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{{Short description|American anthropologist (1870–1947)}}
{{refimprove|date=October 2007}}
{{more citations needed|date=October 2007}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=April 2021}}
{{Infobox scientist
{{Infobox scientist
|name = Clark Wissler
|name = Clark Wissler
|image = Clark Wissler.jpg
|image = Clark Wissler.jpg
|birth_date = {{Birth-date|September 18, 1870}}
|birth_name = Clark David Wissler
⚫
|birth_date = {{birth date|1870|9|18}}
|birth_place = Cambridge City near [[Hagerstown, Indiana]]
|birth_place = [[Cambridge City, Indiana]]
⚫
|death_date = {{death date and age|1947|08|25|1870|09|18}}
|death_date = {{death date and age|1947|8|25|1870|9|18}}
|death_place = [[New York City]]
|death_place = [[New York City]]
|residence =
|residence =
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|nationality = [[United States|American]]
|nationality = [[United States|American]]
|ethnicity =
|ethnicity =
|field = [[anthropology|anthropologist]]
|field = {{plainlist|
* [[anthropology|anthropologist]]
* [[ethnologist]]
* [[archaeologist]]
⚫
}}
|work_institutions =
|work_institutions =
|alma_mater = [[Columbia University]]
|alma_mater = {{plainlist|
* [[Indiana University Bloomington|Indiana University]] <small>([[Bachelor of Arts|BA]], [[Master of Arts|MA]], [[Legum Doctor|LLD]])</small>
⚫
|doctoral_advisor =
* [[Columbia University]] <small>([[Doctor of Philosophy|PhD]])</small>
}}
⚫
|doctoral_advisor = [[James McKeen Cattell]]
|doctoral_students =
|doctoral_students =
|known_for = North American [[ethnography]]
|known_for = North American [[ethnography]]
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|religion =
|religion =
|footnotes =
|footnotes =
|spouse = {{marriage|Etta Viola Gebhart|1899}}
|children = 2
}}
}}
'''Clark David Wissler''' (September 18, 1870 &ndash; August 25, 1947) was an [[United States|American]] [[anthropology|anthropologist]].
'''Clark David Wissler''' (September 18, 1870 – August 25, 1947) was an American [[anthropology|anthropologist]], [[ethnologist]], and [[archaeologist]].


==Early life==
⚫
Born in Cambridge City near [[Hagerstown, Indiana]], Wissler graduated from [[Indiana University Bloomington|Indiana University]] in 1897. He received his doctorate in psychology from [[Columbia University]] in 1901. After Columbia, Wissler left the field of psychology to focus on Anthropology. Clark Wissler worked at the American Museum of Natural History as a Curator in ethnology from 1902 to 1907. In 1907 Wissler was named Curator of Anthropology when the Archaeology and Ethnology departments were recombined under the Department of Anthropology. Clark Wissler was the first anthropologist to perceive the normative aspect of culture, to define it as learned behavior, and to describe it as a complex of ideas, all characteristics of culture that are today generally accepted.<ref name="Freed 1947">Freed, Stanely and Freed, Ruth. Clark Wissler 1870-1947. National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Biographical Memoirs, 61, 468-497. National Academy Press, Washington DC. 1992.</ref> Wissler was a specialist in North American ethnography, focusing on the [[Native Americans in the United States|Indians]] of the Plains. He contributed to the [[cultural area|culture area]] and age-area ideology of the diffusionist viewpoint that is no longer popular in anthropology. [[Ball State University]] in [[Muncie, Indiana]] holds the archives of Clark Wissler. Furthermore, one hall of Indiana University's Teter Living Center is known as "Clark Wissler Hall".
Clark David Wissler was born in [[Cambridge City, Indiana]] on September 18, 1870 to Sylvania (née Needler) and Benjamin Franklin Wissler.<ref name="richmond">{{Cite web |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/76931691/dr-clark-wissler-wayne-native-dies/ |title=Dr. Clark Wissler, Wayne Native |date=1947-08-26 |page=1 |newspaper=Palladium-Item |via=[[Newspapers.com]] |access-date=2021-05-02}}</ref> After graduating from [[Hagerstown Jr./Sr. High School|Hagerstown High School]], he taught in local schools between 1887 and 1892, and studied at [[Purdue University]] after the six-month school term ended. The following year in 1893 he was the principal of Hagerstown High School, and then he resigned his post and enrolled in [[Indiana University Bloomington|Indiana University]].{{citation needed |date=April 2021}}


