List of contributors; preface; Introduction: accounting for sexual meanings Sherry B. Ortner and Harriet Whitehead; Part I. The Cultural Organization of Gender: 1. The gender revolution and the transition from bisexual horde to patrilocal band: the origins of gender hierarchy Salvatore Cucchiari; 2. The bow and the burden strap: a new look at institutionalized homosexuality in native North America Harriet Whitehead; 3. Transforming 'natural' woman: female ritual leaders and gender ideology among Bimin-Kuskusmin Fitz John Porter Poole; 4. Self-interest and the social good: some implications of Hagen gender imagery Maralyn Strathern; 5. Sexuality and gender in Samoa: conceptions and missed conceptions Bradd Shore; 6. Like wounded stags: male sexual ideology in an Analusian town Stanley Brandes; 7. Pigs, women, and the men's house in Amazonia: an analysis of six Mundurucú myths Leslee Nadelson; Part II. The Political Contexts of Gender: 8. Politics and gender in simple societies Jane F. Collier and Michelle Z. Rosaldo; 9. Women, warriors, and patriarchs Melissa Llewelyn-Davies; 10. Gender and sexuality in hierarchical societies: the case of Polynesia and some comparative implications Sherry B. Ortner; Index.