Anna-Britta Hellbom

{{Short description| Swedish anthropologist and Americanist (1919–2004)}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=March 2025}}

File: Anna-Britta Hellbom.jpg

Anna-Britta Hellbom (25 July 1919 – 22 December 2004) was a Swedish anthropologist and Americanist.{{cite book |last= Faust| first= Betty Bernice |year= 2004|title= Rights, Resources, Culture, and Conservation in the Land of the Maya|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=a38_IO1c7fEC|access-date= 4 December 2022|location= Santa Barbara, California| publisher= Greenwood Publishing Group| page= 45| isbn=978-0-897-89731-0}}{{cite book |last= Linné | first= Sigvald |date= 26 March 2003|title= Archaeological Researches at Teotihuacan, Mexico|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=wVP680iD3yUC|access-date= 4 December 2022|location= Tuscaloosa, Alabama| publisher= University of Alabama Press| page= xi| isbn=978-0-817-35005-5}} She is known for her ethnographic fieldworks in Mesoamerica in Mexico.{{cite book |last= Berdichewsky| first= Bernardo |year= 1979|title= Anthropology and Social Change in Rural Areas, Volume 7|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=d8qwAAAAIAAJ|access-date= 4 December 2022|location= Berlin| publisher= Mouton| page= 543| isbn=978-9-027-97810-3}}

==Biography==

Born on 25 July 1919 in Uppsala, Sweden, Anna-Britta Hellbom started her university studies in Nordic ethnology but later changed to social anthropology. She graduated from the Stockholm University in 1940. She also studied in Madrid, where she learned Spanish, which helped in her career as an Americanist.

After her ethnographic fieldwork in Mexico (1962–1963), she received her PhD from the Stockholm University in 1967. She wrote her doctoral thesis on La Participacion Cultural de las Mujeres Indias y Mestizas en el Mexico PreCortesiano y Postrevulcionario.{{cite book |last= Eber| first= Christine|date= 28 June 2010|title= Women and Alcohol in a Highland Maya Town: Water of Hope, Water of Sorrow|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=IGBICUW1BGoC|access-date= 4 December 2022|location= Austin, Texas| publisher= University of Texas Press| page= 290| isbn= 978-0-292-78932-6}}

In the mid-1960s, she started her professional career at the Museum of Ethnography in Stockholm. In 1967, she became the Americanist curator of the ethnographical museum in charge of the collections from the Americas, a position she held until her retirement in 1985.{{cite book |last= Scott| first= Sue A. |year= 1993|title= Teotihuacan Mazapan Figurines and the Xipe Totec Statue: A Link Between the Basin of Mexico and the Valley of Oaxaca|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=5G6BAAAAMAAJ|access-date= 4 December 2022|location= Nashville, Tennessee| publisher= Vanderbilt University| page= i| isbn=978-0-935-46235-7}}

She was influenced by the work of her teacher, Sigvald Linné (1899–1986), a Swedish archeologist and ethnographer, known for his excavations at Teotihuacan, an ancient Mesoamerican city, Mexico.{{cite book |last= Linné | first= Sigvald |year= 2003|title= Mexican Highland Cultures: Archaeological Researches at Teotihuacan, Calpulalpan, and Chalchicomula in 1934–35|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=mLpVAAAAMAAJ|access-date= 4 December 2022|location= Tuscaloosa, Alabama| publisher= University of Alabama Press| page= xi| isbn=978-0-817-31295-4}}

She extensively wrote on the role of women in Mexico based on her ethnographic fieldwork in Aztec culture.{{cite book |last= Rodríguez| first= Jeanette |date= 5 July 2010|title= Our Lady of Guadalupe: Faith and Empowerment among Mexican-American Women|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=Fwtjf64nn6AC|access-date= 4 December 2022|location= Austin, Texas| publisher= University of Texas Press| page= xxix| isbn=978-0-292-78772-8}}

The Ethnographic Museum in Stockholm houses several collections from her fieldwork.

She died in Oscar Parish, Stockholm on 22 December 2004.