General correspondence files contain all communications that do not pertain to a specific project. Because Friedman's personal life and business were so interconnected, many of his business associates also shared personal correspondence with the designer.,Materials in this collection document Friedman's work from 1967, as a student, until his death in 1995.
Files that document his affiliations with Yale University and the State University of New York at Purchase include administrative memos, proposals, lecture outlines, syllabi, bibliographies, examples of students' work, and design projects Friedman did for each school. A copy of the goals and objectives of the Division of Visual Arts within the School of the Arts at SUNY Purchase written by Friedman is included.
Project files include business correspondence, invoices, sketches, contracts, clippings, photographs, and slides. In the case of his graphic projects, some samples of stationery and brochures are included. Extensive documentation exists for Friedman's projects for Citibank, WilliWear, National Public Radio, and Bonwit Teller. Some correspondence is in German. Friedman's lecture notes, proposals for articles and books, and drafts of many articles are included. Clippings of articles on the designer and his work are arranged chronologically.
Research files consist of articles and Friedman's notes on topics of interest to him, such as typography, structure, simultaneity, and information theory. Photographs, slides, and transparencies of many of Friedman's projects, his sources of inspiration, and the work of his students are included.
Arrangement:
Record Groups include:
1: General Correspondence
2: University Affiliations
3: Project Files
4: Lectures and Writings
5: Clippings
6: Research Materials
7: Photographs and Slides
Biographical / Historical:
Educator, graphic and furniture designer. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, 1945. Friedman recieved a BFA from Carnegie Institute of Technology, Pittsburg, PA. He studied graphic design at Hochschule fur Gestaltung, Ulm, and studied with Armin Hofmann and Wolfgang Weingart at Allgemeine Gewerbeschule, Basel. Friedman returned to America in 1969 and began his career as graphic designer for large corporations.
He worked with the firm Anspach Grossman Portugal as a senior designer from 1975 to 1977. Friedman contributed significantly to what came to be known as "post-modern" or "new wave" typography in the 1970s. He taught graphic design at Yale University, 1970-73. He became Assistant Professor and Chairman of the Board of Study in Design at the State University of New York at Purchase, 1972-1975. Friedman designed catalogs and brochures for both universities. Friedman worked with Pentagram Design in New York City from 1979 to 1984. He designed corporate identity programs, posters, publications, packaging, letterheads, and logos, for clients such as Citibank, and Williwear.
Friedman was a long-time friend of artist Keith Haring, and designed the book, "Keith Haring", 1982. He was the author of "Dan Friedman: Radical Modernism", 1994, and co-authored with Jeffrey Deitch, "Cultural Geometry", 1988, and "Artificial Nature", 1990. He designed the books "New Italian Design", 1990, and "Post Human", 1992. He also designed furniture, lighting, screens, wall elements, and interiors. Many of his furniture designs were done especially for Galerie Noetu in Paris. Among his best known furniture designs are the 1989 Virgin Screen, 1989 Zoid sofa and chair, and the Three Mile Island lamps.
Friedman served as the Frank Stanton Professor of Graphic Design at the Cooper Union in New York city, from 1994 until his death in 1995.
Related Materials:
Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, Drawings and Prints Department
Hundreds of designs for letterheads, logos, business cards, invitations, greeting cards, furniture, lighting, screens, office interiors, shoppings bags and gift boxes, calendars, packaging, weather pattern diagrams and maps, book covers, and posters
Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, Applied Arts Department
"U.S.A." table and dome-shaped floor lamp.,.
Friedman's work can be found in the collections of the following museums: Museum of Modern Art, New York City; Museum of Decorative Arts, Montreal, Canada; Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL; Seibu, Tokyo; Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VA; and Israel Museum, Jerusalem.
Provenance:
This collection was donated to the museum by the designer's brother, Ken Friedman in 1995.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Interview of Brice Marden conducted 1972 Oct. 3, by Paul Cummings, for the Archives of American Art. Marden speaks of his early family life and schools in Briarcliff, N.Y.; the development of his interest in art; his art and theater activities at Florida State Southern College; Boston University and the Boston art scene in the 1950s.
