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Herbert S. Lewis

November 13, 2023

Herbert S. Lewis (born May 8, 1934) is a Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he taught from 1963 to 1998. He has conducted extensive field research in Ethiopia and Israel and worked with Oneida Indian Nation of Wisconsin. Aside from publications based on ethnographic field research he has written theoretical works about political leadership and systems, ethnicity, cultural evolution. Since the late 1990s he has published extensively about the history of anthropology, much of it offering new insights into the work and thought of Franz Boas.

Biography edit

Early life edit

Although born across the Hudson River in New Jersey he grew up in several communities around New York City, spending his high school years in Lynbrook on Long Island. He also had the chance to work in Manhattan for several summers and to attend graduate school at Columbia University.

Education edit

Professional life edit

  • 1956-57 Departmental Fellow and Assistant, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, The City College, New York
  • 1957-58 Instructor, Department of Public Instruction, American Museum of Natural History
  • 1961 Lecturer in Anthropology, Columbia University, School of General Studies
  • 1961-63 Instructor, Departments of Anthropology and Political Science, Northwestern University
  • 1963-67 Assistant Professor of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin.
  • 1967-73 Associate Professor of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin.
  • 1973-96 Professor of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin. (Emeritus, May 1996.)
  • 1969-70 Visiting Associate Professor, The Hebrew University, Jerusalem.
  • 1978-81 Chair, Department of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin.
  • 1989-90 Resident Director, University of Wisconsin, Junior Year Abroad Program at University of Warwick, UK
  • 1993-95 Chair and Director, African Studies Program, University of Wisconsin
  • Present: Professor Emeritus in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Wisconsin- Madison.

Research career edit

In Ethiopia, Lewis studied both the history of the Oromo (Galla) Kingdom of Jimma Abba Jifar and the lives of contemporary Oromos from 1958–60 and in 1965–66. (Many of his ethnographic photographs are visible in the University of Wisconsin's Digital Library). His work in Ethiopia was concerned above all with political leadership and community organization as well as ethnohistory and culture history. The book, originally titled A Galla Monarchy: Jimma Abba Jifar, Ethiopia, 1830-1932, is a study of the nature of the monarchy, the sources of the ruler's power, as well as its origins. The study in 1965-66 centered on community life and the leadership of spirit mediums, k'allu, who effectively organized religious life and conflict resolution, and provided a degree of political leadership for rural districts.

In the 1970s and 1980s, Lewis studied ethnicity, class, and culture change in Israel, focusing on those Jews who immigrated from Yemen and Morocco. The major publication resulting from this work was After the Eagles Landed: The Yemenites of Israel. Contrary to the stereotype of the Yemenites as downtrodden and rather poor "Oriental" Jews (mizrachim in current usage) Lewis's evidence showed them to be confident, increasingly successful in status (occupation, education, political presence), as well as maintaining and developing aspects of their music, dance, arts, and persistent in the orthodox Jewish religious belief and practices they brought with them from Yemen.

His 2005 publication, Oneida Lives (see below), presents a large selection of personal accounts by Oneidas of Wisconsin that offer wide-ranging perspectives on the lives of men and women of various ages between 1885 and the beginning of World War II. (These accounts were collected by the Oneidas themselves through a WPA grant to the University of Wisconsin anthropology department. Morris Swadesh initiated the WPA project in 1937 and it was initially overseen by Floyd Lounsbury.)

His book In Defense of Anthropology: An Investigation of the Critique of Anthropology presents a series of chapters that make a sustained argument for the value and honor of modern American and British anthropology. The work traces the major transformation undergone by American anthropology as a result of the cataclysmic events of the 1960s—the war in Vietnam, the civil rights movement, the increasing rise of the women's and other identity movements, and the increasingly visible anti-colonial movements. The discipline of anthropology became the object of numerous critiques; "the critique of anthropology's complicity in projects of power is itself the main political act" (Sherry Ortner 1999). This work responds critically to these critiques, offering evidence to counter the widespread notion of anthropology as the handmaiden of colonialism, and of its liability for exoticizing and otherwise misrepresenting what post-1960s writers call "the Other."

