Renato I. Rosaldo Jr. An Oral History
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Renato Rosaldo, Professor Emeritus, shares reflections on his education, career, and personal life, and reads selections of his own poetry. Rosaldo discusses his family background, his youth in Tucson, Arizona, and his introduction to anthropology as a student at Harvard. He describes his field work and the evolution of his research interests, including his study of the changing cultural practice of headhunting among the Ilongots. Turning to his time at Stanford, Rosaldo recounts the challenges of being one of only a few Latino faculty members as the number of Latino students increased; divisions in the Anthropology Department that resulted in a departmental split; and his love of teaching. Recalling the death of his first wife, Michelle Zimbalist Rosaldo, while doing field work in the Philippines, he describes how he eventually processed his grief through poetry, as well as his method of antropoesía, which infuses verse with ethnographic sensibilities.
- Summary
- Father’s family background, including growing up during the Mexican Revolution • Father’s emigration from Mexico to Chicago • Family stories • Early years in the Midwest • Growing up in a bilingual household • Move to Tucson, Arizona • Struggling with losing ability to speak Spanish • Trips to Mexico • Family roots in Minatitlán • Father’s academic career at University of Arizona • Relationship with brothers • Dealing with brother’s death in 1970 • Making a college decision • Reading Spanish novels independently during high school • Earning a full ride to Harvard for undergraduate studies • Transition from Tucson to East Coast • Theater at Harvard • Introduction to field of anthropology through a class with role-playing • High school friends, the Chasers • Studying Spanish history and literature while making connections to anthropology • Influence of work of Américo Castro de Quesada• Summers in Latin America • Field work in Riobamba, Ecuador • Field work in Callejón de Huaylas, Peru • Undergraduate thesis on historical comedias plays by Lope de Vega • Trying to decide whether to pursue Spanish or anthropology • Fellowship year in Madrid • Political education while in Franco’s Spain • Memories of Dámaso Alonso • Working with Evon Vogt • Thoughts on palomillas and ethnic identity • Use of terms: Mexican, Spanish, Chicano • Lack of Chicano students at Harvard • Discrimination faced by his father for his Mexican heritage • Distinction between Chicano Movement and Chicano as an identity • Field work as a graduate student in Chiapas, Mexico • Influence of Clifford Geertz, Victor Turner • Memories of Geertz • Meeting and dating Shelly Zimbalist • Feeling that there were too many anthropologists working in Chiapas • Hal Conklin’s work in northern Luzon • Transitioning from studying Mesoamerica to the Philippines • Shelly’s academic background and interests • Dissertation on Ilongot headhunting • Shelly’s dissertation on Ilongot emotional life and linguistics • Field work in Luzon • Finishing dissertation and entering the job market • Confusion over Vogt’s recommendation letter to UC Santa Cruz • Affirmative action hiring at Stanford: Chiapas Project alums Frank Cancian and George Collier’s efforts to bring Rosaldo to Stanford • Stanford in the early 1970s • Mentorship from Ben Paul • Memories of Al Hastorf • Arrangement for and division of additional billets to hire Jane Collier and Shelly Rosaldo in Anthropology • Luis Nogales as special advisor to the president on Mexican American affairs • Establishment of the Chicano Fellows program • Being spread thin as one of only a few Latino faculty members • Working with Jerry Porras to mediate dispute between Latino students and Project SCORE organizers regarding communications with Spanish-speaking members of surrounding communities • Early Latino faculty at Stanford • Pressures faced by minority faculty and students during the 1970s • Former students BJ Lucero and Cecilia Ballí • Response of Ilongot headhunters when Rosaldo got his draft notice • Activism at Stanford during the 1970s • Firing of Juan Flores and questions of academic freedom • Chicano activism at Stanford • Cecilia Burciaga • Directing the Chicano Research Center • Advising undergraduates and the difference made by Mellon grants in cultivating Latino PhD students • Anthropology at Stanford in the 1970s • Debate