Ian Hogbin
Australian anthropologist (1904–1989)
Dr Herbert Ian Priestley Hogbin (17 December 1904 – 2 August 1989) was a British-born Australian anthropologist. He conducted field work in the Solomon Islands and New Guinea.
Biography
Ian Hogbin was born in Bawtry, Yorkshire, England in 1904.
Hogbin began his study of anthropology with Alfred Reginald Radcliffe-Brown, who founded the anthropology department at the University of Sydney, and his earliest field work was carried out under Radcliffe-Brown's supervision in Ontong Java, a Polynesian colony in the Solomon Islands. Some of the results were published in his book Law and Order in Polynesia.
He then went to London to work with Bronislaw Malinowski, at whose suggestion he returned to the Solomons, where he stayed in Guadalcanal and afterwards in Malaita. Subsequently, he made an investigation of the people of Wogeo, an island off the north coast of New Guinea. He earned a PhD from the University of London.
During World War II he served in the British Solomon Islands Protectorate Defence Force and later in the Australian Army in New Guinea as an adviser on native rehabilitation problems. He continued working in New Guinea, and, in 1963, published the second of two volumes on the Busama villagers, who occupied a settlement near the town of Lae.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Ian Hogbin” is australian anthropologist (1904–1989). The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Hogbin, Australian and anthropologist, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “australian anthropologist (1904–1989)” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1655545. VIAF identifies the subject as 112391670. The Library of Congress control number is n50043112. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1904, 1989 and 1963.
The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Ian Hogbin”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Ian Hogbin primary sources, Ian Hogbin archive and Hogbin research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Ian Hogbin”?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Ian Hogbin” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.