Lewis' major research interests include: anthropological theory and history, cultural and social change, ethnicity, and political anthropology. Although initiated into anthropology by Marxian, materialist, neo-evolutionists at Brandeis and Columbia he soon became more of a Weberian-Boasian. His conversion was mediated and facilitated by fieldwork in political anthropology in Africa, a concern for ethnicity before this was a common and acceptable subject, the teaching of Conrad Arensberg, the early writings of Fredrik Barth, Max Weber on forms of political action. These led to a concern with individual action in the context of culture.

Significant works edit

Books edit

  • A Galla Monarchy:¬ Jimma Abba Jifar, Ethiopia, 1830-1932.¬ University of Wisconsin Press, 1965. (Reissued by Red Sea Press as Jimma Abba Jifar: An Oromo Monarchy. 2001)
  • After the Eagles Landed: The Yemenites of Israel. Westview, 1989. (Reissued by Waveland Press, 1994.)
  • Oneida Lives: Long-lost Voices of the Wisconsin Oneidas. (Edited with an Introduction) University of Nebraska Press, 2005.
  • In Defense of Anthropology: An Investigation of the Critique of Anthropology. Transaction Publishers, 2014.

Articles edit

  • "The Origins of the Galla and Somali," Journal of African History, 7:27-46, 1966.
  • "Leaders and Followers: Some Anthropological Perspectives," Addison Wesley Module in Anthropology, 1974.
  • "Neighbors, Friends and Kinsmen: Principles of Social Organization Among the Cushitic-Speaking Peoples of Ethiopia," Ethnology, 13(2):145-157, 1974.
  • "Warfare and the Origin of the State: Another Formulation," In Henri Claessen (ed.) The Study of the State, Mouton, (201-221) The Hague, 1981.
  • "Ethnicity in Ethiopia: The View from Below (and from the South, East and West)." In M. Crawford Young (ed.) The Rising Tide of Cultural Pluralism: The Nation State at Bay?, (158-178) Madison, Wisconsin: University of Wisconsin Press, 1993.
  • "The Misrepresentation of Anthropology and its Consequences." American Anthropologist 100 (3):716-731, Sept. 1998.
  • "The Passion of Franz Boas." American Anthropologist, 103 (2):447-467, June 2001. (Reprinted as "Afterword" to a new edition of Franz Boas, Anthropology and Modern Life, 2004, Transaction Publishing.)
  • "Boas, Darwin, Science, and Anthropology." Current Anthropology, 42(3): 381-406, June 2001.
  • "The Globalization of Spirit Possession," In: Social Critique and Commitment: Essays in Honor of Henry Rosenfeld, eds. Majid Al-Haj, Michael Saltman and Zvi Sobel. University Press of America, 2005, pp. 169–191.
  • "The Influence of Edward Said and 'Orientalism' on Anthropology, or: Can the Anthropologist Speak?." In Israel Affairs,13 (4): 774-785, 2007. (Also in C. P. Salzman, ed. Postcolonial Theory and the Arab-Israeli Conflict. 2008.)
  • "The Radical Transformation of Anthropology: History Seen through the Annual
  • Meetings of the American Anthropological Association, 1955–2005." In Regna Darnell & Frederic Gleach (eds.) Histories of Anthropology Annual #5. 2009.

"Adapt Fully to Their Customs": Franz Boas as an Ethnographer among the Inuit of Baffinland (1883-84) and His Monograph The Central Eskimo (1888). In F. Delgado Rosa & H. Vermeulen (eds.) Ethnographers Before Malinowski: Pioneers of Anthropological Fieldwork, 1870-1922. Berghahn Press. 2022. Pp. 47-82. “African Political Systems and Political Anthropology.” A. Boskovic & G. Schlee (eds.) African Political Systems Revisited. Berghahn Press. 2022.

