InfoGuides: Deaf Suffragists/Activists: Benedict, Ruth Fulton

Last Updated: Jul 5, 2024 3:43 PM

Ruth Fulton Benedict

Photograph of Ruth Fulton Benedict (June 5, 1887 – September 17, 1948)----"The purpose of anthropology is to make the world safe for human differences.”

Ruth grew up in Norwich, on a family farm in upstate NY. As a child, she experienced progressive deafness which was discovered when she entered school. She and her sister, Sarah, won scholarships to St. Margaret’s School for Girls, in Buffalo, NY which prepared them for admittance to Vassar College in 1905. Ruth majored in English Literature and continued to pursue her love of writing poetry and stories using different pseudonyms, such as Anne Singleton.

In 1919, a turning point in her life occurred when she entered graduate school and studied with “the Father of Anthropology”, Franz Boas, at Columbia University. He became her mentor and she completed her doctorate in 1923, "The Concept of the Guardian Spirit in North America". Her early career focused on studies of various Native American tribes. She collected Native Americans’ folklore stories and published studies. Ruth became Boas’s assistant and was editor of the Journal of American Folklore.

Another turning point occurred when Ruth Benedict taught her first anthropology course at Barnard College in 1922 and met Margaret Mead, her student. They developed a life-long close relationship, sharing teaching responsibilities, and working on projects together. Ruth could not rely on audiotapes due to her deafness. Due to these barriers, she focused on the VISUAL aspects of culture, such as costumes, architecture, dance, painting, and literature, and a sub-field, visual anthropology was born. Margaret Mead used photography and film to document her work, influenced by Ruth’s visual perspective. Among her many accomplishments, she was the first full woman professor in the U.S.

Ruth Benedict posited a theory that societies had cultures and “personalities”. She is known for her studies of the disenfranchised and deviance within cultures and the influence a person’s culture had on his goals and life direction, particularly those who went against the cultural norms. Margaret Mead and Ruth Benedict were among the first anthropologists to conduct gender and sexuality studies such as gay culture. She published a book, Patterns of Culture, a best-selling seminal work that was used as a major textbook for many introductory anthropology classes.

In 1941, she became a founding member of The Institute for Intercultural Studies which led to her next position. Ruth worked for the Office of War Information to conduct research on Japanese culture from a distance. Franklin D. Roosevelt used her work and advice when he worked with Japan after WW II. She published the Chrysanthemum and the Sword in 1946.

Ruth was committed to social causes, opposed racism, and embraced tolerance. She wrote a powerful book Race: Science and Politics. She was a brilliant leading anthropologist of her time and she interweaved various disciplines such as sociology, psychology, philosophy, and the humanities to create unique and complex perspectives on cultural anthropology.

Banner, L. (2003). Intertwined lives: Margaret Mead, Ruth Benedict, and their circle. New York: Knopf.

Caffrey, M.M. (1989). Ruth Benedict: Stranger in this land. Austin: University of Texas Press.

Modell, J.S. (1983). Ruth Benedict: Patterns of a life. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

Ruth Fulton Benedict. (1995). In H. Lang (with B. Meath-Lang), Deaf persons in the arts and sciences. Westport: Greenwood Press.

Young, V.H. (2005). Ruth Benedict: Beyond relativity, beyond pattern. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.

Sample Book Titles

Intertwined Lives: Margaret Mead, Ruth Benedict, and their circle Ruth Benedict is considered the 'mother of visual anthropology' and was a deaf anthropologist and professor.
Ruth Benedict, Patterns of a Life
Ruth Benedict: Beyond relativity, beyond pattern "Considered one of the most influential and articulate figures in American anthropology, Ruth Benedict (1887-1948) was trained by Franz Boas and Elsie Clews Parsons and collaborated with the equally renowned anthropologist Margaret Mead, a student of hers with whom she was for a time romantically involved. When Benedict died suddenly at the age of sixty-one, she was popularly known for two best-selling works: Patterns of Culture, which became an exemplary model of the integration of societies, and The Chrysanthemum and the Sword, a study of Japanese culture commissioned by the U.S. government during World War II." "Benedict's lasting contribution to anthropology, however, cannot be appreciated solely through her more famous works. Equally innovative were her unpublished or little-noticed writings, which covered such topics as cross-cultural attributes of free societies, the national cultures of Thailand and Romania, and the comparison of Asian consensus politics with American political patterns. This biography by one of Benedict's last graduate students, Virginia Heyer Young, draws on these works, on Benedict's correspondence and collaborative work with Margaret Mead, and on unpublished course notes. Young finds the ordering patterns in the rich materials Benedict left in her papers and demonstrates that Benedict was embarking on new interpretive directions in the last decade of her life - bringing her methods of holistic comparison to bear on contemporary cultures and on the dynamics of social cohesion. Benedict's work, in fact, anticipated trends in anthropology in the decades to come by projecting a framework of individuals not only shaped by their culture but also using their culture for personal or collective objectives."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Sample Book Titles

Deaf Persons in the Arts and Sciences Over the past 30 years, the number of deaf persons studying in colleges and universities has increased from several hundred to more than 12,000. Yet, attitudinal barriers continue to make it difficult for deaf people to enter some fields. This volume provides detailed biographical entries on 150 outstanding deaf individuals, highlighting their contributions to the arts and sciences. It includes several Nobel Prize laureate scientists, an Academy Award winning actress, poets, writers, world-class dancers, and a cadre of painters and sculptors. Some individuals are included for their leadership in education or politics or because they were the first deaf person to hold certain positions. Emphasis is on the subjects' contributions to the arts and the sciences, and particular attention is paid to how being deaf influenced their world view and personal direction. The volume includes many newly-discovered accomplished deaf people, and an appendix listing provides information on additional artists, writers, and scientists of note.
Ruth Benedict Poet, anthropologist, feminist -- Ruth Benedict was all these and much more. Born in the last years of the Victorian era, she came of age during the Progressive years and participated in inaugurating the modern era of American life. This book provides an intellectual and cultural history of the first half of the twentieth century through the life of an important and remarkable woman.
Silence of the Spheres Find information about influential Deaf scientists.