Ricardo Alegría: A Pioneering Anthropologist
Puerto Rico is still mourning the death of Ricardo Alegría, esteemed proponent of the island’s national culture. I wanted to share a thoughtful description of this great man’s legacy—“Un
antropólogo
pionero
”—by fellow anthropologist Dr. Jorge Duany. Here is my translation with a link to the original article below.
Ricardo Alegría was the first Puerto Rican to receive a PhD in anthropology in 1954. In addition to multiple administrative roles, Don Ricardo—as everyone knew him—published extensively in the field of anthropology, especially archaeology. His most important works include a pioneering study on the feast of Santiago Apóstol [St. James the Apostle] in Loíza, an elementary textbook on the Taíno Indians, a collection of folk tales, and numerous archeological essays about Puerto Rico and the West Indies.