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Alfred Irving Hallowell

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Alfred Irving Hallowell
Born(1892-12-28)December 28, 1892
DiedOctober 10, 1974(1974-10-10) (aged 81)
NationalityAmerican
Scientific career
FieldsAnthropology

Alfred Irving "Pete" Hallowell (/ˈhæləwɛl/; 1892–1974) was an American anthropologist, archaeologist and businessman.

Early life and education

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Hallowell was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and attended the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania receiving his B.S. degree in 1914. It was assumed he would follow a career in business but Hallowell developed interests in sociology and became first a social worker for the Family Society.[1]

Hallowell expanded his interests, taking classes in anthropology. At the University of Pennsylvania, he completed his M.A. in 1920, and his Ph.D. in anthropology in 1924.[1] His doctoral dissertation was titled "Bear Ceremonialism in the Northern Hemisphere".[2] Hallowell was a student of the anthropologist Frank Speck but whilst studying for his Ph.D., Hallowell travelled to Columbia University to attend the weekly seminar led by Franz Boas - the ideas discussed at which greatly influenced Hallowell's development as an anthropologist.[1]

Career

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From 1927 through 1963 Hallowell was a professor of anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania - excepting 1944 through 1947 when he taught the subject at Northwestern University. Hallowell played a central role in developing Northwestern's Anthropology department as a major centre in the United States for the study of the discipline.[2]

Hallowell's main field of study was Native Americans including the Abenaki, the Montagnais-Naskapi but particularly the Ojibwe, about whom he wrote nearly forty individual papers, articles, chapters, and one monograph.[2] This output has been described as "one of the most complete recordings of the changing way of life of a hunting-and-gathering population that is available in the ethnographic record".[2]

In his research he utilised anthropological techniques such as ethnography and linguistic studies but also methods drawn from clinical psychology - mainly the Rorschach, or ink-blot, test - to assess the personality structures of Native American populations. Use of such a methodology made Hallowell a controversial figure for many anthropologists.[2]

His students included the anthropologists Melford Spiro, Anthony F. C. Wallace, Raymond D. Fogelson, George W. Stocking, Jr., Regna Darnell, Erika Eichhorn Bourguignon, James W. VanStone and Marie-Françoise Guédon.

After his retirement, his position was filled by the linguistic anthropologist and folklorist Dell Hymes.

Honours

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Hallowell received numerous honors and awards. He served as president of the American Anthropological Association (1949), the American Folklore Society (1940-41),[3] and the Society for Projective Techniques.[2]

Hallowell also served as chairman of the Division of Psychology and Anthropology of the National Research Council (1946–49) and was elected a Fellow of both the National Academy of Sciences (1961) and the American Philosophical Society (1963).[4]

He received the Viking Medal for outstanding achievement in anthropology in 1956.[2]

Selected publications

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  • Bear Ceremonialism in the Northern Hemisphere (1926)
  • The Role of Conjuring in Saulteaux Society (1942)
  • Culture and Experience (1955)
  • Ojibwa Ontology, Behavior, and World View (1960)
  • Contributions to Anthropology (1976)

Further reading

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  • Darnell, Regna (2006) "Keeping the Faith: A Legacy of Native American Ethnography, Ethnohistory, and Psychology." In: New Perspectives on Native North America: Cultures, Histories, and Representations, ed. by Sergei A. Kan and Pauline Turner Strong, pp. 3–16. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.
  • Kan, Sergei A., and Pauline Turner Strong (2006) Introduction. In: New Perspectives on Native North America: Cultures, Histories, and Representations, pp. xi-xlii. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.

References

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  1. ^ a b c Spiro, Melford E. (1976). "Alfred Irving Hallowell, 1892-1974". American Anthropologist. 78 (3): 608–611. doi:10.1525/aa.1976.78.3.02a00090. ISSN 0002-7294. JSTOR 674422.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Wallace, Anthony F. C. (1980). "Alfred Irving Hallowell, 1892—1974: A Biographical Memoir" (PDF). National Academy of Sciences.
  3. ^ "Past AFS Presidents". The American Folklore Society. Retrieved March 5, 2022.
  4. ^ "Alfred Irving Hallowell". January 24, 2005. Archived from the original on January 24, 2005. Retrieved March 5, 2022.