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Melford Spiro
American anthropologist (1920-2014) · United States · On the map · Academics · Died at 94
Melford Elliot Spiro was an American cultural anthropologist specializing in religion and psychological anthropology.
Melford Spiro is read about 8 times a day, in 10 languages.
A typical day, 30 days to 18 June 2026
The middle day of the days counted, so one week of news cannot move it. The line under it is the last 60 days, one point a day.
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About this person
He is known for his critiques of the pillars of contemporary anthropological theory - wholesale cultural determinism, radical cultural relativism, and virtually limitless cultural diversity - and for his emphasis on the theoretical importance of unconscious desires and beliefs in the study of stability and change in social and cultural systems, particularly in respect to the family, politics, and religion. Explicated in numerous theoretical publications, they are empirically exemplified in monographs based on his fieldwork in Ifaluk atoll in Micronesia, an Israeli kibbutz, and a village in Burma.
