“So much that is new”: Baldwin Spencer, 1860-1929 : A Biography

AUSTRALIANA Aboriginal SCIENCE –

First Edition.

• xii, 492 p., [36] p. of plates : ill., maps, ports. ; 24 cm.

• • Spencer, Baldwin, Sir, 1860-1929
  • Anthropologists — Australia — Biography
  • Biologists — Australia — Biography
  • #281125
  • Sir Walter Baldwin Spencer KCMG FRS (23 June 1860 – 14 July 1929), commonly referred to as Sir Baldwin Spencer, was a British-Australian evolutionary biologist, anthropologist and ethnologist.^[1] He is known for his fieldwork with Aboriginal peoples in Central Australia, contributions to the study of ethnography, and academic collaborations with Frank Gillen.^[1] Spencer introduced the study of zoology at the University of Melbourne and held the title of Emeritus Professor until his death in 1929.^[2] He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1900 and knighted in 1916.
  • In 1896 Spencer joined Gillen for the most intensive field-work then attempted in Australia. The Native Tribes of Central Australia (1899), which resulted, was to influence contemporary theories on social evolution and interpretations of the origins of art and ceremonial. It impressed (Sir) James Frazer, author of The Golden Bough, who developed a lifelong friendship with Spencer. Selections from their correspondence were published in 1932.