== Introduction ==
==Education==
⚫
Wissler received a [[Bachelor of Arts|BA]] in Experimental Psychology from Indiana University in 1897 and a [[Master of Arts|MA]] in 1899.<ref name="richmond"/> He continued his psychology graduate work under [[James McKeen Cattell]] at [[Columbia University]]. He received his [[Doctor of Philosophy|doctorate]] in psychology from Columbia in 1901.<ref name="richmond"/> From 1901 to 1903 Wissler performed research on individual mental and physical differences. Wissler's doctoral dissertation used the new [[Pearson correlation coefficient]] formula to show that there was no correlation between scores on Cattell's IQ tests and academic achievement. Wissler's dissertation eventually led the psychology movement to lose interest in psychophysical testing of intelligence.<ref name="Freed 1947"/>
Clark Wissler is a renowned American Anthropologist and Archaeologist who was born on September 18, 1870 in Wayne County, Indiana. After graduating from Hagerstown High School, he taught in local schools between 1887–1892, and studied at Purdue University after the six months school term ended. The following year in 1893 he was the principal of Hagerstown High School, and then he resigned his post and enrolled in Indiana University.


In 1929, he received a [[Legum Doctor|LLD]] from Indiana University.<ref name="richmond"/>
== Education ==
⚫
Wissler received his BA in Experimental Psychology in 1897 and received his MA in 1899. Wissler married Etta Viola Gebhart on June 14, 1899 and he fathered a son and a daughter, Stanley Gebhart Wissler and Mary Viola Wissler. In 1899 Wissler was appointed assistant in psychology at Columbia University. He continued his psychology graduate work under James McKeen Cattell and he received his Ph.D. in psychology in 1901. From 1901 to 1903 Wissler performed research on individual mental and physical differences. Wissler's doctoral dissertation used the new Pearson Correlation Coefficient formula to show that there was no correlation between scores on Cattell's IQ tests and academic achievement. Wissler's dissertation eventually led the psychology movement to lose interest in psychophysical testing of intelligence.<ref name="Freed 1947"/>


== Background ==
==Career==
===Early career===
⚫
When Wissler graduated from Columbia he abandoned psychology for anthropology. In 1902 he became an assistant in Ethnology at the American Museum of Natural History under Franz Boas. In 1904, Wissler was named assistant curator of Ethnology and in 1905, when Boas resigned, Wissler was named Acting Curator of Ethnology. The following year of 1906, he was named curator of the Department of Ethnology and in 1907 he was named curator of Anthropology when the Archaeology and Ethnology departments were recombined under the Department of Anthropology. In 1924 Wissler began teaching at Yale University as a Psychological Researcher until 1931 when he switched to an Anthropology Professor, which he held until 1941. Wissler held the position of Curator of the Department of Anthropology until 1942 when he retired. Clark Wissler: Influences on the Development of Anthropology in the United States 1999.</ref>
In 1897, he served as an instructor at Indiana University.<ref name="richmond"/> From 1897 to 1899, he was an instructor at [[Ohio State University]].<ref name="richmond"/> In 1899 Wissler was appointed assistant in psychology at Columbia University.{{citation needed |date=April 2021}} At Columbia, Wissler also served as an assistant professor of anthropology from 1903 to 1905 and as a lecturer from 1905 to 1909.<ref name="richmond"/> Wissler was also an instructor at [[New York University]] from 1901 to 1902.<ref name="richmond"/>


