American Studies and Comparative Linguistics. Comments by the Translator

In these comments, the author of the translation reconstructs the wide context in which selected works were written, paying close attention to the character of the personal relationships between Franz Boas and his former students, the current scientific agenda and more general discussions of that time. The article uses interviews with experts and archival data from the American Museum of Natural History (New York), as well as two published collections, in particular the correspondence between the main actors of the events described: Edward Sapir, A.L. Kroeber, Waldemar Bogoras et al. Two main conclusions are as follows: by the period under review, a skeptical attitude to both the methodology of European comparativist studies and the value of constructing a genealogical classification triumphed in Boas's views. This shift is explained by the fact that in his struggle against evolutionism, which, in the scholar's opinion, leads to Eurocentrism, it was important for him to emphasize the importance not of origin, but of the influence of the environment on the history of language. The author declares no conflict of interests

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