Transactions of The Royal Society of Canada 



SECTION II 

 Series II DECEMBER 1915 Vol. IX 



The Social Organization of the West Coast Tribes. 



By E. Sapir., Ph.D. 



Presented by Dr. Adam Shortt, C.M.G., F.R.S.C. 



(Read May Meeting, 1915.) 



As is well known, the aborigines of America had developed at the 

 time of the discovery a number of more or less distinct types of social 

 and political organization, ranging from the loosely organized hunting 

 or root-gathering band, with little or no internal complexity and with 

 no definite formal affiliations with other groups, to the complex state 

 found, for instance, in Mexico or Peru, in which a large number of rela- 

 tively small tribal units were united into a larger body politic, com- 

 parable in some measure to the states that we are familiar with in our 

 own history. It is obvious that to a large extent the type of social 

 organization developed by a particular group of people must be due to 

 the economic status attained by it. A roving habit of life will not 

 encourage the formation of social and political solidarity. Conversely, 

 the conditions for social development are more favourable in a com- 

 munity occupying a relatively small territory, to certain parts of which 

 it is bound for at least considerable periods. Typical of the most 

 primitive type of social organization in America are the Eskimo. 

 Among them the unfavourable climatic conditions and the consequent 

 difficulty of maintaining life cause them to form small village 

 groups which change their habitat according to the exigencies of the 

 season, and every individual in which is obliged to procure means of 

 subsistence for himself and his nearest kin. A sea-mammal hunting 

 people like the Eskimo, that cannot find a continuous livelihood in a 

 single spot, cannot be expected to evolve a complex social life, and we 

 are therefore not surprised to find the individual as such more strongly 

 emphasized among them than among most other people. Somewhat 

 analogous, though vastly different in actual detail, is the condition 

 of the roving bands of the Great Basin area of Utah, Nevada, and 

 adjoining states. Here it is the semi-arid character of the soil that 

 makes it impossible for a primitive community to develop a settled 

 mode of life. The necessity of frequently changing camp in order 



