Delmos Jones

[1] Delmos Jones identified with the political marginality and socioeconomic struggles of his subjects and sought ways to direct anthropological research toward the dismantling of oppression and inequality.

Jones was dissatisfied with the way theoretical paradigms, praxis, and outcomes in anthropological research were supportive of, or neutral to, oppressive ends.

His research interests ranged from the Lahu, a hill tribe in Northern Thailand, to the Australian Aborigines, to community organizing among poor people in the United States, but he focused throughout on problems of inequality and the rights of oppressed groups.

In order to pursue his education beyond the segregated Dallas County Training School in Beloit, Alabama, at age of fifteen Jones traveled by bus to join his older sister in Oakland, CA.

This first experience of living an urban setting, surrounded by those working a mix of blue and white-collar jobs, likely impacted Jones's notion of the range of possibilities for how own life.

During his time at San Francisco State, Jones was greatly influenced by the founder of the university's Anthropology Department, Adán Treganza.

Duly inspired, Jones earned a BA in anthropology from San Francisco State University in 1959 and went on to pursue graduate studies in the discipline.

When the US Army sought to draft Jones they learned of some of his earlier political activities and the military rejected him for service, designating him as a security risk.

In this article, he focuses on the linkage between economic changes and residential patterns as the Papago became less involved in "Subsistence Activities" and increasingly reliant on a cha-based economy.

Jones completed his masters's in an anthropology in 1962 with the penning of his thesis mentor, he left Arizona and moved to Ithaca, New York, to begin his doctoral work.

Taking advantage of the program's strong Asian Studies focus, Jones chose Southeast Asia as his site for dissertation research.