Awards and honors edit

  • 1955 Research Institute for the Study of Man, Training and Research Fellowship, for fieldwork in St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands (summer).
  • 1956 Research Institute for the Study of Man, Training and Research Fellowship, for fieldwork in Martinique, F.W.I. (summer).
  • 1956-57 The City College, New York, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Fellowship.
  • 1958-60 Ford Foundation, Foreign Area Fellowship for dissertation research in Ethiopia (24 months).
  • 1963 Social Science Research Council Travel Grant, to attend Second International Conference of Ethiopian Studies.
  • 1965-66 National Science Foundation Research Grant for field research in Ethiopia, (15 months).
  • 1965-66 Social Science Research Council Research Grant for field research in Ethiopia, (declined in favor of the NSF grant).
  • 1969-70 National Institute of Mental Health, Small Grant for research in Israel, (11 months). 1971-72 University of Wisconsin Graduate School for research on ethnicity in Wisconsin, (with A.¬ Strickon).
  • 1975-77 National Science Foundation Research Grant for field research in Israel, (24 months).
  • 1975-77 National Institute of Mental Health Research Grant (24 months, declined in favor of the NSF grant).
  • 1987 Fulbright-CIES Research Award for field research in Israel, (Summer, 3 months, USIA).
  • 1987 Fulbright-CIES Research Award for field research in Israel. (Summer, 3 months, Department of Education-declined).
  • 1993 Received the Oromo Studies Association Award
  • 1994 Institute for the Study of Economic Culture (Boston University, Peter Berger) Fellow, June–July faculty seminar, "Democracy, Development, and Civil Society."
  • 1996 Mellon Resident Research Fellowship at the American Philosophical Society Library (one month) 2001 Brittingham Foundation grant for preparation of "Oneida Lives."
  • University of Wisconsin Graduate School Research Grants, 1964, 1967, 1970, 1971, 1973, 1978, 1981, 1987, 1989, 1991, 1994.
  • 2008-2010 President-elect of the Association of Senior Anthropologists
  • 2010–Present President of the Association of Senior Anthropologists

References edit

External links edit

  • [1] Academia.edu page
  • [2] Africa Focus Collection
  • Homepage at the University of Wisconsin-Madison
  • [4] Lewis' CV
  • [5] Oneida Lives