He comments on the impact of a summer in California on his painting style, living in Paris and New York, and changes in his work, including rectangles, one-color panels, paintings over silk-screen proofs, oil and wax. Marden also speaks of his first one-man exhibition, working as Robert Rauschenberg's assistant, his exhibit in Paris, teaching at the School of Visual Arts, his drawings, lithographs and grid drawings, his use of color, paintings as statements and influences on his work. He recalls Henry Geldzahler, Reed Kay, Bernard Chaet, Jon Schueler, Reginald Pollack, Alex Katz, Esteban Vicente, Carl Andre and Klaus Kertess.
Biographical / Historical:
Brice Marden (1938) is a painter from New York, N.Y.
General:
Originally recorded on 2 sound tape reels. Reformatted in 2010 as 3 digital wav files. Duration is 2 hrs., 47 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and others.
Restrictions:
Transcript available on the Archives of American Art website.
An interview of Denise Scott Brown conducted 1990 October 25-1991 November 9, by Peter Reed, for the Archives of American Art.
Scott Brown discusses her family background and growing up in South Africa; her education at the University of Witwatersrand, the Architectural Association, London, a summer school in Venice, sponsored by Congres Internationale d'Architecture Moderne, and the University of Pennsylvania, recalling some of her teachers (including Arthur Korn and Louis Kahn); her first husband, Robert Scott Brown, and their travels throughout Europe and experiences in Pennsylvania; her teaching philosophy and experiences at the University of Pennsylvania, Yale, Harvard, UCLA, and Berkeley; the architecture program at Penn from her perspective as a student and as a member of the faculty; meeting Robert Venturi, their work together, the firm and the difficulties encountered in the 1970s and 1980s, some of their projects such as the National Gallery, London, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and planning work; publications such as "Complexity and Contradiction," "Urban concepts," "Worm's Eye View," and "Learning from Las Vegas;" postmodern architecture; critics; and her experiences as a woman in the field.
Biographical / Historical:
Denise Scott Brown (1931- ) is an architect of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
General:
Originally recorded on 10 sound cassette. Reformatted in 2010 as 19 digital wav files. Duration is 13 hr., 45 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
University of Florida. Department of Anthropology Search this
Extent:
42.27 Linear feet (85.5 document boxes, 1 oversize box, 4 record storage boxes, 90 computer disks, 19 cassette tapes, 1 7" sound reel, 3 vinyl records, and 1 map folder)
Note:
Boxes 88-91 (formerly designated off-site boxes 1-4) are stored off-site. Advanced notice must be given to view these materials.
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Place:
New York (N.Y.)
Mozambique
Rio de Contas (Brazil)
Arembepe (Brazil)
Chimborazo (Ecuador)
Date:
1945-2001
Summary:
This collection contains the professional papers of anthropologist Marvin Harris. Harris was a prominent anthropologist, best known for developing the controversial paradigm of cultural materialism. He authored several important books in the field of anthropology and taught at Columbia University and The University of Florida. The papers include correspondence, research materials, his publications, unpublished manuscripts, conference papers, lectures, subject files, teaching files, computer files, and photographs.
Scope and Contents:
This collection contains the professional papers of anthropologist Marvin Harris. The papers include correspondence, research materials, his publications, unpublished manuscripts, conference papers, lectures, subject files, teaching files, computer files, and photographs.
His research files document his ethnographic field work in Rio de Contas, Brazil, both for his dissertation and his racial categorization project; his research on forced labor in Mozambique; his videotape study in New York City households; and his India sacred cattle research. The collection also contains his research on food preferences and aversions, his files as a research consultant for the McKinsey Global Institute, and photos from his field work in Chimborazo, Ecuador and Arembepe, Brazil.
Over the course of his career, Harris also participated in several conferences and invited lectures. The collection contains some of the papers he presented as well as audio recordings of his lecture "Levi-Strauss and the Clam: An Open and Shut Case" and a recording of a radio interview. Also present in the collection are materials relating to conference sessions and symposiums that he organized, including the 1967 AAA session on Anthropology and War and his 1983 Wenner-Gren symposium on Food Preferences and Aversions.
