Born on December 16, 1901, and passing away on November 15, 1978, Margaret Mead was a prominent author and speaker in the media during the 1960s and 1970s. She was an American cultural anthropologist.
She obtained her undergraduate degree from Columbia University’s Barnard College, as well as her master’s and doctoral degrees. In 1975, Mead led the American Association for the Advancement of Science as its president.
44 Margaret Mead Quotes
- “Always remember that you are absolutely unique. Just like everyone else.”
2. “Laughter is man’s most distinctive emotional expression.”
3. “Too many people, when they reject God, go on believing in the devil. Many intellectuals have a sense of evil without a confidence in good.”
4. “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”
5. “I was brought up to believe that the only thing worth doing was to add to the sum of accurate information in the world.”
6. “I measure success in terms of the contributions an individual makes to her fellow human beings.”
7. “Be who you really are, do what you want to do, in order to have what you really want.”
8. “Children must be taught how to think, not what to think.”
9. “Never believe that a few caring people can’t change the world. For indeed that’s all who ever have. ”
10. “Everyone needs to have access both to grandparents and grandchildren in order to be a full human being.”
Famous Margaret Mead Quotes
11. “The atmosphere is the key symbol of global interdependence.”
12. “The solution to adult problems tomorrow depends on large measure upon how our children grow up today.”
13. “Even though the ship may go down, the journey goes on.”
14. “One of the most dangerous things that can happen to a child is to kill or torture an animal an get away with it.”
15. “You know you love someone when you cannot put into words how they make you feel.”
16. “I was wise enough never to grow up, while fooling people into believing I had.”
17. “We won’t have a society if we destroy the environment.”
18. “An ideal culture is one that makes a place for every human gift”
19. “My grandmother wanted me to get a good education, so she kept me as far away from schools as possible.”
20. “Never underestimate the power of a small, dedicated group of people to change the world; indeed, that is the only thing that ever has.”
Margaret Mead Quotes About Love
21. “Every time we liberate a woman, we liberate a man. ”
22. “It is an open question whether any behavior based on fear of eternal punishment can be regarded as ethical or should be regarded as merely cowardly.”
23. “Women have an important contribution to make.”
23. “I was brought up to believe that the only thing worth doing was to add to the sum of accurate information in the world.”
24. “Instead of being presented with stereotypes by age, sex, color, class, or religion, children must have the opportunity to learn that within each range, some people are loathsome and some are delightful.”
25. “Where we choose to put our attention changes our brain, which in time can change how we see and interact with the world.”
26. “Having someone wonder where you are when you don’t come home at night is a very old human need.”
27. “I learned the value of hard work by working hard.”
28. “No society that feeds its children on tales of successful violence can expect them not to believe that violence, in the end, is rewarded.”
29. “It may be necessary temporarily to accept a lesser evil, but one must never label a necessary evil as good.”
30. “I learned to observe the world around me, and to note what I saw”
31. “There is no lonelier person than the one who lives with a spouse with whom he or she cannot communicate.”
Thought-Provoking Margaret Mead Quotes
32. “It is utterly false and cruelly arbitrary to put all the play and learning into childhood, all the work into middle age, and all the regrets into old age.”
33. “An ideal culture is one that makes a place for every human gift”
34. “There is no hierarchy of values by which one culture has the right to insist on all its own values and deny those of another.”
35. “It is easier to change a man’s religion than to change his diet.”
36. “If the future is to remain open and free, we need people who can tolerate the unknown, who will not need the support of completely worked out systems or traditional blueprints from the past.”
37. “Never ever depend on governments or institutions to solve any major problems. All social change comes from the passion of individuals.”
38. “One of the oldest human needs is having someone to wonder where you are when you don’t come home at night.”
39. “Women want mediocre men, and men are working hard to become as mediocre as possible.”
40. “Jealousy is not a barometer by which the depth of love can be read. It merely records the degree of the lover’s insecurity.”
41. “For the very first time the young are seeing history being made before it is censored by their elders.”
42. “What people say, what people do, and what they say they do are entirely different things.”
43. “I do not believe in using women in combat, because females are too fierce.”
44. “One of the oldest human needs is having someone wonder where you are when you don’t come home at night.”
Mead served as the Committee on Food Habits’ executive secretary for the National Research Council during World War II. From 1946 to 1969, she served as the American Museum of Natural History’s ethnology curator. She received the honor of being named a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1948, the American National Academy of Sciences in 1975, and the American Philosophical Society in 1977.
Additional Read: MARGARET MEAD (1901-1978) An Anthropology of Human Freedom