The Anthropology Department is very sorry to announce the passing of Robin Fox on January 18, 2024.
Photo of Robin Fox and other CHES members, taken during a Rutgers conference honoring Mary Leakey. Mary Leakey was about to receive an honorary doctorate from Rutgers after CHES people nominated her. Mary Leakey was a famous African prehistoric archaeologist who worked at Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, and she was on the doctoral committee of Jack Harris, a professor in Anthropology at Rutgers. Everyone in the photo is from Rutgers, unless otherwise noted.
From left to right along the back row are the following people:
1. Professor Rob Blumenschine (archaeologist)
2. Professor Carmel Schrire (archaeologist)
3. Professor Jack Harris (archaeologist)
4. Professor Robin Fox (cultural anthropologist)
5. unknown person, probably a Dean
6. Dr. Mary Leakey (archaeologist from the Kenyan National Museum)
7. Dr. John Desmond Clark (archaeologist, Professor on leave from the Univ. of California, Berkeley; teaching a course on African prehistory at Rutgers)
8. Professor Horst Dieter Steklis (primatologist)
9. Professor Lionel Tiger (cultural anthropologist)
10. Professor Susan Cachel (biological anthropologist)
11. Professor Wendy Ashmore (archaeologist)
Photo presented by Professor Susan Cachel
In Memoriam - several memorial messages below
From Lionel Tiger -
Robin Fox, who we memorialize in this collection of comments, was the central and creative figure in the establishment and prosperity of the Department of Anthropology at Rutgers. Before Robin was invited by Earnest Lynton, the new dean of what was to be a college focusing on social science - there had been only occasional and desultory emphasis on anthropology. There had been occasional courses given in the subject by Ashley Montagu, who lived in Princeton and lectured widely on general anthropological matters but enjoyed no formal links to Rutgers.
This was a major gap at Rutgers. Lynton sensibly recruited Robin to locate here from his remarkably productive and intellectually dazzling residence at the London School of Economics and Political Science. I was a doctoral candidate there and there heard Robin deliver a lecture at the LSE in honor of Malinowski. Robin's breadth of approach and empiricism recalled the exquisite contributions of that ancestral master and which seemed to Dean Lynton and the Rutgers Board of Governors an appropriate if not necessary addition to the RU curriculum. The plot thickened when I was mightily impressed by Robin's lecture and was introduced to him by fellow PhD candidate Anthony Forge. We arranged to meet in Robin's office and in a three-day period of white-hot theoretical bravado and assertion we wrote "THE ZOOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE IN SOCIAL SCIENCE" which appeared influentially ('twas the lead article) and surprisingly in MAN; THE JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL ANTHROPOLOGICAL SOCIETY.
Well now: This was sumpin! It seemed both Robin and I had both become convinced somehow that anthropology should re-embrace its roots in the study of evolution.and the societies of other animals - especially all them primate charmers. Suddenly it seemed the way to go, the only way to go.
More than that, we wrote a book about all this -THE IMPERIAL ANIMAL - a contentious, assertive demand that anthropology once again add a Darwinian vitamin to its main empirical and theoretical diet. And thedepartment which housed us developed a faculty of instructors and researchers that in influential measure exemplified a post-Darwinian approach to the social behavior of vivacious social animals.
-Lionel Tiger
From H. Dieter Steklis
Robin Fox and I first crossed paths when he visited the Caribbean Island of St. Kitts in 1973. He and his colleague Lionel Tiger, in their co-roles as research directors for the Guggenheim Fdn., had gotten word that a young primatologist was conducting brain experiments there with vervet monkeys to determine the role of certain brain structures in mediating social behavior and social organization. As part of his biosocial approach to anthropology, Robin had a keen interest in the evolution of the primate brain and how it might be specialized for primate social life. My anthropology Ph.D. advisor, Sherwood Washburn, likewise believed that anthropologists should understand brain evolution and thus should be trained in the neurosciences. So, I was the “brain experiment” guy on St. Kitts that Robin was curious about. It was a fateful meeting, because Robin vowed to bring me to Rutgers to add to the biosocial contingent of anthropology faculty he was assembling.
And in January of 1974 I joined the anthropology faculty. Throughout the years I was there, Robin was a steadfast friend and, importantly, a role model and mentor. There was no intellectual topic he would not discuss with verve and alacrity. He took a strong interest in my primatological work, and his intellectual contributions led to a co-authored publication. I recall that the compatibility of our interests led us to co-teach a course on primate cognition. But beyond his extraordinary multidisciplinary intellectual gifts and academic contributions, I will remember him most for his personal warmth, generosity, and joie de vivre.
- H. Dieter Steklis
From Jack Harris
Robin was like a mentor to me when I first became a chair of the Anthropology Dept in 1992.Interlectually/ academically he will go down as one of the greats in Anthropology because of writings early on linking cultural anthropology and the bio sciences .These are major links that have stood the test of time .His collaborations with Lionel Tiger and their masterpiece “,The Imperial Animal “did much to introduce our field to the behavioral origins of human behavior. Essential reading in my graduate student days.
Robin is sadly missed by all who knew him.
On another note I'm trying to travel to Rutgers around April 19 .My close colleague Kevin Hatala is down to give a paper in the Dept in the afternoon.It will also be a chance to see old colleagues.These days my time is spent between Kenya , Florida ,where I reside, and Sweden ,where my children and grandchildren live , with the occasional foray to New Zealand .
Best wishes to all and especially Lin,
Jack Harris
link to CHES article remembering Robin Fox
https://evolution.rutgers.edu/news/news/news-item/475-remembering-dr-robin-fox
link to festschrift in honor of Robin Fox
https://www.amazon.com/The-Character-Human-Institutions-Biosocial/dp/141285377X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1407786420&sr=8-1&keywords=The+Character+of+Human+Institutions%20
Link to Obituary for Robin Fox
https://www.captivasanibel.com/2024/02/22/robin-fox/
Link to widipedia information about the life and work of Robin Fox
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robin_Fox