Additional materials that may be of interest are materials documenting Harris' activism in the 1960s at Columbia University, which include his anti-Vietnam War activities, as well as his involvement in the student protests of 1968 at Columbia University. The collection also contains Harris' CIA, FBI, and Department of State records that he obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests, photographs from Harris' service in the army in the 1940s, and photos taken in Brazil by Pierre Verger.
Harris corresponded with several prominent anthropologists, many of whom were Latin American specialists. Some of his noteworthy correspondents include Napoleon Chagnon, Derek Freeman, Morton Fried, Conrad Kottak, Sidney Mintz, Anthony Leeds, Claude Levi-Strauss, Darcy Ribeiro, Anisio Teixeira, Charles Wagley, and Karl Wittfogel. Also of special interest is his correspondence with leading figures in the Mozambique and Portuguese liberation movements, including Antonio Figuereido, Eduardo Mondlane, and General Humberto Delgado.
Please note that the contents of the collection and the language and terminology used reflect the context and culture of the time of its creation. As an historical document, its contents may be at odds with contemporary views and terminology and considered offensive today. The information within this collection does not reflect the views of the Smithsonian Institution or National Anthropological Archives, but is available in its original form to facilitate research.
Arrangement:
This collection is arranged in 10 series: (1) Correspondence, 1952-2001; (2) Research, 1949-1997; (3) Writings, 1955-2001; (4) Professional Activities, 1960-1999; (5) Name Subject Files, 1951-2001; (6) University, 1947-1999; (7) Biographical Files, 1954-1999; (8) Writings by Other People, 1961-2000; (9) Photographs, 1945-1996; (10) Computer Files, 1980-2000
Biographical Note:
Marvin Harris was a prominent anthropologist, best known for developing the controversial paradigm of cultural materialism. He authored several important books in the field of anthropology, most notably The Rise of Anthropological Theory (1968) and Cultural Materialism (1979) as well as books that reached a wider audience, such as Cows, Pigs, Wars and Witches (1974) and Cannibals and Kings (1977).
Harris was born in Brooklyn, New York on August 18, 1927. After serving in the U.S. Army Transportation Corps (1945-47), he received his B.A. (1948) and Ph.D. (1953) from Columbia University. His first anthropology course was taught by Charles Wagley, who was influential in Harris' decision to become an anthropologist. Harris joined the faculty at Columbia University after earning his doctorate and served as chair of the Department of Anthropology from 1963 to 1966. In 1980, he left Columbia for a position as Graduate Research Professor at University of Florida, where he stayed until his retirement in 2000.
It was in The Rise of Anthropological Theory that Harris coined the phrase "cultural materialism," a subject he further elaborated on in Cultural Materialism. Cultural materialism, Harris explains, is a scientific research strategy "based on the simple premise that human social life is a response to the practical problems of earthly existence" (1979, xv). Harris applied the paradigm to explain various cultural patterns, such as food preferences and taboos, changes in U.S. family structure, and the collapse of Soviet and East European state socialism. One of his most controversial theories was that the Hindu prohibition of slaughtering and consuming cows in India arose because it was more economically beneficial to use cattle as draft animals than as meat. He challenged Napoleon Chagnon's views that Yanomami men were inherently more aggressive and violent by explaining that it was the pursuit of animal protein that was the cause of Yanomami warfare. Harris similarly argued that protein deficiency was the reason why the Aztecs practiced cannibalism.
Harris presented his theories beyond academic circles to a general audience by contributing a monthly column to Natural History Magazine. He also authored several popular books. In addition to Cows, Pigs, Wars and Witches and Cannibals and Kings, Harris also wrote America Now (1981), Good to Eat (1985), and Our Kind (1989). Harris also authored and edited several editions of two college-level introductory textbooks: Culture, People, Nature (first published as Culture, Man, and Nature in 1971) and Cultural Anthropology (first published in 1983, later editions coauthored with Orna Johnson). According to Harris, the 1975 edition of Culture, People, Nature "was the first anthropology textbook to be written cover to cover in a gender-neutral mode of discourse" (12/3/93 letter from Harris to Deborah S. Rubin, "Furlow - [The Teaching of Anthropology]", Series 3. Writings, Marvin Harris Papers).