===American Museum of Natural History===
== Employment history ==
⚫
After Columbia, Wissler left the field of psychology to focus on anthropology. In 1902 he became an assistant in Ethnology at the [[American Museum of Natural History]] under [[Franz Boas]]. In 1904, Wissler was named Assistant Curator of Ethnology and in 1905, when Boas resigned, Wissler was named Acting Curator of Ethnology. The following year of 1906, he was named curator of the Department of Ethnology and in 1907 he was named curator of Anthropology when the Archaeology and Ethnology departments were recombined under the Department of Anthropology.
⚫
Clark Wissler performed his field research from 1902 until 1905 on the Dakota, Gros Ventre, and the Blackfoot. Wissler's fieldwork provided comprehensive ethnographies of each Native American culture, especially the Blackfoot. While Curator, Wissler funded ethnological and archaeological fieldwork of the Northern Plains and the Southwest. Wissler also "encouraged physical anthropology, built up collections of worldwide scope, planned exhibitions, and oversaw the publication of about thirtyeight volumes of the Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History."<ref name="Freed 1947"/>
⚫
Wissler's best contribution to anthropology is his Culture-Area Approach. "He was the first anthropologist to perceive the normative aspect of culture, to define it as learned behavior, and to describe it as a complex of ideas, all characteristics of culture that are today generally accepted."<ref name="Freed 1947"/> Wissler wanted to compare different cultures, but in order to do that he first needed to define what a culture is. The concept of Culture Area had been around before Wissler, but he redefined the concept so it could be used analytically. Wissler revolutionized the study of culture to a theory of cultural change and as an alternative to the Boasian style of anthropology.<ref>Swartz, BK. "Clark Wissler, Artifact Collector". Proceedings of the Indiana Academy of Science for 1987, Vol. 97, pp. 399-400. Indianapolis.</ref> Wissler shifted the analytical focus away from the culture and history of a specific social unit to "a concern with the trait-complex viewed in cross cultural perspective."<ref name="Freed 1947"/> "The correspondence of a well-defined geographical area with a group of cultures that share many features is the basis of the concept of the culture area." Wissler states that the principal barriers that preserve the distinctness of a culture area as physical: surface, climate fauna, and flora. Wissler was trying to make cultural anthropology more scientific by forming a definition of culture that could be used to compare similar or different cultures. With a set of parameters for what a culture can be based upon, variables such as climate, environment, resources, food, water, and population size etc., researchers could now compare their studies of Plains Indians to their studies of Great Basin Indians. Wissler also helped introduce statistics with the Pearson Correlation Coefficient Formula which could be used to compare different artifacts in relations to their geological location. This could help understand where a certain artifact, piece of pottery, or type of tool originated by testing if there is a high correlation of a certain artifact with sites in certain areas.


===Yale University===
⚫
== Research emphasis ==
In 1924 Wissler began teaching at [[Yale University]] as a psychological researcher until 1931 when he switched to an anthropology professor, which he held until 1941. Wissler held the position of Curator of the Department of Anthropology until 1942 when he retired.<ref name="Clark Wissler 1999">Clark Wissler: Influences on the Development of Anthropology in the United States 1999.</ref>


===Other accomplishments===
⚫
Clark Wissler's main area of research was on Native American Culture. His influence is overlooked because of other anthropologists like Franz Boas and Ruth Benedict. Wissler offered some new theories that were quite different from Boas, who was a leading cultural researcher. One of Wissler's new concepts was the belief in cultural diffusion and that culture was biologically innate in humans. "Wissler also came up with the age-area hypothesis that is a theory that the age of cultural traits may be determined by examining the distribution of these traits throughout the larger area where these traits are present." Clark Wissler: Influences on the Development of Anthropology in the United States 1999.</ref> Wissler's Influence is still felt in Anthropology today and he is credited for helping make Cultural Anthropology and Psychology more scientific with analytical and statistical testing.
He was division chairman of the [[National Research Council (United States)|National Research Council]] in 1920 and 1921.<ref name="richmond"/> He was appointed as a member of the [[National Park Service]] Board by President [[Herbert Hoover]].<ref name="richmond"/> Wissler was elected to the [[American Academy of Arts and Sciences]] in 1920,<ref>{{Cite web |date=2023-02-09 |title=Clark Wissler |url=https://www.amacad.org/person/clark-wissler |access-date=2023-08-25 |website=American Academy of Arts & Sciences |language=en}}</ref> the [[American Philosophical Society]] in 1924,<ref>{{Cite web |title=APS Member History |url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=Clark+Wissler&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced |access-date=2023-08-25 |website=search.amphilsoc.org}}</ref> and the United States [[National Academy of Sciences]] in 1929.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Clark Wissler |url=http://www.nasonline.org/member-directory/deceased-members/20001452.html |access-date=2023-08-25 |website=www.nasonline.org}}</ref>

