LEWIS, OSCAR

LEWIS, OSCAR (1914–1970), U.S. anthropologist. Born in New York City, Lewis was a research associate at Yale (1942–43), a propaganda analyst for the U.S. Department of Justice (1943), and a social scientist in the Department of Agriculture (1944–45). He also taught at various institutions, and, from 1948, at the University of Illinois. Lewis' chief interests were in the fields of cultural change and applied anthropology. His particular contribution was the application of the anthropological method to the study of the urban family unit, especially among poverty-stricken Mexicans and Puerto Ricans. In this connection he originated the idea of the "culture of poverty," a concept that achieved wide currency in the 1960s, a decade of profound social and racial turmoil when the problem of the urban poor became a primary governmental concern. In his research, Lewis made wide use of tape recordings to take down the case histories and reactions of his subjects. His study of a poor family in Mexico City, published as The Children of Sanchez (1961), achieved wide popularity both among sociologists and the general reading public. His other books include Five Families: Mexican Case Studies in the Culture of Poverty (1959); Pedro Martinez: A Mexican Peasant and his Family (1964); and La Vida: A Puerto-Rican Family in the Culture of Poverty, San Juan and New York (1966). (Ephraim Fischoff)