Lambros Comitas (September 29, 1927 – March 5, 2020) was Gardner Cowles Professor of Anthropology and Education at Teachers College, Columbia University.
Influential figures in his early professional years were Conrad Arensberg, Marvin Harris, Charles Wagley, Margaret Mead, and Vera D. Rubin from the Columbia faculty and M. G. Smith, the eminent British-trained anthropologist whom he first met during field work in Jamaica.
A full professor by 1967, Comitas directed the Division of Philosophy, the Social Sciences, and Education (1979–1996) and the Institute for International Studies (1984- ) at Teachers College.
Thomas Bailey, President of Teachers College, and Stephanie J. Rowley, Teachers College Provost, summarized his personality, career, and accomplishments in an obituary published in The New York Times on March 8, 2020: "world-renowned anthropologist, world-class humorist and raconteur, cherished mentor, respected academic statesman, and beloved member of our faculty for more than 56 years as the Gardner Cowles Professor of Anthropology & Education.
One of the world's preeminent authorities on Hispanic and non-Hispanic cultures in the Caribbean, Professor Comitas helped develop the concept of occupational multiplicity, identifying workers who defied classification as peasant farmers or other categories.
And for nearly 40 years, beginning in 1967, he reviewed and annotated more than 2,000 anthropological publications for his biennial West Indian section in the Handbook of Latin American Studies, issued by the Library of Congress.
More recently, Professor Comitas focused on the role of visual anthropology in research, using a photo and video database that he had built over many years.
[7] In addition, from 1967 to 2005, he reviewed and annotated some two thousand anthropological publications for his biennial West Indian section in the Handbook of Latin American Studies, an authoritative bibliographic source issued by the Library of Congress.