You likely have n’t heard of Frederick Starr . Like his contemporary Franz Boas , Starr was an anthropologist come to fame while the discipline of anthropology was still being formed . Throughout his vocation , Starr studied people and civilisation on three dissimilar continents , and still ground prison term to make a name for himself as a lecturer at the University of Chicago . But unlike Boas — who is considered the founding father of American Anthropology — you wo n’t find Starr ’s name in many text . The tale of how Frederick Starr was nearly forgotten is one full of disceptation and ideology .
Starr’s Early Life and Career
Frederick Starr was born in 1858 in Auburn , New York , to the Reverend Frederick Starr Jr. and Helen Mills Starr . As a child , Starr was a potent student and an avid collector of fossils and minerals . He explored that involvement further at the University of Rochester , where he studied geology ; two years later , he transport to Lafayette College in Pennsylvania and graduated in 1882 . He receive a doctor’s degree in geology from Lafayette College in 1885 .
During his metre at the University of Chicago , Starr became a very influential public speaker , frequently give lectures on anthropological subject that were open to the public through the University ’s elongation program . After attending an propagation class about prehistorical and naive art , W.R. French , the director of the Art Institute of Chicago at the meter , write that Starr ’s lectures were “ both authoritative and conformable , ” and that “ Professor Starr has eminently the fine art of making scientific truth interesting to intelligent but unprofessional academic . ”
An Anthropologist is Born
According to Donald McVicker , author ofFrederick Starr : Popularizer of Anthropology , Public Intellectual , and Genuine Eccentric , Starr engaged in an fabulously wide-ranging anthropological career at the turn of the twentieth one C . He conducted notable research in Mexico , among many Native American tribes in the United States , with the Ainu people of Japan , and in several regions of Africa .
The World ’s Fairs that took seat in the United States in the late 19th and other 20th century seemed to provide Starr with the sodding opportunities to put his piece of work on video display . Much to his dismay , however , Starr was not allowed an influential position at the noted World ’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893 . He was excluded by best know anthropologist like Boas and Frederic Ward Putnam , director of Harvard ’s Peabody Museum . Starr was commissioned to collect data about and artifacts from the Eastern Cherokee people in North Carolina for Putnam and Boas , but contributed small else to this fair .
At the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis in 1904 , however , Starr ’s work made a much large splash . The anthropologist brought nine Ainu people and a translator back with him from Japan to be part of an exhibit at the fair . These Ainu , appendage of a Japanese autochthonal grouping from Hokkaido in the northern part of the country , were to be displayed as part of a literal internal representation of the evolutionary stage of humanity towards refinement ; along with several other indigenous groups foregather by other anthropologist , they were on display as “ barbarous and semi - cruel peoples . ” While this is decidedly offensive to today ’s sensibilities , the visitor reply to the display at the time was irresistibly positive , as most mass had never before take heed of the Ainu and were intrigued by their show and practices . In a1993 articleabout the Ainu exhibit , anthropologist James W. Vanstone reports the reaction from author and visitor to the exhibit :
In addition to contributing to these World ’s Fairs , Starr produced several publications in co-occurrence with his fieldwork . These publication let in many scholarly and other articles , as well as books likeThe Truth about the Congo , about his studies in that region;Indians of Southern Mexico : An Ethnographic Album ; andIn Indian Mexico : A Narrative of Travel and Labor , about the operation and findings of his extended work with Indian tribes in Mexico .
Starr’s Methods and Misconduct in Mexico
His appearance in St. Louis with the Ainu may have been Starr ’s most publicly recognized work , but if he is remembered at all today , it ’s for his fieldwork in Mexico . Starrrecalls his purpose thereinIn Indian Mexico :
The master goals in making such recordings were to follow the dispute between various Mexican tribe and to establish the placement of such people , and their race and culture , on the same scale that he had commit the Ainu , from barbarous to civilized . It was assumed at the clock time that there were physical characteristics , such as cranial shape and size of it , that could punctuate such distinctions between races ( a theory that has long since been confute ) .
In his book , Starr refers to the Mexican people he is studying as “ ignorant , timid , and untrusting . ” He also makes steady references to them being too intoxicated to permit their measure to be taken . All of these characteristics attribute to these Mexican Indians by Starr explicate , in his point in time of view , the trouble he often had in securing issue for measurement , and justified the forceful methods he felt compelled to apply . Starr took reward of the fact that prisoners could not turn down his requests to measure them , and regularly photographed and measure imprisoned subjects for his work . What ’s more , if there were individuals he like to measure who did not acquiesce , he would jeopardise them with arrest and jail meter so that they could no longer refuse . The authorisation did not object to these method , or else render support for Starr by collecting issue and keep order . Starr even recount a specific incident where policemen stopped a bullfight in progress to incur a young world take away part in the scrap for Starr ’s enquiry .
Starr Fading from View
Over time , Starr ’s brutish , unethical methods and unsavoury ideas became questionable in the eye of the anthropological community . The hypothesis of his modern-day Boas , however , start out to amass a great deal of support from other anthropologists and academic .
Boas , born and prepare in Germany , moved to the United States in 1887 and proceeded to make hearty contributions to the methodology of American anthropology . By incorporating the method acting of natural science into the discipline of anthropology , Boas emphasized the grandness of conducting research before developing hypothesis , as well as draw near study in the most honorable and unbiased way possible . What ’s more , he developed the forward-looking interpretation of polish , viewing it as learned behavior and a merchandise of a multitude ’s history , rather than a hierarchical measure of civilization that would place the western earth on top .
While most anthropologists , inspired by Boas , began to recognise the people they studied as part of the gravid , equal human race , Starr continue to regard them as primitive and subscript , demonstrated by his position towards his subjects in Mexico . Soon , Starr ’s methods of fieldwork were widely deliberate unethical and his idea about acculturation outdated .
Starr ’s charisma and ability as a speaker managed to keep him relevant in public education spheres toward the final stage of his calling . In this capacity , Starr overshadowed Boas , who preferred not to treat the general themes of anthropology necessary in public lecturing and was unquiet about his acquisition in speak English , which was not his first language . The donnish discipline of anthropology , though , became dominate by Boas ’ methods and , over the year , Frederick Starr and his methods were phase out . Today , his work is rarely take , or even cite , in treatment or course of study on anthropological history .
After 31 years at the University of Chicago , Starr retired from his post in 1923 . True to form , he continued to travel the globe and engage in public speak events until his expiry ; he died unexpectedly of pneumonia while in Japan in 1933 .
