Boas, Franz 1858-1942

ANTHROPOLOGIST

The Science of Anthropology.

Whereas Ruth Benedict offered new directions in anthropology, Franz Boas is probably the figure that made anthropology a scientific endeavor. Born in northern Germany in 1858, he studied at the universities of Heidelberg, Bonn, and Kiel, earning a doctorate in physics with a minor in geography. Following his first study expedition, to the Arctic, he visited the United States in 1884 and two years later emigrated from Germany because he perceived greater freedom in the United States to develop his own path of study. Following a brief stint as assistant editor for the journal Science, he taught and researched at Clark University, the University of Chicago, the American Museum of Natural History, and Columbia University, During his career he published about ten thousand pages on northwestern Native American societies. He also published general and specialized scientific...

[The entire page is 810 words long]

Join eNotes

The above is a free excerpt. Get total access to this content with the:

eNotes Pass