Philippe Descola, FBA (born 19 June 1949) is a French anthropologist noted for studies of the Achuar, one of several Jivaroan peoples, and for his contributions to anthropological theory.

Background

Descola started with an interest in philosophy and later became a student of Claude Lévi-Strauss. His ethnographic studies in the Amazon region of Ecuador began in 1976 and were funded by CNRS. He lived with the Achuar from 1976 to 1978. His reputation largely arises from these studies. As a professor, he has been invited several times to the University of São Paulo, Beijing, Chicago, Montreal, London School of Economics, Cambridge, St. Petersburg, Buenos Aires, Gothenburg, Uppsala and Leuven. He has given lectures in over forty universities and academic institutions abroad, including the Beatrice Blackwood Lecture at Oxford, the George Lurcy Lecture at Chicago, the Munro Lecture at Edinburgh, the Radcliffe-Brown Lecture at the British Academy, the Clifford Geertz Memorial Lecture at Princeton, the Jensen Lecture at Frankfurt and the Victor Goldschmidt Lecture at Heidelberg. He has chaired the Société des Américanistes since 2002 and the scientific committee of the Fondation Fyssen from 2001 to 2009, as well as holding memberships in many other scientific committees. He has also be elected Honorary fellow of the Royal Anthropological Institute and received in 2015 the honoris causa doctorate from the University of Montreal, Canada. Descola is currently chair of anthropology at the Collège de France. His wife, Anne-Christine Taylor, is an ethnologist.

Distinctions

Partial bibliography