Definition of = schismogenesis

• Gregory Bateson defines this in his book Steps to an Ecology of Mind,
• defines schismogenesis as = a “creation of division.”
• The term derives from the Greek words σχίσμα skhisma, “cleft,” (borrowed into English as schism), and γένεσις genesis, “generation” or “creation.”
• Bateson claimed that we human beings define ourselves and each other through schismogenesis.

schismogenesis - a portmanteau word comprised of schism and genesis and meant to describe the beginnings of arguments which divide people or ideas from each other.

G&W use the controversy of anthropologist Napoleon Chagnon from the 1970s and his work with the Yanomami peoples of southern Venezuela and northern Brazil as an example of this.