Chagnon, Napoleon A., 1938-

Ya̦nomamö, the fierce people
Book 1968

Summary: Napoleon Alphonseau Chagnon was an American cultural anthropologist, professor of sociocultural anthropology at the University of Missouri in Columbia and member of the National Academy of Sciences. Chagnon was known for his long-term ethnographic field work among the Yanomamö/Yanomami, a society of indigenous tribal Amazonians, in which he used an evolutionary approach to understand social behavior in terms of genetic relatedness. His work centered on the analysis of violence among tribal peoples, and, using socio-biological analyses, he advanced the argument that violence among the Yanomami is fueled by an evolutionary process in which successful warriors have more offspring. His 1967 ethnography Yanomamö: The Fierce People became a bestseller and is frequently assigned in introductory anthropology courses. Wikipedia
Gender or Sex: Male [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8]
Born: 1938-08-27 [2][7]
Birth Place: Port Austin [7]
Died: 2019-09-21 [2][7]
Death Place: Traverse City [7]
Country: United States [2]
Language: English [3][4]
Occupation: anthropologist [7]; university teacher [7]; documentary filmmaker [7]
Profession: Ethnologe [2]
Employer: University of Missouri [7]; University of California, Santa Barbara [7]
Educated at: University of Michigan [7]
Country of Education: United States [7]
Yale LUX: Entity [7]

Sources: 1. VIAF; 2. Deutsche Nationalbibliothek (Germany); 3. Bibliothèque nationale de France; 4. National Library of Latvia; 5. National Library of Korea; 6. Danish Bibliographic Centre; 7. Wikidata; 8. Library of Congress

Last updated Dec 18, 2025