Event Details
Wed, February 18, 2026
18:00 – 19:30
Villa Sassetti
VILLA LA PIETRA
Via Bolognese, 120
50139 Florence, Italy
A conversation with Noga Arikha.
Franz Boas (1858–1942) is widely acknowledged for his pioneering work in the field of cultural anthropology. His rigorous studies of variations across societies were aimed at demonstrating that cultures and peoples were not shaped by biological predispositions. Arikha’s recently published biography of Boas recounts his life and intellectual passions from his roots in Germany and his move to the United States in 1884 – partly in response to growing antisemitism in Germany – to his work with First Nations communities and his influential role as a teacher, mentor, and engaged activist who inspired an entire generation. Arikha will introduce Boas’s ideas and show their continuing relevance today, focusing on his arguments and activism against the entrenched notion of an evolution of cultures and against the racist pseudo-science of eugenics that was popular in the US of his day.
Featured Biographies
Noga Arikha
PHILOSOPHER AND HISTORIAN OF IDEAS, EUROPEAN UNIVERSITY INSTITUTE
Noga Arikha is a philosopher and historian of ideas trained at the Warburg Institute, with a PhD on the life sciences and mind-body relation in early modern Europe. She now works as a “science humanist”, fostering dialogues on the embodied sense of self between neuroscientists, psychologists, clinicians, social scientists, humanists and artists. She is currently a Senior Expert at the Florence School of Transnational Governance at the European University Institute (EUI), within the Horizon Europe grant ScaleDem: Scaling Democratic Innovation, and developing a program on “Emotions in Politics”. She is the author of numerous essays, and her previous books include The Ceiling Outside: The Science and Experience of the Disrupted Mind, an exploration of brain, self, dementia and medicine based on the stories of neuropsychiatric patients (Basic Books, 2022) and Passions and Tempers: A History of the Humours (Ecco/HarperCollins, 2007).