John R. Swanton
Encyclopedia
John Reed Swanton was an American
anthropologist and linguist who worked with Native American peoples throughout the United States. Swanton achieved recognition in the fields of ethnology
and ethnohistory
. He is particularly noted for his work with indigenous peoples of the Southeast
and Pacific Northwest
.
, Swanton attended local schools and then entered Harvard University
. He earned a Masters in 1897 and a doctorate in 1900. His mentor at Harvard was Frederic Ward Putnam
. He studied linguistics with Franz Boas
at Columbia University
in 1898 and 1899.
's recent (1999) translation of the poetry of Haida mythtellers Skaay
and Gandl. Swanton spent roughly a year with the Haida.
He began working for the Bureau of American Ethnology
of the Smithsonian Institution
in Washington, DC. He worked with them for the rest of his career, almost 40 years.
Another major study area was of the Muskogean-speaking peoples in Texas
, Louisiana
, and Oklahoma
. Swanton published extensively on the Creek people
, Chickasaw
, and Choctaw
. He also documented analyses about many other less well-known groups, such as the Biloxi
and Ofo
. He argued in favor of including the Natchez language
with the Muskogean language group.
Swanton wrote works including partial dictionaries, studies of linguistic relationships, collections of native stories, and studies of social organization. He worked with Earnest Gouge, a Creek who recorded a large number of traditional stories at Swanton's request. These materials were never published by Swanton. They have recently been published online as Creek Folktales by Earnest Gouge, in a project by The College of William and Maryhttp://www.wm.edu/linguistics/creek/gouge/. The website includes some of the recordings by Gouge.
Swanton also worked with the Caddo
. He published briefly on the quipu
system of the Inca.
Swanton was president of the American Anthropological Association
in 1932. He also served as editor of the American Anthropological Association's flagship journal, American Anthropologist, in 1911 and from 1921-1923.
Swanton died in Newton, Massachusetts
at the age of 85.
With James Owen Dorsey
:
1873-1958, E Museum, Minnesota State University Mankato
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
anthropologist and linguist who worked with Native American peoples throughout the United States. Swanton achieved recognition in the fields of ethnology
Ethnology
Ethnology is the branch of anthropology that compares and analyzes the origins, distribution, technology, religion, language, and social structure of the ethnic, racial, and/or national divisions of humanity.-Scientific discipline:Compared to ethnography, the study of single groups through direct...
and ethnohistory
Ethnohistory
Ethnohistory is the study of ethnographic cultures and indigenous customs by examining historical records. It is also the study of the history of various ethnic groups that may or may not exist today....
. He is particularly noted for his work with indigenous peoples of the Southeast
Southeastern United States
The Southeastern United States, colloquially referred to as the Southeast, is the eastern portion of the Southern United States. It is one of the most populous regions in the United States of America....
and Pacific Northwest
Pacific Northwest
The Pacific Northwest is a region in northwestern North America, bounded by the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains on the east. Definitions of the region vary and there is no commonly agreed upon boundary, even among Pacific Northwesterners. A common concept of the...
.
Early life and education
Born in Gardiner, MaineGardiner, Maine
Gardiner is a city in Kennebec County, Maine, United States. The population was 6,198 at the 2000 census. Popular with tourists, Gardiner is noted for its culture and old architecture.-History:...
, Swanton attended local schools and then entered Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
. He earned a Masters in 1897 and a doctorate in 1900. His mentor at Harvard was Frederic Ward Putnam
Frederic Ward Putnam
Frederic Ward Putnam was an American naturalist and anthropologist.-Biography:...
. He studied linguistics with Franz Boas
Franz Boas
Franz Boas was a German-American anthropologist and a pioneer of modern anthropology who has been called the "Father of American Anthropology" and "the Father of Modern Anthropology." Like many such pioneers, he trained in other disciplines; he received his doctorate in physics, and did...
at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
in 1898 and 1899.
Career
Following his education, Swanton first did fieldwork in the Northwest. In his early career, he worked mostly with the Tlingit and Haida. He produced two extensive compilations of Haida stories and myths, and transcribed many of them into Haida. These transcriptions have served as the basis for Robert BringhurstRobert Bringhurst
Robert Bringhurst is a Canadian poet, typographer and author. He is the author of The Elements of Typographic Style – a reference book of typefaces, glyphs and the visual and geometric arrangement of type...
's recent (1999) translation of the poetry of Haida mythtellers Skaay
Skaay
Skaay was a blind, crippled storyteller of the Haida village of Ttanuu born c. 1827 at Qquuna. Skaay could neither read nor write, but his stories of Haida mythology have survived in the form of written transcriptions taken down by John Swanton with the aide of Henry Moody over the winter of 1900...
and Gandl. Swanton spent roughly a year with the Haida.
He began working for the Bureau of American Ethnology
Bureau of American Ethnology
The Bureau of American Ethnology was established in 1879 by an act of Congress for the purpose of transferring archives, records and materials relating to the Indians of North America from the Interior Department to the Smithsonian Institution...
of the Smithsonian Institution
Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian Institution is an educational and research institute and associated museum complex, administered and funded by the government of the United States and by funds from its endowment, contributions, and profits from its retail operations, concessions, licensing activities, and magazines...
in Washington, DC. He worked with them for the rest of his career, almost 40 years.
Another major study area was of the Muskogean-speaking peoples in Texas
Texas
Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
, Louisiana
Louisiana
Louisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...
, and Oklahoma
Oklahoma
Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...
. Swanton published extensively on the Creek people
Creek people
The Muscogee , also known as the Creek or Creeks, are a Native American people traditionally from the southeastern United States. Mvskoke is their name in traditional spelling. The modern Muscogee live primarily in Oklahoma, Alabama, Georgia, and Florida...
