Caroline Humphrey, Baroness Rees of Ludlow, (''née'' Waddington; born 1 September 1943) is a British
anthropologist
An anthropologist is a scientist engaged in the practice of anthropology. Anthropologists study aspects of humans within past and present societies. Social anthropology, cultural anthropology and philosophical anthropology study the norms, values ...
and academic.
Biography
Humphrey's father was the biologist
Conrad H. Waddington. Her mother was her father's second wife, architect
Margaret Justin Blanco White
Margaret Justin Blanco White Order of the British Empire, OBE ARIBA (11 December 1911 – 1 November 2001) was an English architect, who lived and worked in Scotland.
Early life and education
Margaret Justin Blanco White was born at 30 Pembrok ...
(daughter of the writer
Amber Reeves); she has a younger sister, the mathematician
Dusa McDuff, and an elder half-brother, the physicist C. Jake Waddington, by her father's first marriage to Cecil Elizabeth Lascelles.
Humphrey received a BA degree in Social Anthropology from
Girton College, Cambridge. Her PhD, completed in 1973, was entitled ''Magical Drawings in the Religion of the Buryat''. She received the
Rivers Memorial Medal in 1999, and, in 2003, an Honorary Doctorate from the
National University of Mongolia. Humphrey was awarded an honorary doctorate by the
University of Bolton
The University of Greater Manchester (legally: The University of Bolton Higher Education Corporation) is a public university in Bolton, Greater Manchester in England. The university is commonly referred to as a 'post-92' institution, which is a ...
in 2017 for her outstanding contribution to the field of anthropology.
Personal life
In 1967, Caroline Waddington married
Nicholas Humphrey
Nicholas Keynes Humphrey (born 27 March 1943) is an English neuropsychologist based in Cambridge, known for his work on the evolution of primate intelligence and consciousness. He studied mountain gorillas with Dian Fossey in Rwanda; he was t ...
; they had no children and divorced in 1977. In 1986, she married
Martin Rees.
Research and positions
Humphrey has conducted research in Siberia, Nepal, India, Mongolia, China (Inner Mongolia), Uzbekistan and Ukraine. In 1966, she was one of the first
Anthropologist
An anthropologist is a scientist engaged in the practice of anthropology. Anthropologists study aspects of humans within past and present societies. Social anthropology, cultural anthropology and philosophical anthropology study the norms, values ...
from a western country to be allowed to do fieldwork in the USSR. Her PhD (1973) focussed on Buryat religious iconography, and ensuing research topics have included Soviet collective farms, the farming economy in India and Tibet, Jainist culture in India, and environmental and cultural conservation in Inner Asia.
Between 1971 and 1978, she undertook research, holding a fellowship at
Girton College, Cambridge and at a post at the
Scott Polar Research Institute
The Scott Polar Research Institute (SPRI) is a centre for research into the polar regions and glaciology worldwide. It is a sub-department of the Department of Geography in the University of Cambridge, located on Lensfield Road in the south ...
. From 1978 to 1983 she lectured at the Department of Social Anthropology at the
University of Cambridge
The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...
, before becoming a director of studies in archaeology and anthropology in 1984-89, and 1992-96. Humphrey has held the posts of university reader in Asian anthropology, University of Cambridge, 1995–98; university professor of Asian anthropology, 1998–2006; visiting professor at the University of Michigan, 2000; and Rausing Professorship of Collaborative Anthropology, 2006–10.
In 1986 she co-founded the Mongolia and Inner Asia Studies Unit (MIASU) at Cambridge, together with
Urgunge Onon. She retired from her post as Sigrid Rausing Professor of Collaborative Anthropology at the
University of Cambridge
The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...
to become Voluntary Research Director of MIASU in October 2010.
She has been a Fellow of
King's College, Cambridge
King's College, formally The King's College of Our Lady and Saint Nicholas in Cambridge, is a List of colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college lies beside the River Cam and faces ...
since 1978. In 2010, she completed the manuscript of a monograph, jointly written with Hurelbaatar Ujeed, entitled ''A Monastery in Time: the Making of Mongolian Buddhism''. The book was the culmination of fieldwork and visits, from 1995, to Mergen Monastery in the
Urad Mongols region of Inner Mongolia (China), where a distinctive form of Mongolian-language Buddhism has survived since the 18th century.
