Anthropology professor died Aug. 9

Igor Kopytoff, a former Department of Anthropology professor, died on Aug. 9 at Hahnemann University Hospital from complications related to Parkinson’s disease.

A 1958 School of Arts and Sciences graduate, Kopytoff began working at the University in 1962. He taught anthropology for 45 years until his retirement in 2007.

While at Penn, his research focused on transformations in social structure, religion and political organization among African countries. He also studied slavery around the world, with one significant project examining slavery in Africa.

“He was one of the most significant anthropologists that we had in this department at the University of Pennsylvania,” said professor of anthropology Brian Spooner, one of Kopytoff’s close colleagues.

While he did not publish as often as other researchers, “what he did publish will be important for a very long time,” Spooner said. “Anyone studying Africa will need to read what he wrote.”

In his life, Kopytoff was a worldly man, and had travelled the far reaches of the globe before he found a home in Philadelphia.

Raised in Shanghai as a refugee from the newly formed Soviet Union, he began his early education at a French school in the city, where he saw world history “through the screen of the French school curriculum,” said 1952 College of Women graduate Jean Adelman, one of Kopytoff’s close friends.

His education allowed him to have “a very different view of the world … than American-educated people did,” Adelman said.

When he was 18, he and his family left China for Chile, after which they made their way to Tanganyika, which later became Tanzania.

While in Africa, the Kopytoffs were granted American citizenship, which let them move to Chicago, where Igor studied anthropology as both an undergraduate and doctoral candidate at Northwestern University. Between his two degrees at Northwestern, he received his master’s degree from Penn.

After Northwestern, he taught for two years at Brown University before coming to Penn. While teaching at Penn, he met his future wife, Barbara Klamon, who was a graduate student in anthropology at the time.

“I think that sort of not belonging anywhere — he seemed to adapt to that,” said Larissa Kopytoff, a 2001 College graduate and Igor’s only daughter.

However, one place at which Igor Kopytoff felt at home was the museum coffee shop.

Spooner recalled that “over time, people spent less time there but there was always one table where Igor Kopytoff sat, and there were always people surrounding [him].”

“The coffee shop was usually where you could find him,” Larissa Kopytoff said. “When I was an undergrad at Penn … if I made plans to meet him in the museum, I would usually check the coffee shop first before checking his office.”

“I think it was really a big part of his life, and his personality, that he had a place that really felt like home, that Penn and the museum filled that role for him,” Larissa added.

A memorial service will be held at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology early next year.

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