At the moment, the current wikipedia entry as earning “a Bachelor of Arts degree in English literature and anthropology”. So if Wikipedia says it it must be true? Hmmm…

Wikipedia lists three citations for this assertion: Rivers’ New York Times obit, her (superbly named) memoir Enter Talking, and a Washington Post obit. In fact, the Times obit gives her major as English. This morning when I checked it the WaPo obit listed her major as anthropology, but now that has been removed for some reason and her major is not specified. In Enter Talking (which Wikipedia cites without a page number, tsk tsk) what Rivers actually says is: “I was an English literature major” (that’s page 55 of the 1986, NYC, Delacorte press edition).

The preponderance of the evidence is against Rivers as an anthropology major, unfortunately. Perhaps she was an anthropology minor? It’s unclear. Its fascinating to imagine Rivers sitting through classes taught by newly-minted Ph.D.s like Eric Wolf and Sidney Mintz, and she may have done so. But, alas, not as an anthropology major.

Its intriguing to think of Joan Rivers as a paradigm for what anthropology could or should be. And since she deserves far more attention than even her death could bring her, perhaps its a fitting memorial for Rivers for us to imagine what she has to teach to anthropology.  Perhaps her gimlet eye provides a model for a critical anthropology yet to emerge.

I mean, let’s face it: Who needs ontology when you have Joan Rivers?

UPDATE: Evidence continues to surface: The Columbia Lion paints Joan Rivers as an anthro major who took courses with Mead while commenter ‘Jiminnc’ points us to a  photographer who says Rivers claimed she was an anthropology minor

UPDATE: Our intern Angela Chen contacted the registrar’s office at Barnard about this issue. They responded: “Joan Rivers majored in English. Although she apparently took Anthropology courses at Connecticut College before transferring to Barnard, she did not take any anthropology courses at Barnard.”