, Chickasaw
Chickasaw
The Chickasaw are Native American people originally from the region that would become the Southeastern United States...
, and Choctaw
Choctaw
The Choctaw are a Native American people originally from the Southeastern United States...
. He also documented analyses about many other less well-known groups, such as the Biloxi
Tunica-Biloxi
The modern Tunica-Biloxi tribe live in Mississippi and east central Louisiana. The modern tribe is composed of descendants of Tunica, Biloxi , Ofo , Avoyel , and Muskogean Choctaw. They speak mostly English and French...
and Ofo
OFO
Ofo may refer to:*Orbiting Frog Otolith*Ofo Language an indigenous language of the lower Mississippi Valley....
. He argued in favor of including the Natchez language
Natchez language
Natchez was a language of Louisiana. Its two last fluent speakers, Watt Sam and Nancy Raven, died in the late 1930s. The Natchez nation is now working to revive it as a spoken language.-Classification:...
with the Muskogean language group.
Swanton wrote works including partial dictionaries, studies of linguistic relationships, collections of native stories, and studies of social organization. He worked with Earnest Gouge, a Creek who recorded a large number of traditional stories at Swanton's request. These materials were never published by Swanton. They have recently been published online as Creek Folktales by Earnest Gouge, in a project by The College of William and Maryhttp://www.wm.edu/linguistics/creek/gouge/. The website includes some of the recordings by Gouge.
Swanton also worked with the Caddo
Caddo
The Caddo Nation is a confederacy of several Southeastern Native American tribes, who traditionally inhabited much of what is now East Texas, northern Louisiana and portions of southern Arkansas and Oklahoma. Today the Caddo Nation of Oklahoma is a cohesive tribe with its capital at Binger, Oklahoma...
. He published briefly on the quipu
Quipu
Quipus or khipus were recording devices used in the Inca Empire and its predecessor societies in the Andean region. A quipu usually consisted of colored, spun, and plied thread or strings from llama or alpaca hair. It could also be made of cotton cords...
system of the Inca.
Swanton was president of the American Anthropological Association
American Anthropological Association
The American Anthropological Association is a professional organization of scholars and practitioners in the field of anthropology. With 11,000 members, the Arlington, Virginia based association includes archaeologists, cultural anthropologists, biological anthropologists, linguistic...
in 1932. He also served as editor of the American Anthropological Association's flagship journal, American Anthropologist, in 1911 and from 1921-1923.
Swanton died in Newton, Massachusetts
Newton, Massachusetts
Newton is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States bordered to the east by Boston. According to the 2010 U.S. Census, the population of Newton was 85,146, making it the eleventh largest city in the state.-Villages:...
at the age of 85.
List of works
- 1905. "Contributions to the Ethnology of the Haida", Publications of the Jesup North Pacific ExpeditionJesup North Pacific ExpeditionThe Jesup North Pacific Expedition was a major anthropological expedition to Siberia, Alaska, and the north west coast of Canada. The purpose of the expedition was to investigate the relationships between the peoples at each side of the Bering Strait...
5(1); American Museum of Natural History Memoirs 8(1). Leiden: E.J. Brill; New York: G.E. Stechert. - 1905. "Haida Texts and Myths: Skidegate Dialect", Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin, No. 29. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office.
- 1909. "Tlingit Myths and Texts", Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin, No. 39. Smithsonian Institution; Washington, D.C.:Government Printing Office.
- 1911. "Indian Tribes of the Lower Mississippi Valley and Adjacent Coast of the Gulf of Mexico", . Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin, No. 43. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, available on Portal to North Texas Website, University of North Texas
- 1918. "An Early Account of the Choctaw Indians", American Anthropologist, Vol. 5, pp. 51–72.
- 1922. "Early History of the Creek Indians and Their Neighbors", Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin, No. 73. Washington D.C.: Government Printing Office.
- 1927. "Religious Beliefs and Medical Practices of the Creek Indians", Forty-Second Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, pp. 639–670. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office.
- 1928. "Social Organization and the Social Usages of the Indians of the Creek Confederacy", Forty-Second Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology for the Years 1924-1925, pg. 279-325. Washington, D.C. Government Printing Office.
- 1929. "Myths & Tales of the Southeastern Indians", Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin, No. 88, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office.
- 1931. "Modern Square Grounds of the Creek Indians", Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections, Vol. 85, No. 8., pp. 1–46 + Plates.
- 1931. "Source Material for the Social and Ceremonial Life of the Choctaw Indians", Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin, No. 103. Washington, D.C.:Government Printing Office.
- 1946. The Indians of the Southeastern United States. Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin, No. 137. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office.
- 1952. The Indian Tribes of North America. Smithsonian Institution Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin, No. 145. Washington: Government Printing Office
- 1952. Swanton, "California Tribes", The Indian Tribes of North America. Smithsonian Institution Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin, No. 145. Washington: GPO, Native American Documents Project, California State University. San Marcos, 2007
With James Owen Dorsey
James Owen Dorsey
James Owen Dorsey was an American ethnologist, linguist, and Episcopalian missionary who contributed to the description of the Ponca, Omaha, and other southern Siouan languages. He also collected much material on beliefs and institutions, although most of his manuscripts have not been published...
:
- 1912. A Dictionary of the Biloxi and Ofo Languages. Bureau of America Ethnology Bulletin, No. 47. Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.:Government Printing Office.
Further reading
- Bringhurst, Robert (1999) A Story as Sharp as a Knife: The Classical Haida Mythtellers and Their World. Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre.
External links
1873-1958, E Museum, Minnesota State University Mankato
- BC Bookworld Search
- Julian H. Steward, "John Reed Swanton (1873-1958): A Biographical Memoir", The National Academies Press, pdf