Guillermo Algaze

{{Short description|Cuban anthropologist}}

{{Infobox scientist

| name = Guillermo Algaze

| image =

| image_size =

| caption =

| birth_date = {{Birth date and age|1954|11|24}}

| birth_place = Havana, Cuba

| citizenship = Cuba (birthplace), United States (naturalized)

| alma_mater = University of Puerto Rico;
University of Chicago

| other_names =

| field = Anthropology

| thesis_title =Mesopotamian expansion and its consequences: informal empire in the late fourth millennium B.C.

| thesis_url = http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/16624666

| thesis_year = 1986

| doctoral_advisors = Robert M. Adams
Helene Juliet Kantor
McGuire Gibson

| known_for = A 2003 MacArthur "Genius" Award.

}}

Guillermo Algaze (born November 24, 1954) is a Cuban-born American anthropologist and recipient of a 2003 MacArthur Award,{{cite web|title=Guillermo Algaze|url=http://www.macfound.org/fellows/703/|publisher=MacArthur Foundation|access-date=24 September 2014}}

Algaze is a former chair of the anthropology department at University of California, San Diego, and project director of the Titris Hoyuk excavation in southern Turkey.{{Cite web |url=http://ucsdnews.ucsd.edu/facultyexperts/details.asp?exp=16802 |title=Faculty Experts |access-date=2009-12-31 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100613072228/http://ucsdnews.ucsd.edu/facultyexperts/details.asp?exp=16802 |archive-date=2010-06-13 |url-status=dead }}{{cite web |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1993/05/25/science/trade-or-colonialism-ruins-may-give-answer.html |work=New York Times |date=May 25, 1993 |author=John Noble Wilford |title=Trade or Colonialism? Ruins May Give Answer }}{{cite web |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2000/05/23/science/ruins-alter-ideas-of-how-civilization-spread.html |date=May 23, 2000 |author=John Noble Wilford |title=Ruins Alter Ideas Of How Civilisation Spread |work=New York Times}}

Life and education

Algaze was born on November 24, 1954, in Havana, Cuba, and was raised in Puerto Rico. He graduated from the University of Puerto Rico in 1976. Algaze later moved to the continental United States, and became a citizen. In 1986, he earned his doctorate from the University of Chicago. He joined the University of California, San Diego faculty in 1990, where he has taught as a professor and has served as the chair of the anthropology department. He currently is a distinguished professor in the UCSD anthropology department.{{cite web |title=Anthropology faculty list UCSD |url=https://anthropology.ucsd.edu/people/faculty/index.html}}

Academic work

Algaze's archaeological interests have mostly been around Mesopotamian history and culture.{{cite news |first=John |last=Wilford |title=Where war was waged 5,500 years ago |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/16/world/africa/16iht-battle.html |work=New York Times |date=2005-12-16 |access-date=2009-12-31}}Akkermans 2003, p. 103 His work has contributed to a vast amount of information in relation to Mesopotamia.Matthews 2003, pp. 114-115 In the 1990s, Algaze was a major proponent of an anthropological theory on the spread of civilisation from the Euphrates valley area and ancient Mesopotamia, arguing that colonial expansion from south to north (from the area that is currently southern Iraq) was responsible for the establishment of city-states in northern Iraq and Syria and southeastern Turkey. Following discoveries in the new millennium, Algaze says he has been "eating a lot of crow", acknowledging that evidence suggests societies in the northern area emerged simultaneously and independently of the Mesopotamian expansion.{{cite web |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1994/01/04/science/enduring-mystery-solved-as-tin-is-found-in-turkey.html |work=New York Times |date=January 4, 1994 |title=Enduring Mystery Solved as Tin Is Found in Turkey |author=John Noble Wilford }}{{cite web |url=http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/01/21/MNGRTNK9BU1.DTL |date=January 21, 2007 |author=John Noble Wilford |publisher=San Francisco Chronicle |title=In Syria, ruins reveal early city's violent end: Archaeologists find Tell Hamoukar fell in 3500 B.C. battle}}

In 2003 he received the MacArthur Genius Award, for his work studying the imperialism and colonialism of ancient civilizations, particularly the Uruk expansion in ancient Mesopotamia.{{cite web |url=http://ucsdnews.ucsd.edu/newsrel/soc/Algaze.htm |publisher=University of California, San Diego |date=October 5, 2003 |title=$500,000 "GENIUS" AWARD GOES TO UCSD ANTHROPOLOGIST GUILLERMO ALGAZE }}{{cite web |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/05/us/24-win-macarthur-genius-awards-of-500000.html |title=24 Win MacArthur 'Genius Awards' of $500,000 |date=October 5, 2003 |author= Felicia R. Lee|work=New York Times}}

List of works

{{Expand list|date=February 2011}}

  • {{cite book |last=Algaze |first=Guillermo|date=November 2008 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |title=Ancient Mesopotamia at the Dawn of Civilization: The Evolution of an Urban Landscape |isbn=978-0-226-01377-0 |url= }}
  • {{cite book |last=Algaze |first=Guillermo |date=June 2005 |publisher=University of Chicago Press |title=The Uruk World System: The Dynamics of Expansion of Early Mesopotamian Civilization, Second Edition |isbn=978-0-226-01382-4 |url=http://www.press.uchicago.edu/presssite/metadata.epl?isbn=9780226013824 }}

References

{{reflist|2}}

Bibliography

  • {{cite book |title=The Archaeology of Syria: From Complex Hunter-Gatherers to Early Urban Societies (c. 16,000-300 BC) |last1=Akkermans |first1=Peter M. M. G. |last2=Schwartz |first2=Glenn M. |year=2003 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=0-521-79666-0}}
  • {{cite book |title=The Archaeology of Mesopotamia: Theories and Approaches |last=Matthews |first=Roger |year=2003 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=0-415-25316-0}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Algaze, Guillermo}}

Category:1954 births

Category:Living people

Category:Educators from Havana

Category:Cuban anthropologists

Category:University of California, San Diego faculty

Category:MacArthur Fellows