Reading Benedict/reading Mead : feminism, race, and imperial visions / edited by Dolores Janiewski and Lois W. Banner.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Introduction : being and becoming Ruth Benedict and Margaret Mead / Dolores Janiewski and Lois W. Banner -- 1. Woven lives, raveled texts : Benedict, Mead and representational doubleness / Dolores Janiewski -- 2. "The bo-cu plant" : Ruth Benedict and gender / Lois W. Banner -- 3. Margaret Mead, the Samoan girl and the flapper : geographies of selfhood in Coming of age in Samoa / Maureen Molloy -- 4. Coming of age, but not in Samoa : reflections on Margaret Mead's legacy for Western liberal feminism / Louise M. Newman -- 5. "A world made safe for differences" : Ruth Benedict's The chrysanthemum and the sword / Christopher Shannon -- 6. White maternity, rape dreams, and the sexual exile in A rap on race / Jean Walton -- 7. Of feys and culture planners : Margaret Mead and purposive activity as value / Gerald Sullivan -- 8. The lady of the chrysanthemum : Ruth Benedict and the origins of The chrysanthemum and the sword / Nanako Fukui -- 9. Ruth Benedict's obituary for Japanese culture / Douglas Lummis -- 10. The parable of Manus : utopian change, American influence, and the worth of women / Margaret M. Caffrey -- 11. Imagining the South Seas : Margaret Mead's Coming of age in Samoa and the sexual politics of paradise / Sharon Tiffany -- 12. Symbolic subordination and the representation of power in "Margaret Mead and Samoa" / Angela Gilliam -- 13. Misconceived configurations of Ruth Benedict / Pauline Kent -- 14. Margaret Mead : anthropology's liminal figure / Nancy Lutkehaus -- 15. "It is besides a pleasant English word" - Ruth Benedict's concept of patterns revisited / Judith Modell -- 16. On the political anatomy of Mead-bashing, or re-thinking Margaret Mead / Virginia Yans.

"As anthropologists, public intellectuals, and feminists, Ruth Benedict and Margaret Mead played remarkable roles in twentieth-century life and thought -- and far beyond the academy. Their work helped to popularize anthropology while introducing such terms as culture and racism into common parlance. At the same time, they contributed to wider debates about environmentalism, sexuality, the women's movement, and American foreign policy. In this collection, prominent international scholars come together to explore the lives, works, and legacies of two influential figures in American anthropology.The contributions reflect a wide range of topics and perspectives: Benedict and Mead's complicated personal and professional relationship; their activities as scholars and outspoken intellectuals; their efforts to promote feminism and undermine racism; their contributions to (and the challenges they posed to) the imperialist project; and the stories behind their best-known works, The Chrysanthemum and the Sword and Coming of Age in Samoa. Together, the essays provide a useful and provocative introduction to Benedict and Mead as well as to the ongoing debate about the legacy they left behind.Contributors: Lois Banner, University of Southern California; Margaret M. Caffrey, University of Memphis; Nanako Fukui, Kansai University; Angela Gilliam, Evergreen State College; Pauline Kent, Ryukoku University; C. Douglas Lummis, Okinawa International University; Nancy Lutkehaus, University of Southern California; Judith Schachter Modell, Carnegie Mellon University; Maureen Molloy, University of Auckland; Louise M. Newman, University of Florida; Dolores E. Janiewski, Victoria University of Wellington; Christopher Shannon, University of Notre Dame; Gerald Sullivan, University of Notre Dame; Sharon Tiffany, University of Wisconsin, Whitewater; Jean Walton, University of Rhode Island; Virginia Yans, Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey"--Publisher description.

Machine converted from AACR2 source record.