Leacock, Eleanor Burke (1922–1987)

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Leacock, Eleanor Burke (1922–1987)

American cultural anthropologist. Name variations: Eleanor Haughton. Born Eleanor Burke on July 2, 1922; grew up in Greenwich Village, NY; died April 2, 1987, in Honolulu, HI; dau. of Kenneth Burke (literary critic and social philosopher) and Lily Mary Batterham (schoolteacher); attended Dalton School and Radcliffe College; graduate of Barnard College, 1944; Columbia University, MA, 1946, PhD, 1952; m. Richard Leacock; m. Jim Haughton (labor organizer); children: several.

Known particularly for ethnohistorical studies of subarctic Innu social and gender relations, work as Marxist feminist, study of racism in US school systems, and reconsideration of work of Lewis Henry Morgan and Frederick Engels; worked at Queens College, City College, Bank Street College of Education Schools and Mental Health project, New York University, and Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute; brought in as chair to rebuild newly overhauled department of anthropology at City College (1972) and remained there until death (1987); wrote 10 books, including Teaching and Learning in City Schools (1969) and Myths of Male Dominance (1981).