Alfred Kroeber
(1876-1960, The United States)
Alfred Kroeber was familiar with many areas of anthropology, such as ethnology, linguistics and archaeology.He was a Historical Particularist, who claimed that each society has its own unique historical development. He was especially known for the idea of “superorganic” in cultural anthropology. Kroeber defined superorganic as certain cultural aspects that do not directly originate from individuals within the society. For example, he studied women’s dress fashion over 300 years and discovered that skirt length changed in a periodic cycle. Kroeber considered various causes that might affect the skirt length, such as political instability, but failed to find any reason for the cycle. Therefore, he came to the conclusion that fashion cannot be explained by outside factors because it evolves according to its own internal laws. He named this independent cultural realm superorganic. Fashion is purely cultural since it is learned, shared, patterned and meaningful among individuals in the society. At the same time, fashion has its own cycle which is beyond the control of individuals. The idea superorganic was introduced to explain this kind of impersonal realm in cultures. This concept dominated anthropological discussion for several decades although it was criticized as being more metaphysical than scientific thought.
Besides presenting the idea of superorganic, Kroeber conducted extensive fieldwork among Native American tribes, especially in California. His research was significant particularly because most tribes were rapidly losing their undisturbed traditions because of the US administration at that time. In a sense, Kroeber’s records preserved their authentic traditions even though the tribes no longer practice the traditions. His ethnographies and linguistic records have led to ethnological hypotheses and methods, which have contributed to the development of theories in cultural anthropology.
Sources:
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Barfield, Thomas. 1996 The Dictionary of Anthropology. Malden: Blackwell.
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Moore, Jerry D. 1997 Visions of Culture. Walnut Creek: AltaMira Press.
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Lavenda, Robert H. and Emily A Schultz. 2003 Core Concepts in Cultural Anthropology. Boston: Mc Graw Hill.