Frederica de Laguna

Frederica de Laguna with the Danish geographer and ethnologist Kaj Birket-Smith on March 18, 1937

Frederica de Laguna (born October 3, 1906 in Ann Arbor , Michigan , † October 6, 2004 in Haverford , Pennsylvania ) was an American ethnologist , anthropologist , archaeologist and writer . She is considered to be the pioneer of archeology in Alaska and is best known for her research on Paleo-Indian cultures. De Laguna founded the Department of Anthropology at Bryn Mawr College . She was one of the first two women to be inducted into the National Academy of Sciences .

life and work

Frederica de Laguna was the daughter of Theodore Lopez de Leo de Laguna and Grace Mead Andrus, who both taught philosophy at Bryn Mawr College. She was homeschooled by her parents until she was 9 years old. She later attended the Phoebe Anne Thorne School . During Frederica's school days, her parents spent two years in Europe. From 1921 to 1922 she attended the Lycée de jeunes filles in Versailles .

She studied economics and political science at Bryn Mawr College and graduated in 1927. She won a research fellowship, which she did not take up immediately. Instead, she first studied anthropology for a year at Columbia University with Franz Boas , Gladys Reichard and Ruth Benedict . Boas sparked her interest in the arts of the Alaskan indigenous people. In the summer of 1928 she went on an educational trip to prehistoric sites in England , France and Spain . In the Dordogne department she took part in archaeological excavations and met Henri Breuil , who inspired her for the art of the Paleolithic . She attended lectures by Henri Breuil in Paris and a seminar with Bronisław Malinowski in London . In order to learn more about the prehistory of Denmark , Frederica de Laguna visited Copenhagen and met the archaeologist and cartographer Therkel Mathiassen and the ethnologist and geologist Kaj Birket-Smith . Mathiassen was planning the first archaeological research excavation in Greenland and employed de Laguna as an assistant. In 1929 de Laguna planned to take part as Birket-Smith's assistant on his research trip to Prince William Sound in Alaska. When Birket-Smith fell ill, she took over the expedition together with her younger brother Wallace de Laguna, who studied geology . De Laguna later wrote her autobiographical book Voyage to Greenland about these first trips to Alaska . A Personal Initiation Into Anthropology .

From 1931 de Laguna worked in the Museum of the University of Pennsylvania , which also funded her further research in Prince William Sound. In 1933 she received her Ph.D. for her research work on modern and prehistoric culture in Alaska. from Columbia University. In it, she examined the question of whether the contemporary art of the indigenous population of Alaska was directly related to Upper Paleolithic art and came to the conclusion that although there were parallels, no straight-line historical development could be demonstrated. In 1935, de Laguna led an anthropological and geological survey in the Yukon Valley, and in 1936 another in the Pima area on behalf of the Soil Conservation Service of the State of Arizona .

It was around this time that de Laguna began writing novels . Her first novel, the historical book for young people The Thousand March: Adventures of an American Boy with the Garibaldi , was published in 1930 and is about Giuseppe Garibaldi's Zug der Thousand . She then wrote two detective novels, The Arrow Points to Murder , in which she processed her museum work, and Fog on the Mountain , which is set in Alaska. She invested the proceeds from the books in her research projects, including a study trip to Denmark in 1938.

In 1938 Frederica de Laguna accepted her first teaching position at Bryn Mawr College. Their anthropological and archaeological seminars were located in the Sociology Department , as there was no institute for anthropology at that time. On de Laguna's initiative, a joint institute for sociology and anthropology was established and de Laguna became its first director. In 1967 the Institute for Anthropology became an independent unit, still headed by Frederica de Laguna. De Laguna has also taught as visiting professor at the University of Pennsylvania and the University of California, Berkeley .

During the Second World War worked de Laguna for three years for the United States Navy Reserve and taught at Smith College recruiters of women's unit WAVES in naval history and cryptography .

After the war, Frederica de Laguna returned to Alaska and started a new research project on the Tlingit culture in Yakutat . Her three-volume monograph became the standard work on Tlingit culture. Then she turned to the area of ​​the Copper River , where she researched until 1968. In her research, de Laguna combined archaeological, anthropological and ethnological perspectives. For the American Anthropological Association de Laguna edited the anthology Selected Papers from the American Anthropologist, 1888-1920 . This selection of scientific articles from the late 19th and early 20th centuries was one of the first contributions to the history of science in anthropology.