November 13, 2023
herbert, lewis, this, article, lead, section, short, adequately, summarize, points, please, consider, expanding, lead, provide, accessible, overview, important, aspects, article, august, 2018, born, 1934, professor, emeritus, anthropology, university, wisconsi. This article s lead section may be too short to adequately summarize the key points Please consider expanding the lead to provide an accessible overview of all important aspects of the article August 2018 Herbert S Lewis born May 8 1934 is a Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at the University of Wisconsin Madison where he taught from 1963 to 1998 He has conducted extensive field research in Ethiopia and Israel and worked with Oneida Indian Nation of Wisconsin Aside from publications based on ethnographic field research he has written theoretical works about political leadership and systems ethnicity cultural evolution Since the late 1990s he has published extensively about the history of anthropology much of it offering new insights into the work and thought of Franz Boas Contents 1 Biography 1 1 Early life 1 2 Education 1 3 Professional life 2 Research career 3 Significant works 3 1 Books 3 2 Articles 4 Awards and honors 5 References 6 External linksBiography editEarly life edit Although born across the Hudson River in New Jersey he grew up in several communities around New York City spending his high school years in Lynbrook on Long Island He also had the chance to work in Manhattan for several summers and to attend graduate school at Columbia University Education edit 1955 A B Anthropology Cum Laude Brandeis University 1963 Ph D Anthropology Columbia UniversityProfessional life edit 1956 57 Departmental Fellow and Assistant Department of Sociology and Anthropology The City College New York 1957 58 Instructor Department of Public Instruction American Museum of Natural History 1961 Lecturer in Anthropology Columbia University School of General Studies 1961 63 Instructor Departments of Anthropology and Political Science Northwestern University 1963 67 Assistant Professor of Anthropology University of Wisconsin 1967 73 Associate Professor of Anthropology University of Wisconsin 1973 96 Professor of Anthropology University of Wisconsin Emeritus May 1996 1969 70 Visiting Associate Professor The Hebrew University Jerusalem 1978 81 Chair Department of Anthropology University of Wisconsin 1989 90 Resident Director University of Wisconsin Junior Year Abroad Program at University of Warwick UK 1993 95 Chair and Director African Studies Program University of Wisconsin Present Professor Emeritus in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Wisconsin Madison Research career editIn Ethiopia Lewis studied both the history of the Oromo Galla Kingdom of Jimma Abba Jifar and the lives of contemporary Oromos from 1958 60 and in 1965 66 Many of his ethnographic photographs are visible in the University of Wisconsin s Digital Library His work in Ethiopia was concerned above all with political leadership and community organization as well as ethnohistory and culture history The book originally titled A Galla Monarchy Jimma Abba Jifar Ethiopia 1830 1932 is a study of the nature of the monarchy the sources of the ruler s power as well as its origins The study in 1965 66 centered on community life and the leadership of spirit mediums k allu who effectively organized religious life and conflict resolution and provided a degree of political leadership for rural districts In the 1970s and 1980s Lewis studied ethnicity class and culture change in Israel focusing on those Jews who immigrated from Yemen and Morocco The major publication resulting from this work was After the Eagles Landed The Yemenites of Israel Contrary to the stereotype of the Yemenites as downtrodden and rather poor Oriental Jews mizrachim in current usage Lewis s evidence showed them to be confident increasingly successful in status occupation education political presence as well as maintaining and developing aspects of their music dance arts and persistent in the orthodox Jewish religious belief and practices they brought with them from Yemen His 2005 publication Oneida Lives see below presents a large selection of personal accounts by Oneidas of Wisconsin that offer wide ranging perspectives on the lives of men and women of various ages between 1885 and the beginning of World War II These accounts were collected by the Oneidas themselves through a WPA grant to the University of Wisconsin anthropology department Morris Swadesh initiated the WPA project in 1937 and it was initially overseen by Floyd Lounsbury His book In Defense of Anthropology An Investigation of the Critique of Anthropology presents a series of chapters that make a sustained argument for the value and honor of modern American and British anthropology The work traces the major transformation undergone by American anthropology as a result of the cataclysmic events of the 1960s the war in Vietnam the civil rights movement the increasing rise of the women s and other identity movements and the increasingly visible anti colonial movements The discipline of anthropology became the object of numerous critiques the critique of anthropology s complicity in projects of power is itself the main political act Sherry Ortner 1999 This work responds critically to these critiques offering evidence to counter the widespread notion of anthropology as the handmaiden of colonialism and of its liability for exoticizing and otherwise misrepresenting what post 1960s writers call