Return to Eden

In the third edition of Return to Eden, David H. Turner returns to his groundbreaking study of the Indigenous people of Amagalyuagba in northern Australia. As in the first two editions, published in 1989 and 1996, Turner recounts the Indigenous people's own theoretical interpretation of their society and history, and brings that interpretation to life in a journey with them through the sacred landscape of Bickerton Island, Groote Eylandt, and the adjacent mainland. In a new preface, Turner reflects on his fieldwork and on the fate of the people of the region, whose way of life continues to be challenged by mining, economic development, and the effects of ongoing contact with the outside world. Turner argues that the worldview of the people he studied may, in fact, allow access to a deeper and more meaningful interpretation of reality itself-a perspective that could prove of utmost importance in addressing the global challenges of the twenty-first century. "Return to Eden is written by a Professor of Anthropology, published in a Religious Studies series, and destined to cause profound concern, perhaps even to infuriate, scholars from both disciplines. Can a book ask for any higher praise? If publications are to be prized for their ability to stimulate, for their capacity to present the world in a new light, and so to persuade us to view others afresh, then David Turner has surely given us one of the finest ethnographies Aboriginal studies has yet to see." -Tony Swain, Method & Theory in the Study of Religion, on the first edition "Turner, who is well known in Aboriginalist circles, has carried out anthropological research in northern Australia, in particular Groote Eylandt and Bickerton Island (Amagalyuagba), in several periods between 1969 and 1986. The book represents the accrued wisdom of his long involvement with Aboriginal studies." -Erich Kolig, Otago University, Man, on the first edition