Although Harris is primarily known for his work as a theoretician, he also conducted ethnographic fieldwork throughout his career. Harris traveled to Rio de Contas, Brazil in 1950-51 to conduct research for his dissertation, "Minas Velhas: A Study of Urbanism in the Mountains of Eastern Brazil." This research was also the subject of his book Town and Country in Brazil (1958) and his chapter, "Race Relations in Minas Velhas, a Community in the Mountain Region of Central Brazil" in Race and Class in Rural Brazil (Charles Wagley, 1952). He continued his research in Brazil in 1953-54 while serving as a research advisor for the Ministry of Education in Rio de Janeiro. As field leader of the Columbia-Cornell-Harvard-Illinois Summer Field Studies Program, Harris returned to Brazil in 1962 to study fishing villages in Arembepe. Prior to that, he also served as field leader for the program in Chimborazo, Ecuador in 1960.
In 1956-57, Harris conducted field research in Mozambique, at the time under Portuguese rule. He initially intended to study the influence of Portuguese rule on race relations, comparing the race relations in Brazil and Mozambique. He soon became aware, however, of the political brutalities that the Portuguese government was imposing on the people of Mozambique. Consequently, Harris decided to focus his research on labor exploitation in the colony. Antonio de Figueiredo, who later became an important figure in the Mozambique liberation movement, served as an informal assistant to Harris. Harris was also friends with Eduardo Mondlane, president of FRELIMO, the Mozambican Liberation Front. Because Harris was openly critical of the Portuguese government, he was forced to leave Mozambique before he completed his research. When he returned to the United States, Harris published Portugal's African "Wards" (1958), a critical evaluation of Portugal's colonialism. His publication was influential in eradicating the forced labor system in Mozambique a few years later.
Harris' activism extended to the social and political unrest at home during the 1960s. He was vice-chairman of Vietnam Facts, an organization of professors in the United States who were against the Vietnam War, and was one of the organizers of the Ad Hoc Teaching Committee on Vietnam. In 1967, he brought an academic focus to war by organizing a symposium on the subject with Morton Fried and Robert Murphy at the American Anthropological Association's (AAA) annual meeting. Together, they edited War: The Anthropology of Armed Conflict and Aggression (1968), a compilation of the papers presented at the conference. During the 1968 student uprising at Columbia University, Harris was one of the few faculty members that openly sided with the students. Harris criticized the actions of the university administrators in his article, "Big Busts on Morningside Heights" (1968).
Due to his experiences in Mozambique, Harris also began to think about the distinctions between emic and etic perspectives, which he discusses in his book, The Nature of Cultural Things (1964). During the 1960s-70s, Harris experimented with the use of video recordings as an etic approach to collecting ethnographic data. He collaborated with the Bronx State Hospital to videotape domestic life in two Puerto Rican and two African American families. He also videotaped and coded behavioral streams of two Caucasian and two African-American families in New York City for his NSF funded project, "Patterns of Authority and Subordination in Low-Income Urban Domiciles." In 1965 and 1992, Harris returned to Brazil to study racial categorizations and identifications, specifically the emic and etic differences in the perception of race. He published several papers on the subject, including "The Structural Significance of Brazilian Racial Categories" (1963), "Referential Ambiguity in the Calculus of Brazilian Racial Identity" (1970), and "Who are the Whites?" (1993).
During the 1980s, Harris was troubled by the rising popularity of postmodernist theory within anthropology. He believed that anthropology was a science and was concerned about the harmful consequences of postmodernist theory to the field. He organized a AAA session on postmodernism called "Anti-anti Science" in 1989 and participated in multiple conference sessions on the subject, including a 1993 session on "The Objectivity Crisis: Rethinking the Role of Science" at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) meeting. "Anthropology and Postmodernism," a revised version of his AAAS paper was published as a chapter in Science, Materialism, and the Study of Culture (Martin F. Murphey and Maxine L. Margolis, 1995). Harris also criticized postmodernist theory in his final book, Theories of Culture in Postmodern Times (1999).
