Elizabeth_Colson
Elizabeth Colson
US social anthropologist
Elizabeth Florence Colson (June 15, 1917 – August 3, 2016) was an American social anthropologist and professor emerita of anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley.[1] She was best known for the classic long-term study of the Tonga people of the Gwembe Valley in Zambia and Zimbabwe,[2] which she began in 1956 with Thayer Scudder, 11 years after she obtained her doctorate and while Scudder was a second-year graduate student.[1] Dr. Colson focused her research on the consequences of forced resettlement on culture and social organization,[3] the effects of economic pressure on familial relationships, rituals, religious life, and even drinking patterns.[4]