Paul Radin

1883 – 1959.   American Socio-Cultural Anthropologist and Ethnographer

Strengths: commendable ethnographer, diligent fieldworker.

Weaknesses:  idiosyncratic approach, disliked institutionalized aspect of intellectual life

Paul Radin was an Anthropologist who received his PhD from Columbia University under the teachings of Franz Boaz.  He spent many years studying religion and mythology, though his main focus was on the culture and social life of Native Americans.  He conducted fieldwork in many regions, but continually came back to the Great Lakes Region to study the Winnebago (now the Ho-Chunk Nation) and the Ojibwa Indians.  Radin eventually taught at many universities including the University of California, Berkeley, Cambridge University, Kenyon College, University of Chicago, and Brandeis University where he became a Samuel Rubin professor and the head of the anthropology department.  He never stayed more than a few years at each school because he felt that the institutionalized aspect of intellectual life was uncongenial and preferred to be an independent scholar.

 Bibliography:

• Social Anthropology (1932)
• The World of Primitive Man (1953)
• The Method and Theory of Ethnology (1933)
• Primitive Man as Philosopher (1927)
• The Trickster: A Study in Native American Mythology (1956)

 card by Lindsey