Richard Thurnwald (18 September 1869 – 19 January 1954) was an

Austria Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...

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 sociologist, known for his comparative studies of social institutions.

Biography

He studied law, economics and

oriental languages Asia is home to hundreds of languages comprising several families and some unrelated isolates. The most spoken language families on the continent include Austroasiatic, Austronesian, Japonic, Dravidian, Indo-European, Afroasiatic, Turkic, ...

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

, earning a law degree in 1891. He then took a government post, and while being stationed in

Bosnia Bosnia and Herzegovina, sometimes known as Bosnia-Herzegovina and informally as Bosnia, is a country in Southeast Europe. Situated on the Balkans, Balkan Peninsula, it borders Serbia to the east, Montenegro to the southeast, and Croatia to th ...

(from 1896), he conducted research of the local social and economic climate. In 1898 he travelled to

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

, and following his return to Berlin, he took classes in

Egyptology Egyptology (from ''Egypt'' and Ancient Greek, Greek , ''wiktionary:-logia, -logia''; ) is the scientific study of ancient Egypt. The topics studied include ancient Egyptian History of Egypt, history, Egyptian language, language, Ancient Egypt ...

and

Assyriology Assyriology (from Greek , ''Assyriā''; and , ''-logia''), also known as Cuneiform studies or Ancient Near East studies, is the archaeological, anthropological, historical, and linguistic study of the cultures that used cuneiform writing. The fie ...

(1901–05). In Berlin, he found employment as an assistant curator at the Museum für Völkerkunde.German Anthropology
Short Portrait: Richard Thurnwald In 1917 he completed his habilitation at the

University of Halle Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (), also referred to as MLU, is a public research university in the cities of Halle and Wittenberg. It is the largest and oldest university in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. MLU offers German and i ...

, and several years later, began giving lectures in sociology and anthropology in Berlin (1924). From 1931 to 1936, he taught classes in the United States, giving lectures at

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher lear ...

Yale Yale University is a private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, and one of the nine colonial colleges ch ...

and at the

University of California The University of California (UC) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university, research university system in the U.S. state of California. Headquartered in Oakland, California, Oakland, the system is co ...

. After

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, as a professor at the

Free University of Berlin The Free University of Berlin (, often abbreviated as FU Berlin or simply FU) is a public university, public research university in Berlin, Germany. It was founded in West Berlin in 1948 with American support during the early Cold War period a ...

, he established the Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology. During his career, he conducted ethno-sociological studies in the

Solomon Islands Solomon Islands, also known simply as the Solomons,John Prados, ''Islands of Destiny'', Dutton Caliber, 2012, p,20 and passim is an island country consisting of six major islands and over 1000 smaller islands in Melanesia, part of Oceania, t ...

and

Micronesia Micronesia (, ) is a subregion of Oceania, consisting of approximately 2,000 small islands in the Northwestern Pacific Ocean. It has a close shared cultural history with three other island regions: Maritime Southeast Asia to the west, Poly ...

(1906–09). In

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; , fossilized , also known as Papua or historically ) is the List of islands by area, world's second-largest island, with an area of . Located in Melanesia in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is ...

(1912–15) he was the first European entering the highlands of central New Guinea along with

Walter Behrmann Walter Emmerich Behrmann (May 22, 1882, Oldenburg – May 3, 1955, Berlin) was a German geographer. He is remembered for introducing a cylindrical map projection known as the "Behrmann projection". Biography From 1901 to 1905, he studied ...

also a member of the ''Kaiserin-Augusta-Fluss Expedition'' of 1912-13. Later he traveled to

East Africa East Africa, also known as Eastern Africa or the East of Africa, is a region at the eastern edge of the Africa, African continent, distinguished by its unique geographical, historical, and cultural landscape. Defined in varying scopes, the regi ...

(1930) to continue his studies.Google Books
Encyclopedia of Law and Society: American and Global Perspectives He departed from the influential views of

Wilhelm Wundt Wilhelm Maximilian Wundt (; ; 16 August 1832 – 31 August 1920) was a German physiologist, philosopher, and professor, one of the fathers of modern psychology. Wundt, who distinguished psychology as a science from philosophy and biology, was t ...

and

Lucien Lévy-Bruhl Lucien Lévy-Bruhl (; 10 April 1857 – 13 March 1939) was a French scholar trained in philosophy who furthered anthropology with his contributions to the budding fields of sociology and ethnology. His primary field interest was ways of thinking. ...

, and believed that by analyzing social institutions comparatively, one could better explain their differences and how these differences determined the fundamental function of each institution. Thus, by comparing functional social structures, Thurnwald formed sequences of historical development.

Robert Lowie Robert Harry Lowie (born '; June 12, 1883 – September 21, 1957) was an Austrian-born American anthropologist. An expert on Indigenous peoples of the Americas, he was instrumental in the development of modern anthropology and has been described a ...

praised him in an obituary as "one of the most productive ethnologists of his time".

Published works

In 1925 he founded the journal, ''Zeitschrift für Völkerpsychologie und Soziologie'', a publication that was later renamed '' Sociologus''. From 1931 to 1934, he published the highly acclaimed ''Die menschliche Gesellschaft in ihren ethno-soziologischen Grundlagen'' ("The ethno-sociological foundations of human society"; 5 volumes). Several of his works have been published in English, such as: * ''Bánaro society; social organization and kinship system of a tribe in the interior of New Guinea'', 1916. * ''Economics in primitive communities'', 1932. * (with Diedrich Westermann) ''The missionary and anthropological research'', 1932. * ''Black and white in East Africa; the fabric of a new civilization; a study in social contact and adaptation of life in East Africa'', 1935. * ''Profane literature of Buin, Solomon Islands'', 1936.OCLC Classify
List of published works

References

External links

(BEROSE International Encyclopaedia of the Histories of Anthropology) In Memoriam Richard Thurnwald by Leonhard Adam, Oceania volume 25 (3) March 1, 1955 {{DEFAULTSORT:Thurnwald, Richard 1869 births 1954 deaths Austrian anthropologists Scientists from Vienna Academic staff of the Humboldt University of Berlin Academic staff of the Free University of Berlin Scientists from Austria-Hungary