Benjamin Irving Rouse (August 29, 1913 – February 24, 2006) was an American archaeologist on the faculty of Yale University best known for his work in the Greater and Lesser Antilles of the Caribbean, especially in Haiti. He also conducted fieldwork in Florida and Venezuela. He made major contributions to the development of archaeological theory, with a special emphasis on taxonomy and classification of archaeological materials and studies of human migration.
Early life
Rouse was born on August 29, 1913, in Rochester, New York, the son of Louise Gillespie (Bohachek) and Benjamin Irving Rouse. His maternal grandfather was Czech. His family had been in the plant nursery industry for nearly a century, and Ben (as he was known to family and friends) was planning on continuing in the family business when he enrolled at Yale University in 1930 as a plant science major. His father had also attended Yale as an undergraduate.
Education
Rouse began his academic career studying forestry and obtained his bachelor's degree in plant science from Yale University's Sheffield Scientific School in 1934. Rouse identifies his background in botany as a major factor in his lifelong interest in classification and taxonomy. As a result of family financial reversals resulting from the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and the Great Depression from 1929 to 1932, Rouse needed employment to continue at Yale. As an undergraduate, he worked at the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History cataloging archaeological specimens. It was through this job that Rouse met Cornelius Osgood, who convinced Rouse to take some graduate-level anthropology courses and eventually enroll in the graduate program at Yale, where Osgood directed his doctoral dissertation. Rouse claimed that his perception of the need for classification in what was at that time the young field of anthropology was a major factor in his decision to pursue a career in anthropology rather than the much more established field (in terms of classification of materials) of botany. His dissertation was eventually published in two parts, the first exploring method and analysis entitled Prehistory in Haiti: A Study in Method (1939), the second an application of these methods entitled Culture of the Ft. Liberté Region, Haiti (1941).
Professional career
Upon receiving his Ph.D. in 1938, Rouse accepted a job as assistant curator at Yale's Peabody Museum. He was promoted to associate curator (1947) and research associate (1954). While employed at the museum, Rouse also taught courses in anthropology, beginning as an instructor in anthropology from 1939 to 1943, advancing to Assistant Professor (1943), Associate Professor (1948), Professor (1954), and finally becoming Charles J. MacCurdy Professor of Anthropology (1970), holding this position until his retirement in 1984. He held many positions in professional organizations, including serving as editor of American Antiquity, president of the Society for American Archaeology (1952–1953), vice president of the American Ethnological Society (1957–1958), associate editor of American Anthropologist (1960–1962), and president of the American Anthropological Association (1967–1968). He was also a member of the National Academy of Sciences, a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and Guggenheim Fellow.
Dissertation
Rouse was a major contributor to the study of Caribbean archaeology, and his contribution to this field began with his dissertation, which was broken down into two parts and dealt with the culture of the Ft. Liberté region of Haiti. The first segment of his dissertation is a definition of the methods he would use in studying the cultures of this region titled Prehistory in Haiti: A Study in Method (1939).