That exchange was unequal because of the institutional situation, but it was not intellectually one-directional.

The myth of civilization encountering primitiveness disappears once both sides are recognized as possessing different bodies of knowledge.

Ishi’s survival itself should have made that obvious.

A person does not remain alive for decades in a small, hidden community under intense pressure without adaptability, judgment, and skill.

The strange part was not that Ishi could learn San Francisco.

The strange part was how long San Francisco remained committed to imagining him as a man from outside modern time.

The 1914 Journey Home Was Supposed To Recover A Vanishing World

In 1914, Ishi returned to the Deer Creek region with a small group connected to the University of California.

The trip has often been described as a field expedition.

For the anthropologists, it offered a rare opportunity.