Franz Boas, Social Activist: The Dynamics of Ethnicity

(Hardback)

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Considered the father of modern American anthropology, Franz Boas introduced the relativistic, culture-centered methods and principles of inquiry that continue to dominate the field. This study analyzes the development of his thought and his contributions to radical and ethnic theory in the context of his own ethnicity and personal experience with persecution. The author focuses primarily on Boas's attempt to fuse science with political and social activism - an effort to insure that his ideological contributions to science had practical relevance to the difficult issues facing American society. Hyatt fills in the details of Boas's background, from his early years in Germany to his emigration to the United States in the late 1880s, and discusses his pivotal role in transforming anthropology from an amateur pursuit into a rigorous academic discipline. The author examines Boas's attacks on those who used "science" to promulgate theories of racial inferiority based on alleged differences in mental ability. He traces the origins of Boas's own theories and the use that he made of them in working for equal rights for immigrants and African Americans. This is a biographical study focusing on the historical meaning of Boas's contributions and the motivating forces that shaped his work.

Reviews

This selective biography of Franz Boas concentrates on the great anthropoligist's work as a student of race and as a courageous opponent to scientific and popular racism. Historian Hyatt ignores all other aspects of Boas's personal and professional life execpt those that have an obvious connection with his multifaceted work on ethnicity. It is, however, a fine and important achievement, which by its careful reexamination of Boas the scientist and Boas the citizen has reestablished the anthropologist's preeminence in the scientific and ideological resistance to racism. This well-written biography-based on a wide array of previous publications (the influence of M. J. Herskovits's biography Franz Boas: The Science of Man in the Making, 1953, is evident) and on the Boas papers and correspondence-is a welcome contribution to the scholarly discourse on the resurgence of racism and nativism in Western society. This work is recommended for all academic and public libraries.-Choice
"This selective biography of Franz Boas concentrates on the great anthropoligist's work as a student of race and as a courageous opponent to scientific and popular racism. Historian Hyatt ignores all other aspects of Boas's personal and professional life execpt those that have an obvious connection with his multifaceted work on ethnicity. It is, however, a fine and important achievement, which by its careful reexamination of Boas the scientist and Boas the citizen has reestablished the anthropologist's preeminence in the scientific and ideological resistance to racism. This well-written biography-based on a wide array of previous publications (the influence of M. J. Herskovits's biography Franz Boas: The Science of Man in the Making, 1953, is evident) and on the Boas papers and correspondence-is a welcome contribution to the scholarly discourse on the resurgence of racism and nativism in Western society. This work is recommended for all academic and public libraries."-Choice

Author Bio

MARSHALL HYATT is Director of the Center for Afro-American Studies at Wesleyan University in Connecticut. He is the author of The Afro-American Cinematic Experience and articles on African American civil rights, race and ethnicity, and film and its influence on American history in journals such as The Journal of Negro Education, Negro History Bulletin, Perspectives in American History, and The Western Journal of Black Studies.