Category:Between the Wars 1914-1945

WWI caused a major break in the intellectual careers of early sociologists and anthropologists, and put an end to the work of Durkheim and Weber. The school of sociology that Durkheim had established in Paris flourished under his nephew Marcel Mauss. Boas continued working at Columbia, but the post-war period really belonged to his many extraordinary students. In both the US and England, this period saw the rise of ethnographic fieldwork and participant observation as the primary methodology of anthropology. WWII, and the beginning of the Cold War, changed the conversation again.

In Europe during this period the dominant theoretical trend was known as Functionalism, and later Structural-Functionalism. Pure structuralism would come soon afterwards. In the US, Anthropology in the Boasian school was dominated by discussions of Cultural Relativism and by attempts to systematize the concept of Culture.

Scholars associated with this period include, in the US: Franz Boas, Margaret Mead, Alfred Kroeber, Ruth Benedict. In France: Marcel Mauss, Lucien Levy-Bruhl. In England: Bronislaw Malinowski, R.R. Radcliffe-Browne, E.E. Evans-Pritchard.