⚫
==Research==
⚫
Clark Wissler performed his field research from 1902 until 1905 on the [[Dakota people|Dakota]], [[Gros Ventre]], and the [[Blackfoot Confederacy|Blackfoot]]. Wissler's fieldwork provided comprehensive ethnographies of each Native American culture, especially the Blackfoot. While Curator, Wissler funded ethnological and archaeological fieldwork of the Northern Plains and the Southwest. Wissler also "encouraged physical anthropology, built up collections of worldwide scope, planned exhibitions, and oversaw the publication of about thirty-eight volumes of the Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History."<ref name="Freed 1947"/>

⚫
Wissler's best contribution to anthropology is his [[culture area]] approach.{{citation needed |date=April 2021 |reason=best according to who?}} "He was the first anthropologist to perceive the normative aspect of culture, to define it as learned behavior, and to describe it as a complex of ideas, all characteristics of culture that are today generally accepted."<ref name="Freed 1947"/> Wissler wanted to compare different cultures, but in order to do that he first needed to define what a culture is. The concept of culture area had been around before Wissler, but he redefined the concept so it could be used analytically. Wissler revolutionized the study of culture to a theory of cultural change and as an alternative to the Boasian style of anthropology.<ref>Swartz, BK. "Clark Wissler, Artifact Collector". Proceedings of the Indiana Academy of Science for 1987, Vol. 97, pp. 399–400. Indianapolis.</ref> Wissler shifted the analytical focus away from the culture and history of a specific social unit to "a concern with the trait-complex viewed in cross cultural perspective."<ref name="Freed 1947"/> "The correspondence of a well-defined geographical area with a group of cultures that share many features is the basis of the concept of the culture area."{{citation needed |date=April 2021}} Wissler states that the principal barriers that preserve the distinctness of a culture area as physical: surface, climate fauna, and flora. Wissler was trying to make cultural anthropology more scientific by forming a definition of culture that could be used to compare similar or different cultures. With a set of parameters for what a culture can be based upon, variables such as climate, environment, resources, food, water, and population size etc., researchers could now compare their studies of Plains Indians to their studies of Great Basin Indians. Wissler also helped introduce statistics with the Pearson correlation coefficient formula which could be used to compare different artifacts in relations to their geological location. This could help understand where a certain artifact, piece of pottery, or type of tool originated by testing if there is a high correlation of a certain artifact with sites in certain areas.{{citation needed |date=April 2021}}

⚫
Clark Wissler was the first anthropologist to perceive the normative aspect of culture, to define it as learned behavior, and to describe it as a complex of ideas, all characteristics of culture that are today generally accepted.<ref name="Freed 1947">Freed, Stanely and Freed, Ruth. Clark Wissler 1870–1947. National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Biographical Memoirs, 61, 468–497. National Academy Press, Washington DC. 1992.</ref> Wissler was a specialist in North American ethnography, focusing on the [[Native Americans in the United States|Indians]] of the Plains. He contributed to the culture area and age-area ideology of the diffusionist viewpoint that is no longer popular in anthropology. [[Ball State University]] in [[Muncie, Indiana]] holds the papers of Clark Wissler.<ref>[http://www.bsu.edu/libraries/archives/findingaids/MSS304.pdf Clark Wissler Papers], Archives and Special Collections, Ball State University Libraries</ref> Furthermore, one hall of Indiana University's Teter Living Center is known as "Clark Wissler Hall".{{citation needed |date=April 2021}}

