Jean L Briggs

Jean L Briggs is Professor Emerita of Anthropology at Memorial University. Her first book, Never in Anger: Portrait of an Eskimo Family, was published in 1970 by Harvard University Press. The book was one of the first ethnographies to be wrtten as a personal narrative, recounting the life Briggs lived for 17 months (1963-65) as an adopted daughter in an Inuit family in a small Central Arctic camp. It was also one of the first accounts of the social importance of emotional values. Inuit Morality Play: The Emotional Education of a Three-Year-Old, was published in 1998, by Yale University Press and ISER Books, Memorial University. This book was laid in a Baffin Island camp, and again focussed on the emotional values underlying social life. It analyzed 40 dramatic interactions between one little girl and her caretakers, showing how these interrogations taught the 3-year-old about the emotionally complex situations she would meet in her everyday life: what dangers to watch out for, and how to defuse them. Briggs taught at Memorial University, and did Arctic research, from 1966-1997.