Keith Hamilton Basso (March 15, 1940 – August 4, 2013) was a cultural and linguistic anthropologist noted for his study of the Western Apaches, specifically those from the community of Cibecue, Arizona.

His early inclination to anthropology started with Clyde Kluckhohn's classes at Harvard University where he completed his undergraduate studies in 1962[3] with magna cum laude honours.

[3] A classic contribution to ethnopoetics and the ethnography of speaking, Basso's 1979 book Portraits of the Whiteman examines complex cultural and political significance of jokes as a form of verbal art.

[5] Basso was awarded the Victor Turner Prize for Ethnographic Writing in 1997 for his ethnography, Wisdom Sits in Places: Landscape and Language Among the Western Apache.

In his 1988 article 'Speaking with Names', he acknowledged her as 'partner in fieldwork as in everything else, whose steady encouragement, graceful acumen, and sheer good sense helped immeasurably in moving things.