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Johannes Fabian

Anthropology

Johannes Fabian was a German anthropologist who served as professor of anthropology at the University of Amsterdam. His ethnographic and historical research focused on religious movements, language, work, and popular culture in the Shaba mining region of Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of the Congo, while his theoretical and critical work addressed questions of epistemology and history in anthropology, most notably in his influential book Time and the Other (1983), which became a classic in the field.

Facts
Birth DateSourced to the subject's own account
1937-05-19 1
Birth YearSourced to the subject's own account
1937 1
Death DateSourced to the subject's own account
2026-01-06 1
Death YearSourced to the subject's own account
2026 1
BirthplaceSourced to the subject's own account
Glogau (then Germany, now in Poland) 1
Nationality / CultureSourced to the subject's own account
German 1
Defining ContributionSourced to the subject's own account
Author of Time and the Other: How Anthropology Makes its Object (1983), a work that changed how anthropologists think about their relationship with the people they study and is considered an important work of postcolonial critique within anthropology. 1
Notable WorkSourced to the subject's own account
Time and the Other: How Anthropology Makes its Object (1983) 1
In the Other Atlases
Sources
1. Wikipedia: Johannes Fabian
Wikipedia
  • Early life section, first sentence
    Johannes Fabian was born on 19 May 1937 in the German town of Glogau (now in Poland).
  • Death notice
    Fabian died on 6 January 2026, at the age of 88.
  • Lead paragraph, first sentence
    was a German anthropologist who was professor of anthropology at the University of Amsterdam.
  • Lead paragraph, work description
    Fabian is most famous for his book Time and the Other: How Anthropology Makes its Object (1983), a classic in the field of anthropology that had changed the way that anthropologists think about their relationship with the people they study and is an important work of postcolonial critique within anthropology.
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