⚫
Clark Wissler's main area of research was on Native American cultures. His influence is overlooked because of other anthropologists like Franz Boas and [[Ruth Benedict]].{{citation needed |date=April 2021}} Wissler offered some new theories that were quite different from Boas, who was a leading cultural researcher. One of Wissler's new concepts was the belief in cultural diffusion and that culture was biologically innate in humans. "Wissler also came up with the age-area hypothesis that is a theory that the age of cultural traits may be determined by examining the distribution of these traits throughout the larger area where these traits are present."<ref name="Clark Wissler 1999"/> Wissler's Influence is still felt in anthropology today and he is credited for helping make the fields of cultural anthropology and psychology more scientific with analytical and statistical testing.

==Views on Race and Eugenics==
Wissler was actively engaged in the [[Eugenics in the United States|American eugenics movement]], a movement with the aim of purifying the American population of people with hereditary qualities deemed undesirable.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Defending the Master Race: Conservation, Eugenics, and the Legacy of Madison Grant |last=Spiro |first=Jonathan P. |publisher=Univ. of Vermont Press |year=2009 |isbn=978-1-58465-715-6}}</ref> He also was a proponent of a hierarchic racial theory that saw Africans as the lowest and Nordics as the highest rungs. This theory is today considered part and parcel of the early history of [[scientific racism]].<ref>SHAPIRO, W. (1985), Some Implications of Clark Wissler's Race Theory. Mankind, 15: 1–17.</ref><ref>Eric B. Ross. 1985.
The "Deceptively Simple" Racism of Clark Wissler. American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 87, No. 2 (Jun., 1985), pp. 390–393</ref>

==Personal life==
Wissler married Etta Viola Gebhart of [[Hagerstown, Indiana]] on June 14, 1899.<ref name="richmond"/>{{citation needed |date=April 2021 |reason=exact date}} Together, they had a son and a daughter, Stanley Gebhart Wissler and Mary Viola Wissler.<ref name="richmond"/>

==Death==
Wissler died at [[Doctors Hospital (Manhattan)|Doctors Hospital]] in [[New York City]] on August 25, 1947.<ref name="richmond"/>


== Selected books and articles ==
== Selected books and articles ==
Line 51: Line 83:
*Making Mankind: (Clark Wissler, Fay Cooper Cole, William M. McGovern, et al.). 1929. D. Van Nostrand Company
*Making Mankind: (Clark Wissler, Fay Cooper Cole, William M. McGovern, et al.). 1929. D. Van Nostrand Company
*Star Legends (Clark Wissler). 1936. The American Museum of Natural History.
*Star Legends (Clark Wissler). 1936. The American Museum of Natural History.
*Indian Cavalcade or Lifeon the Old-Time Indian Reservations (Clark Wissler). 1938. Sheridan House.
*Indian Cavalcade or Life on the Old-Time Indian Reservations (Clark Wissler). 1938. Sheridan House.
*Indian Costumes in the United States: A Guide to the Study of the Collections in the Museum (Clark Wissler).
*Indian Costumes in the United States: A Guide to the Study of the Collections in the Museum (Clark Wissler).
*Man and Culture (Clark Wissler). 1940. Norwood Editions.
*Man and Culture (Clark Wissler). 1940. Norwood Editions.
*Indians of the United States: Four Centuries of Their History and Culture (Clark Wissler). 1941. Doubleday and Company.
*Indians of the United States: Four Centuries of Their History and Culture (Clark Wissler). 1941. Doubleday and Company.
*A Blackfoot Source Book: Papers (Clark Wissler, David Hurst Thomas). 1986, Garland Pub.
*A Blackfoot Source Book: Papers (Clark Wissler, David Hurst Thomas). 1986, Garland Pub.

