• More on Lévi-Strauss
Tributes to Claude Lévi-Strauss continued to appear in mainstream media worldwide such as the Times of India and the Economist, extolling his contribution to the discipline of anthropology. In my comments last week, I joined the chorus of positive notes. I do quibble, however, with those who call him the “father of modern anthropology” as going too far…unless we agree that contemporary anthropology is the product of multiple fathers. And several mothers as well. Speaking of fathers of the French variety, I would wager that contemporary cultural anthropologists cite Bourdieu and Foucault far more often than Lévi-Strauss. Perhaps Lévi-Strauss is better typified as a grandfatherly figure in the field–important in his time, but a bit quaint now.
Continuing with the kinship metaphor, I cannot recall any historic female anthropologist ever being referred to as the “mother of modern anthropology.” Margaret Mead would be my nomination for this accolade, odd-sounding as it is.
• Michael Kearney: pioneer of migration studies in anthropology and activist
Michael Kearney, professor of anthropology at UC Riverside died at the age of 71 years. He received his PhD in 1968 from the University of California at Berkeley. A founding figure in the anthropological study of migration, he carried out long term fieldwork with Mixtex-speaking Indians in Oaxaca, Mexico starting in the mid-1960s and returning frequently to maintain ties with members of the community and document changes taking place. He also studied Oaxacan migrants in the United States and how they maintained ties with their communities of origin. In addition to his scholarly work, he was an activist for civil rights and human rights. Tom Patterson, chair of the UCR anthropology department, comments that “Michael was protective of the Mixtex communities…He was fearless in confronting oppressive authorities on both the Mexican and American sides of the border.”
• Jane Goodall on endangered species
Primatologist and animal rights activist Jane Goodall provides inspiring examples of efforts to save animal species nearing extinction in her new book, Hope for Animals and Their World: How Endangered Species Are Being Rescued from the Brink. It was reviewed in Sunday’s Washington Post, earning nearly three-fourths of the page and commanding attention with four large color photographs of species that have been rescued from extinction.
Meanwhile, Sunday’s New York Times carried an article conveying little to no hope for the cultural survival of the Ogiek, Kenya’s last “forest people.” They are in grave danger of being booted out of their traditional lands in the Mau Forest due to a purported conservation effort of the government.
anthropologyworks 