Alfred Reginald Radcliffe-Brown was an English social anthropologist who helped develop the theory of structural functionalism. He carried out fieldwork in the Andaman Islands and Western Australia that became the basis of his later books, held academic appointments at universities in Cape Town, Sydney, Chicago and Oxford, and sought to model the study of anthropology after the natural sciences.
Facts
BirthplaceSparkbrook, Birmingham, England 1 Nationality / Culture Defining ContributionFounded structural-functionalist theory in British social anthropology, using comparative ethnographic fieldwork to analyze how social institutions function to maintain the structure of a society as an integrated system. 1 Notable WorkStructure and Function in Primitive Society (1952) 1 A. R. Radcliffe-Brown
Connections
Institutions Informed
Gluckman early structural-functionalism drew directly on Radcliffe-Brown before Gluckman own Manchester School extended and revised it around conflict and process.
Fortes structural-functionalist studies of African kinship developed in close intellectual dialogue with Radcliffe-Brown comparative method.
Practices Studied
Radcliffe-Brown analyzed kin avoidance customs alongside their joking counterpart in On Joking Relationships, Africa 13(3), 1940, the founding structural-functionalist treatment of both patterns.
Radcliffe-Brown's On Joking Relationships, Africa 13(3), 1940, is the foundational anthropological study defining and analyzing the joking relationship.
In the Other Atlases
Sources
1. A. R. Radcliffe-Brown (Wikipedia)
Wikipedialead paragraph, opening sentences (dates through academic appointments)Quote, lead paragraph, opening sentences (dates through academic appointments)
17 January 1881 - 24 October 1955) was an English social anthropologist who helped develop the theory of structural functionalism. He performed fieldwork in the Andaman Islands and Western Australia, which became the basis of his later books. He had academic appointments at universities in Cape Town, Sydney, Chicago, and Oxford, and sought to model the topic of anthropology after the natural sciences.
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