Binghamton University Anthropology Professor Murdered by Graduate Student

Retired Anthropology Professor Richard Antoun stabbed to death in his office by a graduate student. A former student, Maximilian Forte, remembers Professor Antoun:

I was still new to anthropology when I met Dr. Antoun, and his work on tradition — a focus of my work in Ruins of Absence, Presence of Caribs — was vital to me, as was his material on the “social organization of tradition” that underpinned my own concept of “reengineering indigeneity.” He was the one to introduce me to the concept of “culture brokers” and how to use it, which I did, considerably. It is now my burden to say this here, never having taken the time to express my thanks to him directly, when he was still alive.

Dr. Antoun did not just mark essays. He called me in to meet with him in his office, where he devoted considerable time going over all the fine points, pulling books from the shelves of his massive office library, and fishing for old copies of journal articles in one of his numerous filing cabinets packed with them, so as to recommend resources that always proved helpful and had an important impact on the development of my own work. He was a model scholar, whose professionalism and commitment to teaching and research are an inspiration to all of us who knew him.

Read entire tribute here.


tags:anthropology, binghampton, crime