Origin and alteration in Rousseau's anthropological thought

Abstract

Human physical and cultural diversification can be read in Rousseau’s anthropology through the lens of the idea of degeneration and the deviation of an original nature. However, it can also be seen, in a positive way, as the affirmation of human variety, regardless of its link to an original model. Thus, Rousseau’s anthropological thought moves between two distinct and equally valid poles: historical judgment and ethnographic knowledge. If the first one is based on a unique and original model of human being that gradually and historically degenerates and becomes corrupted, the latter multiplies the origins in order to positively affirm the differences among men. One constitutes a scale of measurement, the other is an antidote against ethnocentrism. The main objective of this article is to present the last pole. In it, physical and cultural diversity affirms itself as such, with no need to establish as superior this or that society located at a specific point in time and space due to its alleged purity. Diversity would no longer indicate corruption, rather the various
paths assumed and taken by human groups according to the times and circumstances experienced.