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| James George Frazer (1854 – 1941) |
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James George Frazer was born in Glasgow into a Presbyterian family. His dad was a pharmacist, he built and owned a chemical factory, and he wrote two books about local history. Frazer studied at the University of Glasgow and later attended Cambridge University, where he had lectures in law and classical literature. He finished with a doctorate on a thesis on Plato and from then on he taught until 1922. At the Liverpool University a chair of sociology and anthropology was created for him in 1907, but he lectured for only one year there. J. G. Frazer, who was interested in folklore and anthropology inspiring his work, wrote two entries on taboo and totemism for the Encyclopedia Britannica.
Last update: 29-06-2009 18:27
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| Edward Burnett Tylor (1832 — 1917) |
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E. B. Tylor and a group of anthropologists were the first to support significant scholarly achievments in Britain of the 19th century. Anthropology arose out of Quaker and Nonconformists activities, and the Aborigines Protection Society was found, influenced by the abolition of slavery in 1833. After British trade and colonial expansion had furthered, scholarly and public interest increased in knowledge, mainly of naturalistic orientation in geography, zoology and botany; travel literature was readily welcome to the public, and there were published two outstanding studies to mention: First, E. W. Lane s An Account of the Manner and Customs of the Modern Egyptians (1836) and second, Mountstuart Elphinstone s An Account on the Kingdom of Caubul (1839) both of which failed to generalize in theory. So called savages did not receive much attention, and writers referred to geography and history to garnish their literature.
Last update: 28-07-2009 20:35
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| Claude Levi – Strauss (1908) and Structuralism |
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Two anthropologists formed the discipline in France and they were both Marcel Mauss s followers, namely Claude Levi –Strauss (born 1908) and Louis Dumont (1911 – 1998). Claude Levi – Strauss, one of the most famous anthropologists and structuralists, influenced this branch of science like no other. Levi – Strauss was born in Brussels in November 1908. He grew up in Paris and studied philosophy and law at the Sorbonne. Some years Levi – Strauss taught in a secondary school, in 1935 he took the chance to be a part of the French cultural mission and to work as a professor at the University of Sao Paolo in Brazil. Until 1938, he travelled to central Brazil often, but critics noted, that his travels were more or less expeditions to the Amazonas region, “that intervened chronologically between armchair anthropology and long – term fieldwork” (Parkin 2005: 209). During WWII Levi – Strauss lived in New York, where he adapted the work of his friend Roman Jakobson in terms of linguistics. His quotidian presence at the New York Public Library underpinned his interest in human mental patterns, Boasian anti-evolutionist and anti-racist positions, and the “reification of culture” (Parkin 2005: 209). He returned to Paris in 1947 and soon became,
Last update: 29-06-2009 20:07
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