While Harris thought that postmodernism was moving anthropology further away from science, behavior scientists began to see the relevancy of cultural materialism in their own research. In 1986, Harris was invited to give an address at the annual conference of the Association for Behavioral Analysis (ABA). His paper was titled, "Cultural Materialism and Behavior Analysis: Common Problems and Radical Solutions." He also participated in a symposium on "The Integration of Cultural Materialism and Behavior Analysis" at the 1991 ABA annual meeting.
From 1988-90, Harris served as president of the General Anthropology Division of AAA. In 1991, he was given the honor of presenting the Distinguished Lecture at the AAA annual meeting. His talk was titled, "Anthropology and the Theoretical and Paradigmatic Significance of the Collapse of Soviet and East European Communism." That same year, The Rise of Anthropological Theory was designated a Social Science Citation Classic.
Harris died at the age of 74 on October 25, 2001.
Sources Consulted
Margoline, Maxine L. and Conrad Phillip Kottak. "Marvin Harris (1927-2001)." American Anthropologist. 105(3) (2003): 685-688.
Curriculum Vitae. Series 7. Biographical Files. Marvin Harris papers, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution.
Harris, Marvin. "Cultural Materialism is Alive and Well and Won't Go Away Until Something Better Comes Along." In Assessing Anthropology,edited by Robert Borofsky, 62-76. New York: McGraw Hill, 1994.
Chronology
1927 -- Born August 18 in Brooklyn, New York
1945-1947 -- Served in U.S. Army Transportation Corps
1948 -- B.A. from Columbia College
1950-1951 -- Field research in Brazil
1953 -- Ph.D. in Anthropology from Columbia University Field research in Brazil
1953-1954 -- Research Advisor, National Institute of Pedagogical Studies, Rio de Janeiro. Brazilian Ministry of Education
1953-1959 -- Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology, Columbia University
1956-1957 -- Field research in Mozambique
1959-1963 -- Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology, Columbia University
1960 -- Field leader of Columbia-Cornell-Harvard-Illinois Summer Field Studies Program in Chimborazo, Ecuador
1962 -- Field leader of Columbia-Cornell-Harvard-Illinois Summer Field Studies Program in Arembepe, Bahia, Brazil. NSF
1963-1980 -- Professor, Department of Anthropology, Columbia University
1963-1966 -- Chair, Department of Anthropology, Columbia University
1965 -- Field Research in Brazil
1965-1972 -- Video Tape Methodology and Etic Ethnography
1969-1974 -- Principle Investigator, Videotape Studies of Urban Domiciles
1968-1969 -- Visiting Distinguished Professor, Central Washington State College
1976 -- Field Research in India
1980-2000 -- Graduate Research Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of Florida
1983-1984 -- Consultant, United Nations Fund for Population Activities
1984 -- McMurrin Professor, University of Utah, Fall
1991-1992 -- Consultant, McKinsey and Company Global Institute
1991 -- Presented AAA Distinguished Lecture, "Anthropology and the Theoretical and Paradigmatic Significance of the Collapse of Soviet and East European Communism" The Rise of Anthropological Theory designated Social Science Citation Classic
1992 -- Field Research in Brazil
2001 -- Died October 25
Selected Bibliography
1952 -- Harris, Marvin. "Race Relations in Minas Velhas." In Race and Class in Rural Brazil, edited by Charles Wagley, 51-55. Paris: UNESCO, 1952.
1956 -- Harris, Marvin. Town and Country in Brazil. New York: Columbia University Press, 1956.
1958 -- Harris, Marvin, and Charles Wagley. Minorities in the New World. New York: Columbia University, 1958. Harris, Marvin. Portugal's African "Wards". New York: The American Committee on Africa, 1958.
1959 -- Harris, Marvin. "The Economy Has No Surplus?" American Anthropologist 51 (1959): 189-199. Harris, Marvin. "Labor Emigration Among the Mozambique Thonga: Cultural and Political Factors." Africa 29 (1959): 50-56.
1963 -- Harris, Marvin, and Conrad Kottack. "The Structural Significance of Brazilian Racial Categories." Sociologia 25 (1963): 203-209.
