William N. Fenton’s contributions to the understanding of the cultures and histories of the Iroquois are formidable. Fenton grounded his studies in decades of fieldwork among the Senecas, an encyclopedic knowledge of pertinent historical accounts, a keen appreciation for interpretive theory and practice in ethnohistory and anthropology, and an enduring, generous character.

 

William Fenton: Selected Writings brings together for the first time Fenton’s most influential writings on the Iroquois and anthropology, written across nearly six decades. This volume includes Fenton’s classic studies of such key issues as Iroquois folklore, factionalism, and the repatriation of material culture; discussions of theory and practice and the methodology of “upstreaming”; obituaries of colleagues and reviews of other studies of the Iroquois; and summaries of the early Conferences on Iroquois Research. This collection reveals much about the world of the Iroquois, past and present, as well as the career and accomplishments of Fenton himself.

William N. Fenton (1908–2005) is the author and editor of numerous books, including The Great Law and the Longhouse: A Political History of the Iroquois Confederacy.

 

William A. Starna is a professor emeritus of anthropology at the State University of New York College at Oneonta. He is coeditor (with Jack Campisi) of William N. Fenton’s Iroquois Journey: An Anthropologist Remembers (Nebraska 2007) and is coeditor of Gideon’s People, a two-volume set (Nebraska 2009).

 

Jack Campisi is an independent consultant and coeditor of Extending the Rafters: Interdisciplinary Approaches to Iroquoian Studies.

"This must-read memoir provides valuable insights for those interested in the twentieth-century Iroquois, ethnographic field methods, or the history of anthropology."—Denis Foley, Journal of Anthropological Research