Dr. Marvin Harris
was born on August 18, 1927 in Brooklyn, New York. Upon the completion of his
higher education, he spent a portion of his life teaching in the Anthropology
Department at Columbia University where
he served as the Department Chair. In 1981, he accepted the position of
Graduate Research Professor of Anthropology at the University of Florida. Dr. Harris was
the Chair of the General Anthropology Division of the
American Anthropological Association.
Dr. Marvin Harris is considered to be a generalist with an interest in the global processes that account for human origins and the evolution of human cultures. Due to his interests in cultural anthropology, Dr. Harris assumed the role of an anthropological historian theoretician. His work with cultural materialism took him to the Islas de la Bahia, Brazil, Mozambique, Ecuador, India and East Harlem.
Dr. Harris shared his knowledge of cultural anthropology with the world through the publication of 16 books. They include Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches and Cannibals and Kings. He also authored an introductory anthropology college textbook with multiple editions titled Culture, People, Nature. Upon the completion of his previous publications, he composed a series of essays concerning modern human behavior based on our origins according to evolution which he has titled, Our Kind. Dr. Harris died in Gainesville, Florida on October 25, 2001 2001.
Harris, Marvin. Our Kind. Harper Perennial, 1989.
Written by: Students in an Introduction to Anthropology Class, Minnesota State University, Mankato, Minnesota 2001