1964 -- Harris, Marvin. "Racial Identity in Brazil." Luso-Brazilian Review 1 (1964): 21-28. Harris, Marvin. The Nature of Cultural Things. New York: Random House, 1964. Harris, Marvin. Patterns of Race in the Americas. New York: Walker and Company, 1964.
1965 -- Harris, Marvin. "The Myth of the Sacred Cow." In Man, Culture and Animals, edited by A. Vayda and A. Leeds, 217-228. Washington: American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1965.
1966 -- Harris, Marvin. "The Cultural Ecology of India's Sacred Cattle." Current Anthropology 7 (1966): 51-66. Harris, Marvin, and George Morren. "The Limitations of the Principle of Limited Possibilities." American Anthropologist 58 (1966): 122-127.
1967 -- Harris, Marvin, Morton Fried, and Robert Murphy, eds. "The Anthropology of War and Aggression." Special Supplement, Natural History (December 1967): 30-70.
1968 -- Harris, Marvin. "Big Bust on Morningside Heights." The Nation 206 (1968): 757-763. Harris, Marvin. The Rise of Anthropological Theory. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1968. Harris, Marvin, Morton Fried, and Robert Murphy, eds. War: The Anthropology of Armed Conflict and Aggression. New York: Natural History Press, 1968.
1970 -- Harris, Marvin. "Referential Ambiguity in the Calculus of Brazilian Racial Identity." Southwestern Journal of Anthropology 26 (1970): 1-14.
1971 -- Harris, Marvin. Culture, Man and Nature: An Introduction to General Anthropology. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1971.
1974 -- Harris, Marvin. Cows, Pigs, Wars and Witches: The Riddles of Culture. New York: Random House, 1974.
1976 -- Harris, Marvin, and William Divale. "Population, Warfare, and the Male Supremacist Complex." American Anthropologist 78 (1976): 521-538.
1977 -- Harris, Marvin. Cannibals and Kings: The Origins of Cultures. New York: Random House, 1977.
1979 -- Harris, Marvin. Cultural Materialism: The Struggle for a Science of Culture. New York: Random House, 1979.
1981 -- Harris, Marvin. America Now: The Anthropology of a Changing Culture. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1981.
1982 -- Harris, Marvin, A. Vaidynathan, and K.N. Nair. "Bovine Sex and Species Ratios in India." Current Anthropology 23 (1982): 365-383.
1983 -- Harris, Marvin. Cultural Anthropology. New York: Harper and Row, 1983.
1984 -- Harris, Marvin. "Animal Capture and Yanomamo Warfare: Retrospect and New Evidence." Journal of Anthropological Research 40 (1984): 183-201.
1985 -- Harris, Marvin. Good to Eat: Riddles of Food and Culture. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1985.
1987 -- Harris, Marvin. "Cultural Materialism: Alarums and Excursions." In Waymarks: The Notre Dame Inaugural Lectures in Anthropology, edited by Kenneth Morre, 107-126. Notre Dame: Notre Dame Press, 1987. Harris, Marvin, and Eric Ross, eds. Food and Evolution: Toward a Theory of Human Food Habits. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1987. Harris, Marvin, and Eric Ross. Death, Sex and Fertility: Population Regulation in Preindustrial and Developing Societies. New York: Columbia University Press, 1987.
1988 -- Harris, Marvin. Why Nothing Works: The Anthropology of Daily Life. New York: Touchstone, 1988.
1989 -- Harris, Marvin. Our Kind: Who We Are, Where We Came From, and Where We're Going. New York: Harper and Row, 1989.
1991 -- Harris, Marvin. "Anthropology: Ships that Crash in the Night." In Perspectives on Social Science: The Colorado Lectures, edited by Richard Jessor, 70-114. Boulder, CO.: Westview, 1991. Harris, Marvin, Thomas Headland, and Kenneth Pike, eds. Emics and Etics: The Insider/Outsider Debate. Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1991. Harris, Marvin. "The Evolution of Human Gender Hierarchies: A Trial Formulation." In Sex and Gender Hierarchies, edited by Barbara Miller, 57-79. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991.