Frederica de Laguna taught and researched at Bryn Mawr College until she retired in 1972. Despite her dwindling eyesight, she continued to spend much time in Alaska, especially with the Tlingit. The documentary Reunion at Mt St. Elias: The Return of Frederica de Laguna to Yakutat of Laura Bliss Spann shows her return to the territory of the Tlingit almost 50 years after their first visit. De Laguna also worked as an archaeological and ethnological advisor to the US Forest Service and founded the Frederica de Laguna Northern Books Press for studies of Arctic cultures. She wrote another autobiographical book in which she reflected on her academic career. It was published in 2003 under the title Becoming an Anthropologist. My Debt to European and Other Scholars Who Influenced Me .

Frederica de Laguna died in 2004 three days after her 98th birthday.

Offices and honors

Frederica de Laguna was Vice President of the Society for American Archeology from 1949 to 1950 . From 1966 to 1967 she was the vice president of the American Anthropological Association . The organization gave her the Distinguished Service Award in 1986 .

In 1972 de Laguna received the Lindback Award for Distinguished Teaching from Bryn Mawr College. In 1975, Frederica de Laguna and Margaret Mead were the first women to be elected to the National Academy of Sciences . In 1999 the University of Pennsylvania awarded her the Lucy Wharton Drexel Medal.

Frederica de Laguna also enjoyed great respect among the indigenous people of Alaska. The Tlingit in Yakutat honored them with a potlatch in 1996 .

Bryn Mawr College dedicated an exhibition to her in 1999 recognizing her work for the university and her contribution to the exploration of Alaska.

Fonts (selection)

Scientific literature

• The Archeology of Cook Inlet, Alaska. University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia 1934 (with Bruno Oetteking).
• The Eyak Indians of the Copper River Delta, Alaska. Levin & Munksgaard, Copenhagen 1938 (with Kaj Birket-Smith).
• The Prehistory of Northern North America As Seen From the Yukon. Society for American Archeology, Menasha 1947.
• Chugach Prehistory. The Archeology of Prince William Sound, Alaska. (= University of Washington Publications in Anthropology. Volume 13.) University of Washington Press, Seattle 1956.
• The Story of a Tlingit Community. A Problem in the Relationship Between Archeological, Ethnological, And Historical Methods. USGPO, Washington 1960.
• Selected Papers from the American Anthropologist, 1888-1920. Row, Peterson, Evanston 1960 (as editor Irving Hallowell).
• Archeology of the Yakutat Bay Area, Alaska. USGPO, Washington 1964.
• Under Mount Saint Elias. The History and Culture of the Yakutat Tlingit. (= Smithsonian Contributions to Anthropology. Volume 7.) Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington 1972.
• Voyage to Greenland. A Personal Initiation Into Anthropology . 1977.
• The Tlingit Indians. (= Anthropological papers of the American Museum of Natural Histor. Volume 70.) University of Washington Press, Seattle 1991 (based on an unfinished manuscript by George Thornton Emmons).
• Tales from the Dena. Indian Stories from the Tanana, Koyukuk, & Yukon Rivers. University of Washington Press, Seattle 1995 (with Norman Reynolds and Dale DeArmond).
• Becoming an Anthropologist. My Debt to European and Other Scholars Who Influenced Me. 2003.

Novels

• 1930: The Thousand March. Adventures of an American Boy with the Garibaldi
• 1937: The Arrow Points to Murder
• 1938: Fog on the Mountain

Filmography

• 1992: Video Dialogues in Anthropology
• 1997: Reunion at Mt St. Elias: The Return of Frederica de Laguna to Yakutat

literature

• Catharine McClellan: Frederica de Laguna. In: Ute Gacs (Ed.): Women Anthropologists: A Biographical Dictionary. Greenwood Press, New York 1988, pp. 37-44.
• Regna Darnell: Frederica de Laguna (1906-2004). In: American Anthropologist. Volume 107, No. 3, 2005, pp. 554-556.
• Steve Ferzacca, Laura Bliss Spaan: Frederica de Laguna and Her Reunion Under Mount Saint Elias. (1998).

Web links

Commons : Frederica de Laguna  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Literature by and about Frederica de Laguna in the WorldCat bibliographic database
• Directory of Frederica de Laguna's estate: Part 1 , Part 2 , on the website of the National Museum of Natural History
• Frederica de Laguna on the Bryn Mawr College website
• Interview from 1984 , 1:11:56

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k l m} Short biography in the directory of Frederica de Laguna's estate, pp. 3–5.
2. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g h} Catharine McClellan: Frederica de Laguna. In: Ute Gacs (Ed.): Women Anthropologists: A Biographical Dictionary. Greenwood Press, New York 1988, pp. 37-44.
3. ↑ Frederica de Laguna ( Memento of the original from January 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. from the Bryn Mawr College website , accessed February 25, 2017.