the Other Lewis major research interests include anthropological theory and history cultural and social change ethnicity and political anthropology Although initiated into anthropology by Marxian materialist neo evolutionists at Brandeis and Columbia he soon became more of a Weberian Boasian His conversion was mediated and facilitated by fieldwork in political anthropology in Africa a concern for ethnicity before this was a common and acceptable subject the teaching of Conrad Arensberg the early writings of Fredrik Barth Max Weber on forms of political action These led to a concern with individual action in the context of culture Significant works editBooks edit A Galla Monarchy Jimma Abba Jifar Ethiopia 1830 1932 University of Wisconsin Press 1965 Reissued by Red Sea Press as Jimma Abba Jifar An Oromo Monarchy 2001 After the Eagles Landed The Yemenites of Israel Westview 1989 Reissued by Waveland Press 1994 Oneida Lives Long lost Voices of the Wisconsin Oneidas Edited with an Introduction University of Nebraska Press 2005 In Defense of Anthropology An Investigation of the Critique of Anthropology Transaction Publishers 2014 Articles edit The Origins of the Galla and Somali Journal of African History 7 27 46 1966 Leaders and Followers Some Anthropological Perspectives Addison Wesley Module in Anthropology 1974 Neighbors Friends and Kinsmen Principles of Social Organization Among the Cushitic Speaking Peoples of Ethiopia Ethnology 13 2 145 157 1974 Warfare and the Origin of the State Another Formulation In Henri Claessen ed The Study of the State Mouton 201 221 The Hague 1981 Ethnicity in Ethiopia The View from Below and from the South East and West In M Crawford Young ed The Rising Tide of Cultural Pluralism The Nation State at Bay 158 178 Madison Wisconsin University of Wisconsin Press 1993 The Misrepresentation of Anthropology and its Consequences American Anthropologist 100 3 716 731 Sept 1998 The Passion of Franz Boas American Anthropologist 103 2 447 467 June 2001 Reprinted as Afterword to a new edition of Franz Boas Anthropology and Modern Life 2004 Transaction Publishing Boas Darwin Science and Anthropology Current Anthropology 42 3 381 406 June 2001 The Globalization of Spirit Possession In Social Critique and Commitment Essays in Honor of Henry Rosenfeld eds Majid Al Haj Michael Saltman and Zvi Sobel University Press of America 2005 pp 169 191 The Influence of Edward Said and Orientalism on Anthropology or Can the Anthropologist Speak In Israel Affairs 13 4 774 785 2007 Also in C P Salzman ed Postcolonial Theory and the Arab Israeli Conflict 2008 The Radical Transformation of Anthropology History Seen through the Annual Meetings of the American Anthropological Association 1955 2005 In Regna Darnell amp Frederic Gleach eds Histories of Anthropology Annual 5 2009 Adapt Fully to Their Customs Franz Boas as an Ethnographer among the Inuit of Baffinland 1883 84 and His Monograph The Central Eskimo 1888 In F Delgado Rosa amp H Vermeulen eds Ethnographers Before Malinowski Pioneers of Anthropological Fieldwork 1870 1922 Berghahn Press 2022 Pp 47 82 African Political Systems and Political Anthropology A Boskovic amp G Schlee eds African Political Systems Revisited Berghahn Press 2022 Awards and honors edit1955 Research Institute for the Study of Man Training and Research Fellowship for fieldwork in St John U S Virgin Islands summer 1956 Research Institute for the Study of Man Training and Research Fellowship for fieldwork in Martinique F W I summer 1956 57 The City College New York Department of Sociology and Anthropology Fellowship 1958 60 Ford Foundation Foreign Area Fellowship for dissertation research in Ethiopia 24 months 1963 Social Science Research Council Travel Grant to attend Second International Conference of Ethiopian Studies 1965 66 National Science Foundation Research Grant for field research in Ethiopia 15 months 1965 66 Social Science Research Council Research Grant for field research in Ethiopia declined in favor of the NSF grant 1969 70 National Institute of Mental Health Small Grant for research in Israel 11 months 1971 72 University of Wisconsin Graduate School for research on ethnicity in Wisconsin with A Strickon 1975 77 National Science Foundation Research Grant for field research in Israel 24 months 1975 77 National Institute of Mental Health Research Grant 24 months declined in favor of the NSF grant 1987 Fulbright CIES Research Award for field research in Israel Summer 3 months USIA 1987 Fulbright CIES Research Award for field research in Israel Summer 3 months Department of Education declined 1993 Received the Oromo Studies Association Award 1994 Institute for the Study of Economic Culture Boston University Peter Berger Fellow June July faculty seminar Democracy Development and Civil Society 1996 Mellon Resident Research Fellowship at the American Philosophical Society Library one month 2001 Brittingham Foundation grant for preparation of Oneida Lives University of Wisconsin Graduate School Research Grants 1964 1967 1970 1971 1973 1978 1981 1987 1989 1991 1994 2008 2010 President elect of the Association of Senior Anthropologists 2010 Present President of the Association of Senior AnthropologistsReferences editExternal links edit 1 Academia edu page 2 Africa Focus Collection 3 Homepage at the University of Wisconsin Madison 4 Lewis CV 5 Oneida Lives Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Herbert S Lewis amp oldid 1171511498, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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