Progress is the backbone of Tylor’s Anthropology, the first textbook on the subject. Written for a popular audience, Tylor deletes most of the references to non evolutionary processes, focusing instead on the developmental issues of “how mankind came to be as they are, and to live as they do” (1960:1). He emphasizes the progress of cultural development: “History . . . shows arts, sciences, and political institutions beginning in ruder states, and becoming in the course of ages more intelligent, more systematic, more perfectly arranged or organized to answer their purposes” (1960:11). In the balance of Anthropology, Tylor summarizes his discussions of language, technology, and religion with a clarity and purpose rarely present in Researches into the Early History of Mankind or Primitive Culture.
Tylor’s evolution exhibits an uneven determinism. On the one hand, human history is framed by progress rather than degeneration, by transformation from the simple to complex, and by the trajectory from savagery to civilization. Progress, Tylor believed, did not end in the nineteenth century but was transformed from an unconscious tendency to a conscious tenet: “Acquainted with events and their consequences far and wide over the world, we are able to direct our own course with more confidence toward improvement” (1960:275). Anthropology contributes to human progress, Tylor argued; knowing the course of human history “from the remote past to the present, will not only help us to forecast the future, but may guide us in our duty of leaving the world better than we found it” (1960:275). Tylor writes that “the science of culture is essentially a reformer’s science” (1964:539). Perhaps Tylor’s Quaker liberalism led him to embrace progress and reform (Stocking 1968).
Most of Tylor’s adult life was spent in Oxford where he became keeper of the University Museum in 1883. In 1884 Tylor was given a readership in anthropology and held that position until 1896, when he was named the first professor of anthropology. He lectured on the origins of human culture, myth and magic, and the distribution of cultural traits. After the publication of Anthropology, Tylor spent his time teaching and developing academic institutions and anthropological associations rather than writing new works. But Tylor remained extremely influential on the development of British anthropology. He developed potential questions for researchers to ask in the field; influenced scholars like James Frazer, A. C. Haddon, and W. R.
Rivers; and gave numerous public lectures. Primitive Culture was reprinted ten times and was translated into Russian, German, French, and Polish during Tylor’s lifetime.
Tylor retired from Oxford in 1909 as professor emeritus, and his achievements were recognized by a knighthood in 1912. His final years were marked by decreasing mental clarity, and his friends lamented that Tylor never produced another work as great as Primitive Culture (Lang 1907; Stocking 1968).