This study describes adolescent girls' lives in Samoa, drawing on fieldwork in island villages. Its accounts follow girls on the island of Ta'u through work, play, and courtship.
283 pages 5h 30m reading time
One of the best-known and most widely read works of anthropology (the study of human societies and cultures) ever written.
Argues that the stress and rebellion many Americans saw as a natural part of being a teenager come mostly from culture, not biology, since Samoan girls seemed to grow up with far less turmoil.
Suggests that Americans could learn from Samoa to raise young people with more openness about sex and less pressure over choices about family, work, and belief.
Made anthropology popular with the general public and became a key text in the long debate over "nature versus nurture," meaning whether people are shaped more by their biology or their upbringing.
Sparked a lasting argument about how fieldwork should be done after the anthropologist Derek Freeman challenged its findings in 1983, and both books are still studied side by side.
Sent out at 23
Mead was 23 and had never done fieldwork when she sailed to Samoa in 1925.
Her teacher chose the topic
Her teacher Franz Boas pushed her to study teenagers, though she had hoped to study changing island customs.
Lived with an American family
She did not live in a Samoan home but stayed with an American navy family at the island's medical station.
Her publisher wanted more
Her publisher urged her to add closing chapters comparing Samoa with America, so ordinary readers would buy it.
Margaret Mead 1928