Mintz, Sidney Wilfred, 1922-

The people of Puerto Rico
collection 1956

Summary: Sidney Wilfred Mintz was an American anthropologist best known for his studies of the Caribbean, creolization, and the anthropology of food. Mintz received his PhD at Columbia University in 1951 and conducted his primary fieldwork among sugar-cane workers in Puerto Rico. Later expanding his ethnographic research to Haiti and Jamaica, he produced historical and ethnographic studies of slavery and global capitalism, cultural hybridity, Caribbean peasants, and the political economy of food commodities. He taught for two decades at Yale University before helping to found the Anthropology Department at Johns Hopkins University, where he remained for the duration of his career. Mintz's history of sugar, Sweetness and Power, is considered one of the most influential publications in cultural anthropology and food studies. Wikipedia
Gender or Sex: Male [1][2][3][4][5][6]
Born: 1922 [2]; 1922-11-16 [5]
Birth Place: Douvres, N. J. [3]; Dover [5]
Died: 2015 [2]; 2015-12-27 [5]
Death Place: Plainsboro, N. J. [3]; Plainsboro [5]
Country: United States [2]
Language: English [3]
Occupation: anthropologist [5]; university teacher [5]
Profession: Anthropologe [2]
Employer: Johns Hopkins University [5]; Yale University [5]; Columbia University [5]
Educated at: Brooklyn College [5]; Yale University [5]; The New School [5]; Columbia University [5]
Country of Education: United States [5]
Yale LUX: Entity [5]

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

Last updated Dec 16, 2025