BOAS, Franz
- Era: 1858 - 1942
- Location: United States
- Categories: SOCIAL SCIENCE
Emigrating from Germany where he had spent the first third of his life, and from an academic background in Geography, Boas was a key protagonist in the development of the discipline of Anthropology. His approach included a readiness to draw on archaeology, ethnography and linguistics in the service of better understanding the diversities of human culture. Field work and scientific rigour were necessary prerequisites. His early life experience of anti-semitic and nationalistic sentiments, which fuelled his naturalized US citizenship, contributed to his ever-readiness to expose racism. From his professorial base at Columbia, he became a significant shaping influence in both the personal and professional lives of successive generations of those within the US and beyond who helped define and establish what anthropology properly brings to human self-understanding and the moral worth within it.
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