Anthropology Goes To The Fair

As scientists claiming specialized knowledge about indigenous peoples, especially American Indians, anthropologists used expositions to promote their quest for professional status and authority. This title shows how anthropology showcased itself "to show each half of the world how the other half lives".

Coming of Age in Chicago explores a watershed moment in American anthropology, when an unprecedented number of historians and anthropologists of all subfields gathered on the 1893 Chicago Columbian Exposition fairgrounds, drawn together by the fair’s focus on indigenous peoples. Participants included people making a living with their research, sporadic backyard diggers, religiously motivated researchers, and a small group who sought a “scientific” understanding of the lifeways of indigenous peoples. At the fair they set the foundation for anthropological inquiry and redefined the field. At the same time, the American public became aware, through their own experiences at the fair, of a global humanity, with reactions that ranged from revulsion to curiosity, tolerance, and kindness. Curtis M. Hinsley and David R. Wilcox combine primary historical texts, modern essays, and rarely seen images from the period to create a volume essential for understanding the significance of this event. These texts explore the networking of thinkers, planners, dreamers, schemers, and scholars who interacted in a variety of venues to lay the groundwork for museums, academic departments, and expeditions. These new relationships helped shape the profession and the trajectory of the discipline, and they still resonate more than a century later.

A novel study on consciousness and the brain that places culture at the center of the analysis.

One of the more problematic sport spectacles in American history took place at the 1904 World?s Fair in St. Louis, which included the third modern Olympic Games. Associated with the Games was a curious event known as Anthropology Days organized by William J. McGee and James Sullivan, at that time the leading figures in American anthropology and sports, respectively. McGee recruited Natives who were participating in the fair?s ethnic displays to compete in sports events, with the ?scientific? goal of measuring the physical prowess of ?savages? as compared with ?civilized men.? This interdisciplinary collection of essays assesses the ideas about race, imperialism, and Western civilization manifested in the 1904 World?s Fair and Olympic Games and shows how they are still relevant. A turning point in both the history of the Olympics and the development of modern anthropology, these games expressed the conflict between the Old World emphasis on culture and New World emphasis on utilitarianism. Marked by Franz Boas?s paper at the Scientific Congress, the events in St. Louis witnessed the beginning of the shift in anthropological research from nineteenth-century evolutionary racial models to the cultural relativist paradigm that is now a cornerstone of modern American anthropology. Racist pseudoscience nonetheless reappears to this day in the realm of sports.

Does anthropology have more to offer than just its texts? In this timely and remarkable book, Stuart Kirsch shows how anthropology can—and why it should—become more engaged with the problems of the world. Engaged Anthropology draws on the author’s experiences working with indigenous peoples fighting for their environment, land rights, and political sovereignty. Including both short interventions and collaborations spanning decades, it recounts interactions with lawyers and courts, nongovernmental organizations, scientific experts, and transnational corporations. This unflinchingly honest account addresses the unexamined “backstage” of engaged anthropology. Coming at a time when some question the viability of the discipline, the message of this powerful and original work is especially welcome, as it not only promotes a new way of doing anthropology, but also compellingly articulates a new rationale for why anthropology matters.

Over the course of their history, the Navajo (Diné) have constructed many types of architecture, but during the 20th century, one building emerged to become a powerful and inspiring symbol of tribal culture. This book describes the rise of the octagonal stacked-log hogan as the most important architectural form among the Diné. The Navajo Nation is the largest Indian reservation in the United States and encompasses territory from within Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah, where thousands of Native American homes, called hogans, dot the landscape. Almost all of these buildings are octagonal. Whether built from plywood nailed onto a wood frame or with other kinds of timber construction, octagonal hogans derive from the stacked-log hogan, a form which came to prominence around the middle of the last century. The stacked-log hogan has also influenced public architecture, and virtually every Diné community on the reservation has a school, senior center, office building, or community center that intentionally evokes it. Although the octagon recurs as a theme across the Navajo reservation, the inventiveness of vernacular builders and professional architects alike has produced a wide range of octagonally inspired architecture. Previous publications about Navajo material culture have emphasized weaving and metalwork, overlooking the importance of the tribe’s built environment. But, populated by an array of octagonal public buildings and by the hogan – one of the few Indigenous dwellings still in use during the 21st century – the Navajo Nation maintains a deep connection with tradition. This book describes how the hogan has remained at the center of Diné society and become the basis for the most distinctive Native American landscape in the United States. The Diné Hogan: A Modern History will appeal to scholarly and educated readers interested in Native American history and American architecture. It is also well suited to a broad selection of college courses in American studies, cultural geography, Native American art, and Native American architecture.

Clara D. True and Clinton J. Crandall, teacher and superintendent for the Indian Day School of the Santa Clara Pueblo, were typical agents in the campaign waged by the federal government to assimilate Native Americans into mainstream American society. As the primary Office of Indian Affairs officials for the Pueblo, True and Crandall administered the school and also served as de facto health officials, demographers, arbiters, and legal consultants-as well as the eyes and ears of the government. Drawing upon an extensive correspondence between True and Crandall from 1902 to 1907, Adrea Lawrence provides an intimate look at the daily lives and challenges that the two educators faced as they worked with a diverse community of Tewa Indians and Hispanos. Through this long-overlooked correspondence, Lawrence introduces us to two fascinating characters-flawed but intent individuals charged with the task of carrying out the government's colonialist Indian education policy. Through descriptions of such episodes as their disdain for older Indians' suspicion of vaccination, True and Crandall provide clear examples of the inherent contradictions in the federal government's culturally insensitive approach toward its Indian population. Yet they were also great advocates for the Indians, often stepping in to mediate in matters involving land and taxation. The complex portrait of these educators that emerges is based not just on the letters but also on corresponding documents from Pueblo Indians, periodicals, legal cases, statutes, Indian Office circulars, and anthropological studies conducted by both Native and non-Native scholars. Lawrence reveals the challenges federal employees faced as they tried to execute the federal policy of assimilation while dealing with educative issues-relating to land, disease, citizenship, and modes of education-that confronted Santa Clara Pueblo and its neighbors. Several recurring themes are traced through each chapter, such as colonization as negotiation; place as a participant; True and Crandall's notions of "good" and "bad" Indians; and the significance of the relationships among Pueblo Indians, Hispanos, and Anglos. Simultaneously caring and condescending, dedicated yet oblivious to cultural complexities, True and Crandall in these letters offer a rare and nuanced look at the daily interactions between OIA employees and their charges. It makes a unique contribution to both Native American and education history.

Annual series exploring perspectives on the history of anthropology.