Audrey Richards

Audrey Richards (1899-1984) was one of the outstanding ethnographers of her generation. She completed her PhD at the London School of Economics in 1931, under the supervision of Bronislaw Malinowski. She was amongst the first anthropologists to carry out fieldwork in Africa and taught at the University of the Witwatersrand from 1937 to 1940. On her return to England she taught at the London School of Economics and was a key member of the Colonial Social Science Research Council, leading to her...See more

Audrey Richards (1899-1984) was one of the outstanding ethnographers of her generation. She completed her PhD at the London School of Economics in 1931, under the supervision of Bronislaw Malinowski. She was amongst the first anthropologists to carry out fieldwork in Africa and taught at the University of the Witwatersrand from 1937 to 1940. On her return to England she taught at the London School of Economics and was a key member of the Colonial Social Science Research Council, leading to her becoming director of the newly established East Africa Institute at Makerere University, Uganda in 1950. She returned to England again in 1956 as a Fellow of Newnham College, Cambridge, where she later served as vice-principal. She was awarded a CBE in 1955 and became the first woman president of the Royal Anthropological Institute. See less