Download McCarthyism and the FBI`s

May 2004
Publicity Contact: Laura Sell, 919-687-3639; [email protected]
Threatening Anthropology:
McCarthyism and the FBI’s Surveillance of Activist Anthropologists
by David H. Price
Publication date: May 2004
David Price is available to answer these and other questions:
Why did the FBI investigate dozens of American anthropologists during the 1940s and 1950s? Why were anthropology’s scientific views supporting racial equality so threatening to the FBI and the economic forces sustaining
McCarthyism?
Were any of these anthropologists Communists, or were they all non-Communist activists for racial equality?
What sort of records did you have declassified and released by using the Freedom of Information Act? Can you
describe the process of gathering these records?
How did universities and academic associations respond to these investigations? Did they defend the academic
freedom of their colleagues?
You write that McCarthyism and the FBI’s investigations of anthropology significantly changed the course of
American anthropology. What have been the long-term impacts of McCarthyism on American anthropology?
Why do you conclude that McCarthyism and the FBI were more concerned with identifying and persecuting
activists for racial equality than they were interested in finding and persecuting Socialists and Communists?
You document that some anthropologists and other academics were secretly living double-lives as FBI informers
during the McCarthy period. How did this impact anthropology and academic freedom during the 1950s?
Could the types of widespread violations of privacy and political persecutions by the FBI that you document in
Threatening Anthropology occur today?
Why do you argue that the Democratic and Republican Parties equally contributed to the development of
McCarthyism’s loyalty hearings?
Why did the FBI compile an almost thousand page file on Margaret Mead? Was she a Communist?
You document that Margaret Mead, Ruth Benedict, Oscar Lewis and dozens of other anthropologists were added
to the FBI’s secret “Security Index.” What was the purpose of this index and why were so many anthropologists
cataloged in this “Security Index”?
How has your dozen years of research and writing this book changed you, or the type of anthropology you do?
Can you speculate on what sorts of surveillance contemporary anthropologists might be subjected to today?
David Price is Associate Professor of Anthropology at Saint Martin’s College. His field research examines the ancient and modern irrigation systems of Egypt. He is the author of The Atlas of World Cultures (1989), and is
currently researching Cold War connections between anthropologists and the CIA.