Marshall Sahlins
| Marshall Sahlins | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
December 27, 1930 Chicago, Illinois, U.S. |
| Citizenship | American |
| Fields | Anthropology |
| Institutions | University of Chicago |
| Alma mater |
University of Michigan Columbia University |
| Doctoral students | David Graeber, Sherry Ortner |
| Influences | Karl Polanyi, Claude Levi-Strauss, Morton Fried |
Marshall David Sahlins (/ˈsɑːlɪnz/ SAH-linz; born December 27, 1930) is an American anthropologist best known for his ethnographic work in the Pacific and for his contributions to anthropological theory. He is currently Charles F. Grey Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Anthropology and of Social Sciences at the University of Chicago.
Sahlins received his bachelor of arts and master of arts degrees at the University of Michigan where he studied with evolutionary anthropologist Leslie White. He earned his PhD at Columbia University in 1954. There his intellectual influences included Eric Wolf, Morton Fried, Sidney Mintz, and the economic historian Karl Polanyi. After receiving his PhD, he returned to teach at the University of Michigan. In the 1960s he became politically active, and while protesting against the Vietnam War, Sahlins invented the imaginative form of protest called the "teach-in," which drew inspiration from the sit-in pioneered during the civil rights movement. In 1968, Sahlins signed the "Writers and Editors War Tax Protest" pledge, vowing to refuse tax payments in protest against the Vietnam War. In the late 1960s, he also spent two years in Paris, where he was exposed to French intellectual life (and particularly the work of Claude Lévi-Strauss) and the student protests of May 1968. In 1973, he took a position in the anthropology department at the University of Chicago, where he is currently the Charles F. Grey Distinguished Service Professor of Anthropology Emeritus. His commitment to activism has continued throughout his time at Chicago, most recently leading to his protest over the opening of the University's Confucius Institute (which later closed in the fall of 2014). On February 23, 2013, Sahlins resigned from the National Academy of Sciences to protest the call for military research for improving the effectiveness of small combat groups and also the election of Napoleon Chagnon. The resignation followed the publication in that month of Chagnon's memoir and widespread coverage of the memoir, including a profile of Chagnon in the New York Times magazine.
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