Arts and Letters

I met Margaret Mead for the first time more than fifty years ago and had many encounters with her since the late 1950s, but we never broke bread nor had a drink together. All our associations were in public affairs on which we collaborated, and about which we often disagreed. This type of relationship is a flimsy basis from which to write about a person so intensely human that her obituary in The New York Times characterized her as the "Grandmother of the World." A short account of my transient associations with Margaret will forewarn the reader of my scanty qualifications to describe this vibrant person—often irritating in her self-assurance but so enriching through her presence and actions.

In the late 1920s Margaret was part of the famous Department of Anthropology headed by Franz Boas at Columbia University. I was a newcomer to New York at that time and Professor Boas used me a few hours every week to study problems of pronunciation (still unsolved) as I tried to move from French into English. On Saturday evenings, he held open house in his home for his colleagues and students and invited me a few times. This is the setting in which I met Margaret, shortly before her first field trip to Samoa. My only scientific experience at that time was in laboratory science and my memories of the Boas evenings are hazy. Now that I have read a great deal about anthropology, I realize that I was witness among this group to the zenith of a theory of human nature which is now being questioned.

In 1928, Margaret published her first book, Coming of Age in Samoa, which was a study of adolescence in Samoa. The book is written in an easy style and can be regarded as the popular manifesto of the Boas school of anthropology, which taught that we are the products of culture rather than of our genes. Her observations on the development of girls under the then primitive conditions of life in Samoa revealed ways of life, especially in social relationships and in sexual behavior, very different from those prevalent in Western societies. They strengthened Margaret's belief in—to quote her own words—"the tremendous role played in an individual's life by the social environment in which each is born and reared." Her conclusion was that "aspects of behavior which we have been accustomed to consider invariable components of our humanity (are) merely a result of civilization." Her first professional achievement thus documented with picturesque examples the view of culture she had acquired from Boas, who stated once more in his preface to her book that "much of what we ascribe to human nature is in reality the expression of the effects of social life on behavior." Coming of Age in Samoa became immediately, and has remained ever since, an immensely popular book. The new preface that Margaret wrote for the 1973 reprinting makes clear that she remained to the end a faithful disciple of the Boas school.

Margaret died in 1978, exactly fifty years after the first publication of Coming of Age. That very same year, Edward O. Wilson of Harvard University achieved instantaneous world-wide fame—compounded of either admiration or outrage—with his book On Human Nature in which he affirmed that our behavior is controlled by the genetic heritage of the human species. While Wilson does not deny the effects of environmental influences on the modalities of behavior, he recognizes in our evolutionary past deep genetic roots not only for aggressiveness and sexuality but even for the most distinctively human attributes—such as generosity, self-sacrifice, and religious feelings. In his own words, "The evidence for hereditary genetic determinism of human social behavior… is more detailed and compelling than most persons… realize. I will go further: it is already decisive." A far cry from Boas' teachings. Margaret, who was always so intensely in the midst of things, would have had a glorious time participating in the current debate on sociobiology. Even though she is no longer with us, Coming of Age in Samoa must make exciting reading along with On Human Nature for students beginning the study of human behavior.

When Margaret returned from Samoa in September, 1929, Coming of Age had already been published and had been warmly received by the general public. One can learn much about her from the reasons that accounted for her immediate and continued popularity as an exponent of anthropology.

Margaret had been interested in writing since childhood. Both her father and mother were professionals in social sciences and, as she states in her autobiography, "Writing was what my parents did and writing was as much a part of my life as gardening and canning were in the life of a farmer's daughter of those days." She wrote poetry, a novel, and even plays, beginning with her days in grammar school; she intended to become a writer and majored in English at Barnard College. When she came, at the age of twenty-seven, to write on adolescence, especially in women, she felt that this topic would be of special interest for teachers and parents. She therefore made a conscious decision to write in "English"—a language profoundly different from the anthropological jargon which seems to have irritated her during her graduate training in anthropology. From her early twenties and probably as a result of her mother's influence, she did not feel at home in the ivory tower and viewed knowledge chiefly as a way to influence human events.

