November 28, 2008

The Anthropologist's Son

By RUTH BEHAR

Obama's mother taught him to appreciate cultural diversity, and that's a lesson we could all benefit from

Stanley Ann Dunham Soetoro earned a Ph.D. in anthropology with an 800-page dissertation about blacksmithing in Indonesia. She spent long stretches of time learning to love and rescue the cultures and communities of total strangers, at the cost of not always being around while her son was coming of age in Hawaii. Yet she had an indelible impact on him, teaching him to appreciate

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