Born in Rimavska Sobota in the Slovak Republic in 1928, the anthropologist Oswald Werner emigrated to the United States after the Second World War. Having received a bachelor's degree in Applied Physics from the Technische Hochschule in Stuttgart in 1950, he eaarned his MA in Anthropology from Syracuse University and doctorate in Anthropology and Linguistics from Indiana University. His dissertation, "A Typological Comparison of Four Trader Navaho Speakers" (1963), was the first in a long list of contributions to the study of Navajo language and culture that included particularly important work in Navajo medicine, botany, and science.
Werner was a member of the Anthropology Department at Northwestern University from 1963 until his retirement in 1998, serving as chair of the Department from 1978-1983 and 1987-1989. His tenure was marked by a deep concern for cultural anthropological methodology. In addition to serving as editor of Cultural Anthropological Methods, he was author of Systematic Fieldwork (Newbury Park, Calif., 1987), and was founder and director of the Northwestern University Ethnographic Field School in 1974. Situated on the Navajo Reservation in New Mexico, the Field School provides both undergraduates and graduate students exposure to ethnographic field methods and working in partnership with local communities.
From the guide to the Oswald Werner Collection, 1963-1964, (American Philosophical Society)
