Gerald Currens

In 1951 Gerald Elwin Currens began working in Liberia as a Lutheran missionary with his wife Virginia. After working as a missionary for many years, he was granted a one-year study leave. He was accepted into the University of Oregon's school of anthropology in 1968 . After his first year he was awarded with a fellowship from the National Institute of Health, thus beginning his PhD work. His research proposal was to study upland rice cultivation and other features of the subsistence based economy that was prevalent within rural Liberia .

Currens and his wife settled in the town of Lawalazu . The area was largely chosen because the people spoke the Loma language, which he spoke relatively fluently, and he had no associations there from his prior work as a missionary. Currens began his study in December 1971 and remained there until the December of the following year. While there, he studied the market activity, local custom, and the farming style of slash and burn upland rice cultivation.

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