Decoding the Tribe: Carl Schuster's remarkable quest to trace humanity's ancient iconography, by Edmund Carpenter
I first met Carl Schuster in the late 1950s. I was living in desert California, with no phone and few visitors. He simply appeared at my door: " I understand you're just back from Irkutsk."
Archaeology--nothing else--had taken me to Siberia. But in those Cold War years, who would have believed that? And who was this stranger? I determined he wasn't getting past the screen door!
Read the rest (p. 42-47) in the May 2006 issue of Natural History magazine
Further reading:
Check out 'Ted' Carpenter's magnum opus (12 volumes) based on the research of Carl Schuster, Materials for the study of social symbolism in ancient & tribal art: a record of tradition and continuity / based on the researches & writings of Carl Schuster; edited & written by Edmund Carpenter assisted by Lorraine Spiess. New York: Rock Foundation, 1986-1988. (In the Goldwater Library, K3SY S39 Quarto.)
Read a biography of Carl Schuster (courtesy of the Field Museum) here, or one written by Ted Carpenter in Tribal Arts magazine here.
"Edmund Carpenter (Became What He Beheld)", an article by Marshall Sahlins in Media_studies.ca on the working relationship between Carpenter and his University of Toronto colleague Marshall McLuhan.
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