1992 -- Harris, Marvin. "Distinguished Lecture: Anthropology and the Theoretical and Paradigmatic Significance of the collapse of Soviet and East European Communism." American Anthropologist 94 (1992): 295-305.
1993 -- Harris, Marvin, Josildeth Gomes Consorte, Joseph Lang, and Bryan Byrne. "Who are the White? Imposed Census Categories and the Racial Demography of Brazil." Social Forces 72 (1993): 451-462.
1994 -- Harris, Marvin. "Cultural Materialism is Alive and Well and Won't Go Away Until Something Better Comes Along." In Assessing Anthropology, edited by Robert Borofsky, 62-76. New York: McGraw Hill, 1994.
1995 -- Harris, Marvin. "Anthropology and Postmodernism." In Science, Materialism, and the Study of Culture, edited by Martin Murphy and Maxine Margolis, 62-77. Gainsville, FL: University Press of Florida, 1995.
1999 -- Harris, Marvin. Theories of Culture in Postmodern Times. Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press, 1999.
Related Materials:
More of Marvin Harris' correspondence can be found in the papers of William Duncan Strong. Researchers may also want to consult the Human Studies Film Archives, which holds video oral histories of Charles Wagley (HSFA 89.10.5) and Lambros Comitas (HSFA 89.10.20), both of whom discuss Harris in their interviews.
Separated Materials:
An open reel video from the collection was transferred to the Human Studies Film Archives (HSFA 2011.10.1). The video relates to Series 2: Research; Sub-series 2.6: Videotape Research--"[Macy's Santa Claus study]"
Provenance:
The papers of Marvin Harris were donated to the National Anthropological Archives by his daughter, Susan Harris.
Restrictions:
Access to student records (consisting of graded materials and student recommendation letters), grant proposals sent to Harris for review by grant agencies, and part of his faculty recruitment files are restricted until 2081. Series 10. Computer Files are also restricted due to preservation concerns.
An interview of Massimo Vignelli conducted 2011 June 6-7, by Mija Riedel, for the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America, at Vignelli's home and office, in New York, New York.
Vignelli speaks of his youth and early start in art design and architecture; his early work at Catiglione architects at the age of 16; his father; his education; meeting his favorite architects; his influences; architecture and design magazines; organic and rationalist architecture in Italy; influence of Ignazio Gardella; Adolf Loos' idea of spoon to the city; European, American, and Italian architecture; education in Milan; his work with Venini Glass; Italian design; his early graphic work; design and vulgarity; marriage and working with Lella Vignelli; graphic design work at the Container Corporation; concept of design as a whole; his work on corporate identities; his establishment of Vignelli Associates; introduction and use of Helvetica in the United States; working with Knoll; choosing clients; design and culture; his work on St. Peter's Lutheran Church; design work for the United States National Parks newspaper design and layout; Unimark; timelessness and design; working with Poltrona Frau, Zero Labor design; major influences; his work for the United States Postal Service; connectivity and context in architecture; his clothing designs and historical perspectives on clothing; postmodernism; his work on the New York Subway; design work before and after computers; Japanese architecture and design; his work as a teacher; Oliviero Toscani and working for Benetton; America and international design; modernism and the office building; modern design and furniture; a timeline of his career; the Vignelli Center at RIT and archiving. Vignelli also recalls, Le Corbusier, Mies van der Rohe, Giuseppe Terragni, Giuseppe Pagano, Domus, Gió Ponti, Metron, Bruno Zevi, Ignazio Gardella, Ray and Charles Eames, Giancarlo De Carlo, Venini Glass, Carlo Scarpa, Ralph Eckerstrom, Umberto Eco, Sansoni Publishing House, Vignelli Associates, Walter Kacik, Helvetica, Knoll, St. Peter's Lutheran Church, National Parks, New York Herald, Unimark, Lella Vignelli, Arnaldo Pomodoro, Poltrona Frau, Dieter Rams, Louis Kahn, Stendig Calendar, A to Z, Salon de Mobile, Michael Graves, Robert Venturi, Oliviero Toscani, Benetton, Herman Miller, Steelcase, and the Vignelli Center.
