Elliott p skinner biography of rory

American diplomat (–)

Elliott Percival Skinner (June 20, – April 1, ) was an American anthropologist and United States Ambassador to the Republic of Upper Volta from to ^[1]

Background

Born in Port of Spain, Trinidad, in a family with four siblings and Barbadian ancestry on his father's side, Skinner came to the United States in He supported American values, and enlisted in the United States Army in and fought in World War II in France, which later allowed him to obtain citizenship.

Skinner earned a bachelor's degree from New York University in He then attended Columbia University, where he earned a master's degree in and a doctorate in He was rejected for a PhD at Northwestern by Melville J. Herskovits who believed that "black scholars" could not study Africa objectively.^[2] His PhD thesis, working with Morton Fried, was "Ethnic Interaction in a British Guiana Rural Community: A Study in Secondary Acculturation and Group Dynamics."^&#