==See also==
*[[Four Guns]]


== References ==
== References ==
{{Reflist}}
<references/>


==External links==
==External links==
*[http://dmr.bsu.edu/cdm/landingpage/collection/WsslrClrk Clark Wissler Collection] Digital Media Repository, Ball State University Libraries
*[http://www.bsu.edu/libraries/archives/findingaids/MSS304.pdf Clark Wissler Papers] Archives and Special Collections, Ball State University Libraries (PDF)
* {{Gutenberg author | id=37997 | name=Clark Wissler}}
* {{FadedPage|id=Wissler, Clark|name=Clark Wissler|author=yes}}
* {{Internet Archive author |sname=Clark David Wissler}}
* http://books.nap.edu/html/biomems/cwissler.pdf
* http://books.nap.edu/html/biomems/cwissler.pdf
* http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/wissler.shtml
* http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/wissler.shtml
* http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/information/biography/uvwxyz/wissler_clark.html
* https://web.archive.org/web/20090503015834/http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/information/biography/uvwxyz/wissler_clark.html
* http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/645996/Clark-Wissler
* http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/645996/Clark-Wissler


{{American Anthropological Association presidents|state=uncollapsed}}
{{Authority control|VIAF=27179990}}
{{Authority control}}
{{Persondata <!-- Metadata: see [[Wikipedia:Persondata]]. -->
| NAME = Wissler, Clark
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES =
| SHORT DESCRIPTION = American anthropologist
| DATE OF BIRTH = September 18, 1870
| PLACE OF BIRTH = [[Hagerstown, Indiana]]
| DATE OF DEATH = August 25, 1947
| PLACE OF DEATH =
⚫
}}


{{DEFAULTSORT:Wissler, Clark}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wissler, Clark}}

[[Category:1870 births]]
[[Category:1870 births]]
[[Category:1947 deaths]]
[[Category:1947 deaths]]
[[Category:American anthropologists]]
[[Category:American anthropologists]]
⚫
[[Category:American educationists]]
[[Category:American curators]]
[[Category:American curators]]
[[Category:Columbia University alumni]]
[[Category:American educational theorists]]
[[Category:Ethnographers]]
[[Category:Columbia University faculty]]
⚫
[[Category:American ethnographers]]
[[Category:Indiana University alumni]]
[[Category:Indiana University alumni]]
[[Category:People from Wayne County, Indiana]]
[[Category:Indiana University faculty]]
[[Category:Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences]]
[[Category:New York University faculty]]
[[Category:Ohio State University faculty]]
[[Category:People associated with the American Museum of Natural History]]
[[Category:People associated with the American Museum of Natural History]]
[[Category:People from Cambridge City, Indiana]]

[[Category:Teachers College, Columbia University alumni]]
[[de:Clark Wissler]]
[[Category:Yale University faculty]]
[[es:Clark Wissler]]
[[Category:Members of the American Philosophical Society]]
[[ko:클라크 위슬러]]
[[ru:Висслер, Кларк]]
[[uk:Кларк Вісслер]]

Latest revision as of 17:17, 12 September 2023

Clark Wissler
Born
Clark David Wissler

(1870-09-18)September 18, 1870
Cambridge City, Indiana
DiedAugust 25, 1947(1947-08-25) (aged 76)
New York City
NationalityAmerican
Alma mater
Known forNorth American ethnography
Spouse
Etta Viola Gebhart
​
(m. 1899)​
Children2
Scientific career
Fields
Doctoral advisorJames McKeen Cattell

Clark David Wissler (September 18, 1870 – August 25, 1947) was an American anthropologist, ethnologist, and archaeologist.

Early life

[edit]

Clark David Wissler was born in Cambridge City, Indiana on September 18, 1870 to Sylvania (née Needler) and Benjamin Franklin Wissler.[1] After graduating from Hagerstown High School, he taught in local schools between 1887 and 1892, and studied at Purdue University after the six-month school term ended. The following year in 1893 he was the principal of Hagerstown High School, and then he resigned his post and enrolled in Indiana University.[citation needed]

Education

[edit]

Wissler received a BA in Experimental Psychology from Indiana University in 1897 and a MA in 1899.[1] He continued his psychology graduate work under James McKeen Cattell at Columbia University. He received his doctorate in psychology from Columbia in 1901.[1] From 1901 to 1903 Wissler performed research on individual mental and physical differences. Wissler's doctoral dissertation used the new Pearson correlation coefficient formula to show that there was no correlation between scores on Cattell's IQ tests and academic achievement. Wissler's dissertation eventually led the psychology movement to lose interest in psychophysical testing of intelligence.[2]