Biographical / Historical:
Massimo Vignelli (1931- ) is a designer in New York, New York. Mija Riedel (1958- ) is an independent scholar in San Francisco, California.
General:
Originally recorded as 9 sound files. Duration is 6 hr., 52 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
Interview of Emmet Gowin, conducted by Frank Goodyear for the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution at the Gowins' home in Danville, Virginia, on May 13-14, 2010.
Gowin speaks of his upbringing and how he decided to become a Quaker; his relationship with his sister, who had Down Syndrome; growing up in Chincoteague, VA and other Virginia towns; going to business school in Richmond; meeting his wife Edith; transitioning from Richmond Professional Institute to work with Harry Callahan at the Rhode Island School of Design; learning different techniques of printing pictures; studying with Frederick Sommer; the making and reception of his early family photographs of Edith, the Boohers, and his children; other photographic projects including the Mount St. Helens eruption, photographs in the Middle East, Europe, and South America, nuclear test sites in the western U.S., and his collection of moths; teaching at Princeton University; his attitude toward Postmodernism; how the Light Gallery began; and his artistic influences, including Callahan, Sommer, Robert Frank, Alfred Stieglitz, Walker Evans, Eugéne Atget, Hercules Seghers, William Blake, and others. Gowin also recalls Peter Bunnell, Grant Gentry, Fazal Sheikh, Peter McGill, Ralph Eugene Meatyard, Elaine Pagels, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Interviewee Emmet Gowin (1941- ) is an educator and photographer in Newtown, Pa. Gowin photographed Edith and Rennie Booher and extended family. Interviewer Frank H. Goodyear (1967- ) was at the time of the interview the associate curator of photographs with the National Portrait Gallery, in Washington, D.C.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
Restrictions:
For information on how to access this interview contact Reference Services.
An interview of Pat Steir conducted 2008 March 1-2, by Judith Olch Richards, for the Archives of American Art, at Steir's home, in New York, N.Y.
Steir speaks of her parents' history and various occupations; her Russian Jewish background; her early desire to become a poet or artist; the lack of encouragement from both her parents; memories of earlier interactions with a number of influential figures; rejecting a scholarship offer to go to Smith College for a scholarship to study art at Pratt Institute; studying art at Boston University; illustrating for Harper & Row; her experiences and reflections as a female artist struggling to get recognition equal to that of her male counterparts; teaching at Parsons School of Design; living in Pasadena, California and teaching at CalArts; traveling to Europe, China, Japan, and India; opening a studio in Amsterdam; her involvement with the feminist movement; working as an editor at Semiotext magazine and how that launched her into starting a private company called Printed Matter, designing books; traveling to the Southwest and the influence of the Navajo culture on her work; her relationships with various performing artists; her interns and teaching; how she got involved with printmaking; her preference for oil-based paints rather than acrylic; printmaking as a major art form; how her relationship with dealers changed over time; how her work was seen and promoted in Europe; exhibiting at Paley & Lowe; working with large canvases; her interest in reacquiring her sold works; influences from Japonism, Impressionism, Modernism, and Postmodernism; the influence of Chinese and Japanese art, process, and technique; the significance of her Brueghel paintings; her artistic process and techniques; her interest in the romance of art history; almost giving up painting; working with Cheim & Read; her current exhibition at the Ochi Gallery in Idaho; the future of her work; the struggle for women to gain critical attention in the art world; the fusion of the art world and fashion; and her love and zeal for fashion. Steir also recalls Agnes Martin, Mark Rothko, Dick Solomon, Joan Mitchell, Brigitte Cornand, Louise Bourgeois, Lucy Lippard, Flora Biddle, Willem de Kooning, Marcia Tucker, Joan Snyder, Miriam Schapiro, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Pat Steir (1938- ) is a painter and printmaker in New York, N.Y. Judith Olch Richards (1947- ) is the former executive director for iCI in New York, N.Y.
General:
Originally recorded on 4 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 5 digital wav files. Duration is 3 hr., 47 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
Occupation:
Printmakers -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Painters -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Genre/Form:
Sound recordings
Interviews
Sponsor:
Funding for the digital preservation of this interview was provided by a grant from the Save America's Treasures Program of the National Park Service.
