Dr Ayinapalli Aiyappan was an anthropologist born in Pavaratty

Pavaratty

Pavaratty is a census town in Thrissur district in the Indian state of Kerala.-Demographics: India census, Pavaratty had a population of 10,823. Males constitute 45% of the population and females 55%. Pavaratty has an average literacy rate of 84%, higher than the national average of 59.5%: male...

 in the Thrissur

Thrissur

This article is about the city in India. For the district, see Thrissur district. For the urban agglomeration area of Thrissur see Thrissur Metropolitan Area...

 district of Kerala

Kerala

or Keralam is an Indian state located on the Malabar coast of south-west India. It was created on 1 November 1956 by the States Reorganisation Act by combining various Malayalam speaking regions....

, India.

Life

He obtained an MA in economics from the University of Madras

University of Madras

The University of Madras is a public research university in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. It is one of the three oldest universities in India...

 in 1927, and in 1929 he joined the Madras Government Museum. He continued to study, taking a PhD in 1937 after being a student of Raymond Firth

Raymond Firth

Sir Raymond William Firth, CNZM, FBA, was an ethnologist from New Zealand. As a result of Firth's ethnographic work, actual behaviour of societies is separated from the idealized rules of behaviour within the particular society...

 at the London School of Economics

London School of Economics

The London School of Economics and Political Science is a public research university specialised in the social sciences located in London, United Kingdom, and a constituent college of the federal University of London...

. He became head of the museum in 1940 and continued there until 1958, whilst also being a visiting professor at Cornell University

Cornell University

Cornell University is an Ivy League university located in Ithaca, New York, United States. It is a private land-grant university, receiving annual funding from the State of New York for certain educational missions...

 during 1954–1956. He became Professor and Head of the Department of Anthropology at Utkal University in 1958, and filled the same role at Andhra University

Andhra University

Andhra University or Andhra Viswa Kala Parishad , located in Visakhapatnam, north east coastal Andhra Pradesh, is one of the older premier universities in India with a broad focus...

 in 1966–1967. In 1969 he was appointed vice-chancellor of Kerala University, a post in which he stayed for either 18 months or until 1972, dependent on the source selected.

In 1970 he became a sponsoring founder and first chairman of the Centre for Development Studies

Centre for Development Studies

The Centre for Development Studies , Trivandrum, Kerala, India is a premier social science research institution. Over the years it has established a tradition of interdisciplinary research on development problems in India. Its main objective is to promote research, teaching and training in...

. He was also a sponsoring founder and Director of the Tribal Research Bureau of Orissa

Orissa

Orissa , officially Odisha since Nov 2011, is a state of India, located on the east coast of India, by the Bay of Bengal. It is the modern name of the ancient nation of Kalinga, which was invaded by the Maurya Emperor Ashoka in 261 BC. The modern state of Orissa was established on 1 April...

 (now known as Tribal and Harijan Research and Training Institute), and Director of the Department of Rural Welfare of Orissa.

Aiyappan was involved in the reorganisation of the Orissa Museum as a multipurpose museum with the addition of natural history

Natural history

Natural history is the scientific research of plants or animals, leaning more towards observational rather than experimental methods of study, and encompasses more research published in magazines than in academic journals. Grouped among the natural sciences, natural history is the systematic study...

, mining and geology, and anthropology galleries.

He was awarded the Saratchandra Roy Gold Medal of the Asiatic Society

Asiatic Society

The Asiatic Society was founded by Sir William Jones on January 15, 1784 in a meeting presided over by Sir Robert Chambers, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court at the Fort William in Calcutta, then capital of the British Raj, to enhance and further the cause of Oriental research. At the time of...

 in Bengal

Bengal

Bengal is a historical and geographical region in the northeast region of the Indian Subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal. Today, it is mainly divided between the sovereign land of People's Republic of Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal, although some regions of the previous...

. He was also an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Anthropological Institute. He died on 28 June 1988.

Works

• Iravas and Cultural Change (PhD thesis, published in Bulletin of the Madras Museum, 1945)
• Social Revolution in a Kerala Village (1965)
• Nayads of Kerala
• The Personality of Kerala
• Physical Anthroplogy of the Nayadis of Malabar
• Bharathappazhama ( Malayalam)