Marvin Harris
Marvin Harris was a prominent American anthropologist known for his influential and sometimes controversial theories on human social behavior, particularly his concept of cultural materialism. Born on August 18, 1927, in Brooklyn, New York, he developed an early curiosity about human behavior that led him to pursue a doctorate at Columbia University, where he became a faculty member shortly after graduation. Harris's fieldwork took him to various countries, including Mozambique, Brazil, and India, where he explored topics such as warfare, food taboos, and social structures.
His groundbreaking work, "The Rise of Anthropological Theory," published in 1968, introduced cultural materialism as a framework asserting that social and cultural systems emerge from the basic needs of survival, encompassing three interrelated components: infrastructure, structure, and superstructure. Harris argued that a society's material conditions significantly influence its cultural values and behaviors. His research also examined cultural practices, such as the significance of cows in Indian society, arguing that certain customs evolve rationally based on survival needs.
Harris published extensively, with many of his works aimed at a general audience, helping to bridge the gap between academic anthropology and public understanding. His theories have had a lasting impact on the field, and his texts are widely used in anthropology courses. Harris passed away on October 25, 2001, but his contributions continue to shape discussions in cultural anthropology today.
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Subject Terms
Marvin Harris
Anthropologist
- Born: August 18, 1927
- Place of Birth: Place of birth: Brooklyn, New York
- Died: October 25, 2001
- Place of Death: Place of death: Gainesville, Florida
Education: Columbia University
Significance: Marvin Harris was an anthropologist known for his controversial theories on human social behavior. Harris contributed a wide range of theories to the field of anthropology throughout his career and published several commercially successful books.
Background
Marvin Harris was born on August 18, 1927, in Brooklyn, New York. As a child growing up in Brooklyn during the Great Depression, Harris became extremely curious about human behavior. He would often peer into the windows of strangers’ homes to watch them living their lives. Harris attended Columbia University where he earned his doctorate degree in 1953. He began teaching at Columbia shortly before graduating and remained on the faculty until 1981. He then began teaching graduate studies at the University of Florida in Gainesville where he taught until retiring in 2000.
Harris immersed himself in anthropological theory during his years as a professor. During his time at Columbia, he participated in several field studies. Harris spent a year in Mozambique in 1955, and the experience had a profound influence on his approach to anthropology. His field research later extended to Brazil, India, and parts of the United States where he investigated topics such as the causes of warfare, the importance of food taboos, and the existence of forced labor. Harris garnered an early reputation as a confrontational force in American cultural anthropology and was known for his aggressively critical approach to the field.
Life’s Work
The release of The Rise of Anthropological Theory in 1968 first earned Harris the public’s attention. The book details the behavioral concept Harris identified as cultural materialism, which holds that social and cultural systems stem from the basic needs of survival. The theory comprises three sociocultural principles first examined by German philosopher Karl Marx: infrastructure, structure, and superstructure. Infrastructure is a community’s modes of production and reproduction of material goods. Structure revolves around a society’s political and economic relations. Lastly, superstructure relates to society’s mental and ideological patterns of behavior. Infrastructure determines structure, and structure determines superstructure. Although Harris borrowed from Marx’s notions of materialism, cultural materialism differs from Marxist materialism in that it includes modes of production within the concept of infrastructure, while Marxism views infrastructure separately from production. Both theories hold that the modes of production, with or without infrastructure, serve as the primary factors shaping a society.
Harris postulated that the technologies and labors developed out of infrastructure are responsible for a group’s evolution and adaptation to an environment—crucial processes that encourage the survival of a society. He suggested that cultural values and beliefs depend on the need for this infrastructure. The next tier of Harris’s theory examined structure, which involves the organizational properties of society and includes domestic, political, and economic systems. These social arrangements affect the actions and behaviors of a community, which then affect the development of the superstructure, or ideological and symbolic aspects of society. A society’s superstructure is often divided into behavioral (art, sports, science) and mental (values, beliefs, traditions) superstructures. Overall, cultural materialists believe in a society dominated and shaped by material production and reproduction and label infrastructure the seed from which all cultural development (structure and superstructure) grows.
Harris applied his cultural materialist views to his other areas of research, which often focused on rationalizing the seemingly strange behaviors of people. Harris wrote extensively on the subject of the sacred cow in Indian religion in his 1974 book Cows, Pigs, Wars and Witches: The Riddles of Culture and his 1985 book Good to Eat: Riddles of Food and Culture. His research led him to several conclusions about cultural eating habits and taboos. Harris believed Hindus made the cow sacred and outlawed cow slaughter to protect against starvation. Killing the cow simply meant a short-term meal, while keeping a cow alive and healthy meant having a long-term means for plowing fields and providing milk. Harris also examined the reasons why dogs and horses are kept as pets in some countries, while they are eaten as meals in others. He was eager to make his ideas comprehendible to those outside the academic realm, and many of the seventeen books he published over the course of his career were written for general audiences. Harris published his final book, Theories of Culture in Postmodern Times,in 1999. The work examines postmodern society from a cultural materialist perspective.
Following his retirement in 2000, Harris battled pancreatic cancer. He died on October 25, 2001, at the age of seventy-four, in Gainesville, Florida.
Impact
Several of Harris’s publications have become standard reading for anthropology students worldwide. His 1971 work Culture, People, Nature: An Introduction to General Anthropology is commonly used as an anthropology textbook in many universities. His theory of cultural materialism remains his greatest contribution to the cultural anthropology field. The Rise of Anthropological Theory is considered at once his most significant and his most challenged work.
Personal Life
Harris was married to Madeline for nearly fifty years before his death. They had a daughter, Susan.
Bibliography
Burns, Allan. "Marvin Harris." Guardian. Guardian News and Media Limited, 13 Dec. 2001. Web. 24 May 2016.
Buzney, Catherine and Jon Marcoux. "Cultural Materialism." Department of Anthropology, University of Alabama.Department of Anthropology, University of Alabama. Web. 24 May 2016.
Elwell, Frank. "Cultural Materialism: A Sociological Revision." Rogers State University. Rogers State University. Web. 24 May 2016.
Edberg, Mark. "The Starting Point: Defining Culture, Defining Health." In Essentials of Health, Culture, and Diversity. 2nd ed. Richard Riegelman, series editor. Jones & Bartlett Learning, 2023, pp. 9-20.
Margolis, Maxine L. "Marvin Harris, 1927–2001." Department of Anthropology Newsletter, University of Florida. University of Florida. Web. 24 May 2016.
"Marvin Harris Papers." Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, www.si.edu/object/archives/sova-naa-2009-27. Accessed 1 Oct. 2024.
Oliver, Myrna. "Marvin Harris, 74; Anthropologist, Writer." Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, 30 Oct. 2001.Web. 24 May 2016.