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of the Histories of Anthropology

Anthropologist Eric R. Wolf (1923-1999) was a leading figure in American anthropology throughout the second half of the twentieth century. Born in Austria, Wolf escaped Nazi occupied Europe and moved with his family to New York City in 1939. Wolf earned his PhD in 1951 at Columbia University. He was a leader among those who sought to restore historically and regionally situated understandings of power relations to anthropological study. Wolf conducted ethnographic research in Puerto Rico, Mexico, and Southern Italy. Wolf is best known for his book Europe and the People Without History (1982) and is remembered as well for organizing academic responses to American wars in Southeast Asia in the 1960s.

Keywords: History | Marxism | Second half of the 20th century | Italy | Mexico | Puerto Rico | Race

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