Honours
In the
2011 New Year Honours
The New Year Honours 2011 were announced on 31 December 2010 in the United Kingdom,United Kingdom: New Zealand,New Zealand"New Year Honours 2011"(14 January 2011) 2 '' New Zealand Gazette'' 55. The Cook IslandsThe Cook Islands: Grenada,Grenada: ...
, Humphrey was appointed
Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding valuable service in a wide range of useful activities. It comprises five classes of awards across both civil and military divisions, the most senior two o ...
(DBE) 'for services to scholarship'.
Humphrey is an honorary fellow of
Robinson College, Cambridge
Robinson College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1977, it is one of the newest Oxbridge colleges and is unique in having been intended, from its inception, for both ...
. In 2004, she was elected to the
American Philosophical Society
The American Philosophical Society (APS) is an American scholarly organization and learned society founded in 1743 in Philadelphia that promotes knowledge in the humanities and natural sciences through research, professional meetings, publicat ...
.
Work
* ''Karl Marx Collective: Economy, Society and Religion in a Siberian Collective Farm''
taley Prize, School of American Research(1983)
* (ed. with Michael Carrithers) ''The Assembly of Listeners: Jains in Society'' (1991)
* (ed. with Stephen Hugh-Jones) ''Barter, Exchange and Value'' (1992)
* (ed. with Nicholas Thomas) ''Shamanism, History and the State'' (1994)
* (with
James Laidlaw) ''The Archetypal Actions of Ritual, illustrated by the Jain rite of worship'' (1994)
* (with
Urgunge Onon) ''Shamans and Elders: Experience, Knowledge and Power among the Daur Mongols'' (1996)
* (ed. with David Sneath) ''Culture and Environment in Inner Asia'' (1996)
* (with Piers Vitebsky) ''Sacred Architecture'' (1997)
his is a popular work
His or HIS may refer to:
Computing
* Hightech Information System, a Hong Kong graphics card company
* Honeywell Information Systems
* Hybrid intelligent system
* Microsoft Host Integration Server
Education
* Hangzhou International School, in ...
* ''Marx Went Away, but Karl Stayed Behind'' (1998)
* (with David Sneath) ''The End of Nomadism? Society, the State and the Environment in Inner Asia'' (1999)
* (ed. with A. Tulokhonov) ''Kul'tura i Priroda vo Vnutrenneyi Azii'' ''(Culture and Environment in Inner Asia, in Russian)'' (2001)
* (ed. with David Sneath) (2002)
* ''The Unmaking of Soviet Life: Everyday Economies After Socialism''
eldt Prize(2002)
* (ed. with Katherine Verdery) ''Property in Question: Value Transformation in the Global Economy'' (2004)
* (ed. with Catherine Alexander and Victor Buchli) ''Urban Life in Post-Soviet Central Asia'' (2007)
* (with Hurelbaatar Ujeed) ''A Monastery in Time: The Making of Mongolian Buddhism''
ssociation for Asian Studies: E. Gene Smith Book Prize Honorable Mention(2013)
References
External links
Caroline Humphrey interviewby
Alan Macfarlane
Alan Donald James Macfarlane (born 20 December 1941) is a British anthropologist and historian, and a Professor Emeritus of King's College, Cambridge. He is the author or editor of 20 books and numerous articles on the anthropology and histo ...
(August 5, 2010)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Humphrey, Caroline
1943 births
Living people
Academics of the University of Cambridge
Alumni of Girton College, Cambridge
Fellows of King's College, Cambridge
British anthropologists
British women anthropologists
Fellows of Girton College, Cambridge
British women scientists
Dames Commander of the Order of the British Empire
Fellows of the British Academy
University of Michigan faculty
People of the Scott Polar Research Institute
Spouses of life peers
Rees of Ludlow
Members of the American Philosophical Society
Reeves family
Alumni of the University of Leeds
Wives of knights