Margaret Mead was an American cultural anthropologist. She got featured frequently as an author during the 1960s and 1970s. She earned her bachelor's degree at Barnard College in New York City and her MA and PhD degrees from Columbia University. Mead had also served as President of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
On December 16, 1901, Margaret Mead was born in Philadelphia but was raised in nearby Doylestown, Pennsylvania. Her father, Edward Sherwood Mead, was a professor of finance at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Her mother, Emily Mead, was a sociologist. Her family moved frequently and shifted to a lot of cities.
Mead was a communicator of anthropology in Western culture. She gave reports detailing the attitudes towards sex in the South Pacific and Southeast Asian traditional cultures. During World War II, Mead was executive secretary of the National Research Council's Committee on Food Habits. From 1946 to 1969, she was curator of ethnology at the American Museum of Natural History.
She was a professor of anthropology at Fordham University's Lincoln Center campus. She also taught at The New School and Columbia University as an adjunct professor from 1954 to 1978. Mead was very popular during her tenure and did remarkable yet controversial work. She died on November 15, 1978.
Below are some of the famous Margaret Mead Quotes.
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.
You should never doubt the size of a small number of individuals who want to do good. They may seem to be small in number. However, if they are thoughtful and highly passionate about the world, they can surely make it a better place to live.
Always remember that you are unique. Just like everyone else.
You should never engage in self-pity or self-doubt. Always think that you are unique, just like everyone else. What it means is that you are exotic in your rights. You don't need anyone else to make you feel the way you are feeling. Just trust your talent that makes you outstanding.
Never believe that a few caring people can't change the world. For, indeed, that's all who ever have.
This quote is an extension of the first quote by Mead. Mead says that one should never think or believe that a few caring people cannot change the world. Rather one should take it the other way around. One should see how that's all that can ever happen.
We won't have a society if we destroy the environment.
Environment, meaning the natural world has a lot of potentials. You cannot imagine living in a society where the environment is destroyed. You should always see how the environment and society have an important role in our lives. A good environment ensures ultimate satisfaction and bliss.
I learned the value of hard work by working hard.
You don't learn the value of hard work by reading some books on hard work. You learn its value by working hard. While you work hard, you get familiarised with the entire process. All of this makes you even more conscious about the entire exercise. That's how you start learning the value of hard work.
What people say, what people do, and what they say they do are entirely different things.
People can be called extremely malicious and hypocritical beings. What they say is entirely different from what they do. They can speak lies on the face, but they might be doing something else behind your back. Similarly, what they do in their daily lives is also different from what they do.
Continue reading some more Margaret Mead Quotes...
I was wise enough to never grow up while fooling most people into believing I had.
This is quite an interesting quote. Herein, Mead is saying that she was wise enough to make all people believe that she was growing up. However, in reality, she didn't grow at all. Thus, her wisdom lay in the fact that she made people believe that she did without growing up.
I must admit that I measure success in terms of the contributions an individual makes to her or his fellow human beings.
Success can be measured in various parameters. Some people weigh it in terms of money or material success. However, real success should be seen in terms of the contribution one person makes to others. The way we add value to others' lives is how we should define success.
Every time we liberate a woman, we liberate a man.
Liberating women from the grasp of violence and illiteracy is very crucial. One should see how the entire universe is connected to women. If you make sure that the women are treated nicely and given knowledge, you will see how men automatically get liberated.
Anthropology demands the open-mindedness with which one must look and listen, record in astonishment and wonder that which one would not have been able to.
Mead as an anthropologist is saying that anthropology demands a lot of open-mindedness. One should look and listen with open eyes. One should record everything with passion and wonder how one would do those things which we would have never imagined.
One of the oldest human needs is having someone to wonder where you are when you don't come home at night.
Humans need love, care and warmth. They want to feel nice and special. That's why the oldest human need of any person wants someone who asks them little things. This mostly includes the care one shows by asking where the person was during the last night if they didn't come home.
If we are to achieve a richer culture, rich in contrasting values, we must recognize the whole gamut of human potentialities, and so weave a less arbitrary social fabric, one in which each diverse human gift will find a fitting place.
If we want to achieve a richer culture, we must learn to respect exotic identities within this world. We must see that there are a whole lot of opportunities there in this world. One must feel proud of their identity in all ways. Thus, all individuals should be able to fit in the social fabric without compromise.
Few more Margaret Mead Quotes...
Thanks to television, for the first time the young are seeing history made before it is censored by their elders.
Television is a wonderful creation of humans. We can watch anything on television. We can watch history channels on it and can see what happened in the past. It's the best way to feel close to the history of around 100 years old without it being censored by elders.
I do not believe in using women in combat, because females are too fierce.
Mead is making a very witty remark over here. She says that she doesn't support women working in combat because they are already too fierce. What she is trying to say is that fierce women and combat is a dangerous combination. She's reinforcing the power of women here.
It is utterly false and cruelly arbitrary to put all the play and learning into childhood, all the work into middle age, and all the regrets into old age.
We all tend to create watertight divisions in our life. We feel that childhood is the age when one should learn everything. Then middle age should be given to work and job. And finally, old age should be used for relaxing without any regrets. However, these divisions are wrong as one is free to do anything at any age.
A city is a place where there is no need to wait for next week to get the answer to a question, to taste the food of any country, to find new voices to listen to and familiar ones to listen to again.
There are many perks of living in a city. One can get anything at any point in time. You don't have to wait to eat your favourite food or snack. You can go about ordering it at any time. Similarly, you can find new voices to listen to and can also meet new people. Thus, the city is a very happening place.
We are now at a point where we must educate our children in what no one knew yesterday, and prepare our schools for what no one knows yet.
Education as a whole needs restructuring. The entire education model needs a revamp. We should see how we need to educate our children with good things. We should also prepare our teachers and schools for what may not be known to us. New things should enter the curriculum.
Some more Margaret Mead Quotes...
We have nowhere else to go... this is all we have.
We have nowhere else to go. What this means is that our present and mother Earth, where we live is all we have. We don't have any other place which we can call our own. Thus, we need to be happy about whatever we have at present.
Fathers are biological necessities, but social accidents.
Fathers are biological necessities in the sense that they are crucial to producing babies. However, they are just social accidents. What it means is that fathers as men have perpetuated many stereotypes in our society. They have given way to various misconceptions.
I have a respect for manners as such, they are a way of dealing with people you don't agree with or like.
This line is a witty and funny remark by Mead over good manners. She says that she likes manners. However, she is quick to remark that her respect for manners isn't that much. That's because they are just a way to deal with people you disagree with or just don't like.
