Benedict, Ruth

orig. Ruth Fulton

(born June 5, 1887, New York, N.Y., U.S.—died Sept. 17, 1948, New York City) U.S. anthropologist. She received a Ph.D. under Franz Boas at Columbia University and taught at Columbia from 1924 until her death. In Patterns of Culture (1934), her most famous work, she emphasized how small a part of the range of possible human behaviour is elaborated or emphasized in any one society. She described how these forms of behaviour are integrated into patterns or configurations, and she supported cultural relativism, or the judging of cultural phenomena in the context of the culture in which they occur. In The Chrysanthemum and the Sword (1946), she applied her methods to Japanese culture. Her theories had a profound influence on cultural anthropology.

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