Howard Morphy (born 13 June 1947) is a British anthropologist who has conducted extensive fieldwork in northern Australia, mainly among the Yolngu people.
He was founding director of the Research School of Humanities and the Arts at the Australian National University and is currently a distinguished professor of anthropology.
[2] He has also produced a multimedia biography The Art of Narritjin Maymuru with Pip Deveson and Katie Hayne (ANU epress 2005).
[3] After a period teaching at ANU he was appointed lecturer in anthropology and curator at the Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford, in 1986.
During his period in Oxford, Morphy served as Junior Proctor in 1990-91, Senior Tutor of Linacre College, and, with Sir Barry Cunliffe, helped develop the new Archaeology and Anthropology undergraduate degree.
Frances Morphy has said that 'that field experience with the Yolngu gave us the solid foundation for our long-term partnership and our lifelong, shared interests.
'Landscape and the reproduction of the ancestral past', In The anthropology of landscape: perspectives on place and space, edited by Eric Hirsch and Michael O'Hanlon.