Margaret missed the chance for the kind of fight she loved by dying in 1978, precisely at the time when sociobiology was becoming the hottest issue in anthropology, but she had been involved in many other controversies from the beginning of her professional life. As early as 1929, the popular style and success of Coming of Age convinced many anthropologists and other social scientists that Margaret went to Samoa not really to investigate adolescence as an anthropological problem but to prove a point. According to her critics she wanted to show that the stormy, stressful American style of adolescence was not inevitable and that the Samoan ways of life made in fact this phase of human development a peaceful and pleasant experience. I did not know Margaret well enough, nor am I sufficiently familiar with anthropology, to evaluate the validity of this criticism of her work, but I know enough about science and scientists in general to suspect that, even if true, this criticism of her work is not very significant. Scientists—whatever their field of specialization—aim in theory at discovering the truth through objective observations and through willingness to recognize flaws in their interpretation of the facts, but the practice of science is usually different from this idealized image—especially when knowledge touches directly on human affairs. For example, the amount and diversity of information concerning the advantages and dangers of nuclear energy have enormously increased during the past three decades, but even though most scientists are familiar with this accumulation of knowledge concerning nuclear radiations, few if any have changed their original views about the desirability of building nuclear reactors for the production of energy.

Another criticism leveled against Margaret was that she tried to appeal to the general public by dealing extensively with sex—as she did indeed in most of her writings. With her usual vigor, she replied that other anthropologists also generally deal with sex, but rarely manage to present the topic in an interesting way relevant to the preoccupations of ordinary people. The simple truth is that, in a very human way, Margaret had views not only about sex and family life but also about most meaningful social and technological problems of her time. She may not have displayed much originality in dealing with sociotechnical problems but she had a remarkable sense for becoming aware of them at an early stage and an immense ability for acquainting herself with their essential elements. She seemed to have, furthermore, an overwhelming eagerness to take a position on any issue—whether because of moral concern for public affairs, or for the excitement of being in the limelight and of participating in a fight that was both scientifically interesting and socially important. More important, perhaps, her identification with any cause helped other participants to function more effectively. In the words of a person who worked with her on several occasions, she was an "energizer" rather than a leader.

Margaret managed to stay relevant and current by regarding as anthropological topics and therefore within her professional field the most vital problems of our own times—population control, environmental degradation, women's liberation, black power, the generation gap, civil liberties, child development, the role of churches in the modern world, drug addiction, and alcoholism, the use of nuclear energy in warfare or for peaceful purposes. By the late 1960s, she had come to take a stand on practically all the important issues of our time. Since she discussed all problems in the light of anthropological science she came to be regarded by the public as an expert in all fields and thus became the best known or at least the most "visible" scientist of the late twentieth century. According to a survey made in 1973, 82 percent of the college students interviewed knew her name and some aspect of her activities. Even more evidence of her fame can be seen in Cambridge's Harvard Square, on the wall in a restaurant where stained glass windows dating from 1972 contain portraits in mock-saint costumes of the best known people of the day. Among them are Richard Nixon, Joe Namath, Humphrey Bogart, and… Margaret Mead! She had come to symbolize the scholar willing to move out of the ivory tower to solve the problems of humankind.

Although I had little personal contact with Margaret, what I have seen and heard of her testifies to her immense vitality, generosity, and human warmth. I know how far she went to help her young colleagues and students. It was in the course of a scientific meeting that I discovered how proud she was of her daughter's academic achievements and how fondly she spoke of her granddaughter, almost in a grandmotherly doting way. The last chapters of her autobiography testify to the intensity of her very human feelings for her daughter and granddaughter.

There were obviously difficult moments in her personal life, as illustrated by the fact that she had divorced three times by the age of forty-seven. In her autobiography, Margaret has acknowledged that her own character was probably responsible in large part for her marital difficulties. "American women are good mothers, but they make poor wives," she wrote, and in the same sentence she added, as further explanation, "Americans are very poor at being attentive to anybody else." This peculiar phrase is characteristic of the sweeping unwarranted statements that Margaret was wont to make on almost any subject and that long prevented the full recognition of her genius. So silly is her generalization about American women that I shall take it as an excuse to end my presentation with a remark that may not make much more sense than her own statement.

During the First World War, a song entitled "La Madelon" became immensely popular in France. Madelon was a pretty waitress in a tavern near the front and was very much in the minds of the soldiers of the region. As one of them proposed marriage to her, she answered smilingly, "How could I possibly marry only one man when I am in love with the whole regiment?" (Pour-quoi n'epouserai- je qu'un seul homme / Quand j'aime tout le régiment?)

Lèse majesté as it may seem, I believe that the waitress's reply fits the case of Margaret Mead. She was in love with the whole world and with all of life and found it difficult to limit herself to only one person or one cause. Her last coherent words as she was dying are a wonderful expression of her philosophy of life. When a close friend came to visit her in the hospital to inform her that he had to attend the annual anthropological meeting in a distant city, she smiled and answered simply "Have fun." For other people as well as for herself, Margaret wanted life to be fun.