taunts, ridicule, or even ostracism. Egalitarian hunter-gatherers pre- vent the acquisition of power by individuals; all in- dividuals assert their own authority over their own affairs in their day-to-day lives. Nonegalitarian hunter-gatherers, such as those of the Northwest Coast, have developed quite different mechanisms of social and environmental control that do enable individuals, for the good of their groups, to assert authority. I would add one further analogy: one might say that egalitarian hunter-gatherers hold an anarchist's view of anarchy. That is, they do not see anarchy as a breakdown of legitimate authority, but rather as a prevention of the illegitimate use of authority by antisocial forces, whether these forces are represented by the state, by outside groups, or by power-seeking individuals within hunter-gath- erer society. The book is rich in discussion of the multiplicity of theoretical ideas within hunter-gatherer studies. It also makes good use of short ethnographic exam- ples from a wide variety of hunter-gatherer socie- ties, mainly well-known cases such as Ju/'hoansi, Pintupi, and Kwakiutl. There are comparisons too among Bushman societies, among those of Aborigi- nal Australia, and among those of the Northwest Coast. The latter form of comparison, in my view, is where the future lies. Kelly could go further in the exploration of these regional models. It is only by making such comparisons that we can test the limits of ecological theory. On ecology, Kelly tends toward a different ap- proach. He regards Steward's cultural ecology as an old-fashioned paradigm now superseded by mod- els that make use of ideas from evolutionary ecol- ogy such as those fostered by Bruce Winterhalder and Eric Alden Smith. True to his archaeological in- terests, he proposes that such an approach also holds promise over crude ethnographic analogies. In this, he builds on earlier work by Lewis R. Bin- ford, who receives praise from Kelly for developing the notion of a forager-collector continuum. While different readers might prefer different em- phases, The Foraging Spectrum is an excellent over- view of key issues in hunter-gatherer studies. Kelly pushes his line on diversity gently but effectively. The book sometimes assumes a prior knowledge of the basics, but it offers plenty of good summary in- formation and a wealth of bibliographic back- ground for further reading. It can certainly be rec- ommended, if not as a text with which to teach, then as a balanced and thought-provoking resource for those who teach about foragers and the anthro- pological theories that have been put forward to ex- plain the place of foragers in human culture gener- ally. Rationalizing Culture: IRCAM, Boulez, and the Institutlonallzatlon of the Musical Avant- garde. GEORGINA BORN. Berkeley: Univer- sity of California Press, 1995. xvl + 390 pp., fig- ures, photographs, appendix, glossary, bibliography, notes, Index. PAUL D. LOPES Tufts University Georgina Bom's ethnography of IRCAM (Institut de Recherche et de Coordination Acoustique/Mu- sique) presents a beautifully layered analysis of this institution's culture of production. Opened in 1977 under the leadership of Pierre Boulez, a world-re- nowned modernist composer, and with the finan- cing of the French state, IRCAM was envisioned as a major world center of contemporary music. Its mission was the realization of the postserialist agenda in contemporary music: the use of rational scientific analysis in the creation of a new musical system to replace the traditional tonal system of European classical music. Born shows how the in- stitutional culture of IRCAM became the embodi- ment of the logic and contradictions of this musical modernist agenda in late 20th-century classical music. Born begins her work by introducing the reader to the general aesthetics of modernism in the 20th century, its relationship to both postmodernism and popular culture, and its history in contemporary music. She also sets up a structure of opposing dis- positions (p. 63) between musical modernism and postmodernism. This dichotomous structure is pre- sented as a refraction, or sublimation, of the opposi- tion between the high and the popular. Given this general opposition in the cultural production of contemporary music, Bom's ethnography is in es- sence a critique of modernism and cultural elitism, but unlike other critiques it details empirically the consequences of modernist attempts at rationaliz- ing culture. The power of Bom's analysis rests in her demon- stration of how the modernist agenda infused the culture of IRCAM. The analysis is a "social semio- tics of music, one that stresses the multitextuality of music as culture and the need to analyze its various mediations—aural, visual-textual, technological, social—both in themselves and as an ensemble" (p. 17). Given the discursive power of modernism at IRCAM, Born demonstrates in convincing detail how this general disposition is articulated in organ- izational design, project and technological priori- ties, individual and group status, software produc- tion, music performance, and the subjectivity of individuals participating in this culture. Further- more, Born shows how the modernist trajectory at IRCAM confronts a number of obstacles, or contra- dictions, that undermine the stated goal of develop- ing a sophisticated interface among computer pro- grams, computer synthesizers, artists, musical compositions, and musical performances. The modernist agenda is most fully articulated both in this institution's obsession with technology and science, and in its abhorrence for the commer- cial and the popular. The result is the dominance of computer language, high-end computer technol- ogy, and theoretical excursions into acoustic com- puter simulation in IRCAM's discourse and activi- ties. What becomes marginal is music composition reviews 37