In 1929, he received a LLD from Indiana University.[1]

Career

[edit]

Early career

[edit]

In 1897, he served as an instructor at Indiana University.[1] From 1897 to 1899, he was an instructor at Ohio State University.[1] In 1899 Wissler was appointed assistant in psychology at Columbia University.[citation needed] At Columbia, Wissler also served as an assistant professor of anthropology from 1903 to 1905 and as a lecturer from 1905 to 1909.[1] Wissler was also an instructor at New York University from 1901 to 1902.[1]

American Museum of Natural History

[edit]

After Columbia, Wissler left the field of psychology to focus on anthropology. In 1902 he became an assistant in Ethnology at the American Museum of Natural History under Franz Boas. In 1904, Wissler was named Assistant Curator of Ethnology and in 1905, when Boas resigned, Wissler was named Acting Curator of Ethnology. The following year of 1906, he was named curator of the Department of Ethnology and in 1907 he was named curator of Anthropology when the Archaeology and Ethnology departments were recombined under the Department of Anthropology.

Yale University

[edit]

In 1924 Wissler began teaching at Yale University as a psychological researcher until 1931 when he switched to an anthropology professor, which he held until 1941. Wissler held the position of Curator of the Department of Anthropology until 1942 when he retired.[3]

Other accomplishments

[edit]

He was division chairman of the National Research Council in 1920 and 1921.[1] He was appointed as a member of the National Park Service Board by President Herbert Hoover.[1] Wissler was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1920,[4] the American Philosophical Society in 1924,[5] and the United States National Academy of Sciences in 1929.[6]

Research

[edit]

Clark Wissler performed his field research from 1902 until 1905 on the Dakota, Gros Ventre, and the Blackfoot. Wissler's fieldwork provided comprehensive ethnographies of each Native American culture, especially the Blackfoot. While Curator, Wissler funded ethnological and archaeological fieldwork of the Northern Plains and the Southwest. Wissler also "encouraged physical anthropology, built up collections of worldwide scope, planned exhibitions, and oversaw the publication of about thirty-eight volumes of the Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History."[2]

Wissler's best contribution to anthropology is his culture area approach.[citation needed] "He was the first anthropologist to perceive the normative aspect of culture, to define it as learned behavior, and to describe it as a complex of ideas, all characteristics of culture that are today generally accepted."[2] Wissler wanted to compare different cultures, but in order to do that he first needed to define what a culture is. The concept of culture area had been around before Wissler, but he redefined the concept so it could be used analytically. Wissler revolutionized the study of culture to a theory of cultural change and as an alternative to the Boasian style of anthropology.[7] Wissler shifted the analytical focus away from the culture and history of a specific social unit to "a concern with the trait-complex viewed in cross cultural perspective."[2] "The correspondence of a well-defined geographical area with a group of cultures that share many features is the basis of the concept of the culture area."[citation needed] Wissler states that the principal barriers that preserve the distinctness of a culture area as physical: surface, climate fauna, and flora. Wissler was trying to make cultural anthropology more scientific by forming a definition of culture that could be used to compare similar or different cultures. With a set of parameters for what a culture can be based upon, variables such as climate, environment, resources, food, water, and population size etc., researchers could now compare their studies of Plains Indians to their studies of Great Basin Indians. Wissler also helped introduce statistics with the Pearson correlation coefficient formula which could be used to compare different artifacts in relations to their geological location. This could help understand where a certain artifact, piece of pottery, or type of tool originated by testing if there is a high correlation of a certain artifact with sites in certain areas.[citation needed]

Clark Wissler was the first anthropologist to perceive the normative aspect of culture, to define it as learned behavior, and to describe it as a complex of ideas, all characteristics of culture that are today generally accepted.[2] Wissler was a specialist in North American ethnography, focusing on the Indians of the Plains. He contributed to the culture area and age-area ideology of the diffusionist viewpoint that is no longer popular in anthropology. Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana holds the papers of Clark Wissler.[8] Furthermore, one hall of Indiana University's Teter Living Center is known as "Clark Wissler Hall".[citation needed]

