Franz Boas: Successes and Failures at the Museum of Natural History

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Nayar

February 28th 2005

Franz Boas: Successes and Failures at the Museum of Natural History

America in the early twentieth century carried with it an idealism that was deeply rooted in religion. The Christian white male was the dominant decisive force with an army of Negro slaves that were scientifically of a lesser intelligence and much inferior race. In contrast to this, Boas's study was inspired by the previously tolerant
and broad-minded German science. "Franz Boas had come of age in a far
more liberal scientific tradition" (p50). While his American counterparts measured skulls to determine racial intelligence, Boas's mentor Rudolf Virchow "prevented racial prejudice from gaining 'scientific' support..." (p50)  Although by 1887 Boas was an acknowledged expert in various fields such as Indian linguistics, mythology, and art, he was not the first choice for the department of anthropology at the Museum. He was a young anthropologist with radical and liberal attitudes towards science and what he considered scientific experience. The president of the Museum of Natural History, Morris K Jesup, agreed to bring Boas on board only after an anonymous donation was made towards his salary by Boas’s uncle (Jacobi). (p54)

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In 1896, when Boas begun work at the museum he brought with him an alarming desire for change. By the end of the first year he had pioneered a new project researching the origin of the culture group we now refer to as American Indians. Jesup has known to call this “the greatest thing ever undertaken by any museum.” (p54) The project was titled the Jesup Expedition and included anthropologists, archeologists, linguists, etc. After five long years of collecting data and variety of artifacts from various cultures the expedition ultimately resulted in failure. Boas published one volume out of an ...

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