over readings in Western Civilizations courses • Anthropology faculty • Stanford department’s focus on cultural anthropology • Senior administration efforts to build up sociobiology side of anthropology • Archeology at Stanford • Divisions among the Anthropology faculty • Chairing the Anthropology Department • Civil War in the Anthropology Department • Strokes • Attempts at mediation in the Anthropology Department • Leading interpretation seminar for faculty • Decision to split the Anthropology Department in two • Differences between Cultural and Social Anthropology and Anthropological Sciences Departments • Recovering from stroke during the split • Linguistic anthropologist James A. Fox • Teaching and working with students • Nontraditional writing assignments in anthropology courses • Memories of students • Prioritizing teaching • Field work in Baguio, Philippines, and Shelly’s fatal accident • Grief over Shelly’s death • Writing essay “Grief and a Headhunter’s Rage” • Starting to write poetry • Impact of poetry on processing grief and physical healing • Joining the Waverly Writers poet group in Palo Alto • Concept of antropoesía • Writing and publishing The Day of Shelly’s Death • Spanish translations of poetry • Working with Juan José Vélez Otero to translate Yusef Komunyakaa’s Vietnam War poems • Challenges of poetry translation • Selections from The Day of Shelly’s Death: “Silence,” “The Omen of Mungayang,” “How do I, Renato, know that Manny knows?,” “Be Careful,” “The Tricycle Taxi Driver” • Writing The Chasers • Selections from The Chasers: “Prelude,” “A Quiet Guy,” “Fastest Naked Sprinter,” “Champagne in a Martini Glass,” “Papá y yo hablamos”
Description
| Type of resource | sound recording-nonmusical, text, still image |
|---|---|
| Extent | 2 audio files; 1 text file; 1 photograph |
| Place | Stanford (Calif.) |
| Publisher | Stanford Historical Society |
| Date created | November 18, 2019 - 2019-11-19 |
| Language | English |
| Digital origin | born digital |
Creators/Contributors
| Interviewee | Rosaldo, Renato | |
|---|---|---|
| Creator | Rosaldo, Renato | |
| Interviewer | Abel, Suzanne | |
| Publisher | Stanford Historical Society |
Subjects
| Subject | Rosaldo, Renato |
|---|---|
| Subject | Stanford University. Department of Anthropology |
| Subject | Mexican American college teachers |
| Subject | Grief > Poetry |
| Genre | Interview |
Bibliographic information
| Biographical Profile | Renato Rosaldo received his AB in Spanish History and Literature in 1963 from Harvard. He went on to earn a PhD in Social Anthropology from Harvard in 1971. Rosaldo’s first job after completing his PhD was as an assistant professor at Stanford University. He was at Stanford from 1985 until 2003. Since 2003, he has been a professor at New York University, where he is also the Director of Latino Studies. Much of his field research has been among the Ilongots in northern Luzon, Philippines, from which he wrote Ilongot Headhunting: 1883-1974: A Study in Society and History (1980). His teaching has included courses on Chicano Life and Cultures, Anthropology Theory, Island Southeast Asia, and Latino Studies. Rosaldo has served on the editorial boards of many journals, including American Anthropologist, American Ethnologist, and Cultural Anthropology. He served as president of the American Ethnological Society from 1991 to 1995. He has also published multiple volumes of poetry, including The Day of Shelly’s Death: The Poetry and Ethnography of Death and Prayer to Spider Woman/Rezo a la mujer araña, for which he won an American Book Award in 2004. |
|---|---|
| Transcript |
|
| Interview with Renato Rosaldo and Mary Louise Pratt | |
| Finding Aid | |
| Location | https://purl.stanford.edu/vg327tx6751 |
| Location | SC0932 |
| Repository | Stanford University. Libraries. Department of Special Collections and University Archives |
Access conditions
- Use and reproduction
- The materials are open for research use and may be used freely for non-commercial purposes with an attribution. For commercial permission requests, please contact the Stanford University Archives (universityarchives@stanford.edu).
- Copyright
- Copyright © The Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University. All rights reserved.
Collection
Stanford Historical Society Oral History Program interviews, 1999-2022
View other items in this collection in SearchWorksAlso listed in
Loading usage metrics...