Clark Wissler's main area of research was on Native American cultures. His influence is overlooked because of other anthropologists like Franz Boas and Ruth Benedict.[citation needed] Wissler offered some new theories that were quite different from Boas, who was a leading cultural researcher. One of Wissler's new concepts was the belief in cultural diffusion and that culture was biologically innate in humans. "Wissler also came up with the age-area hypothesis that is a theory that the age of cultural traits may be determined by examining the distribution of these traits throughout the larger area where these traits are present."[3] Wissler's Influence is still felt in anthropology today and he is credited for helping make the fields of cultural anthropology and psychology more scientific with analytical and statistical testing.

Views on Race and Eugenics

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Wissler was actively engaged in the American eugenics movement, a movement with the aim of purifying the American population of people with hereditary qualities deemed undesirable.[9] He also was a proponent of a hierarchic racial theory that saw Africans as the lowest and Nordics as the highest rungs. This theory is today considered part and parcel of the early history of scientific racism.[10][11]

Personal life

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Wissler married Etta Viola Gebhart of Hagerstown, Indiana on June 14, 1899.[1][citation needed] Together, they had a son and a daughter, Stanley Gebhart Wissler and Mary Viola Wissler.[1]

Death

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Wissler died at Doctors Hospital in New York City on August 25, 1947.[1]

Selected books and articles

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  • Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History, Volume XI, Part 1 (Clark Wissler). 1913
  • The American Indian (Clark Wissler). 1917. Oxford University Press, NY.
  • North American Indians of the Plains (Clark Wissler). 1920. Smithsonian Institution, New York.
  • Making Mankind: (Clark Wissler, Fay Cooper Cole, William M. McGovern, et al.). 1929. D. Van Nostrand Company
  • Star Legends (Clark Wissler). 1936. The American Museum of Natural History.
  • Indian Cavalcade or Life on the Old-Time Indian Reservations (Clark Wissler). 1938. Sheridan House.
  • Indian Costumes in the United States: A Guide to the Study of the Collections in the Museum (Clark Wissler).
  • Man and Culture (Clark Wissler). 1940. Norwood Editions.
  • Indians of the United States: Four Centuries of Their History and Culture (Clark Wissler). 1941. Doubleday and Company.
  • A Blackfoot Source Book: Papers (Clark Wissler, David Hurst Thomas). 1986, Garland Pub.

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m "Dr. Clark Wissler, Wayne Native". Palladium-Item. August 26, 1947. p. 1. Retrieved May 2, 2021 – via Newspapers.com.
  2. ^ a b c d e Freed, Stanely and Freed, Ruth. Clark Wissler 1870–1947. National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Biographical Memoirs, 61, 468–497. National Academy Press, Washington DC. 1992.
  3. ^ a b Clark Wissler: Influences on the Development of Anthropology in the United States 1999.
  4. ^ "Clark Wissler". American Academy of Arts & Sciences. February 9, 2023. Retrieved August 25, 2023.
  5. ^ "APS Member History". search.amphilsoc.org. Retrieved August 25, 2023.
  6. ^ "Clark Wissler". www.nasonline.org. Retrieved August 25, 2023.
  7. ^ Swartz, BK. "Clark Wissler, Artifact Collector". Proceedings of the Indiana Academy of Science for 1987, Vol. 97, pp. 399–400. Indianapolis.
  8. ^ Clark Wissler Papers, Archives and Special Collections, Ball State University Libraries
  9. ^ Spiro, Jonathan P. (2009). Defending the Master Race: Conservation, Eugenics, and the Legacy of Madison Grant. Univ. of Vermont Press. ISBN 978-1-58465-715-6.
  10. ^ SHAPIRO, W. (1985), Some Implications of Clark Wissler's Race Theory. Mankind, 15: 1–17.
  11. ^ Eric B. Ross. 1985. The "Deceptively Simple" Racism of Clark Wissler. American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 87, No. 2 (Jun., 1985), pp. 390–393
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