| Olga Francesca Linares | |
| Birth Date: | November 10, 1936 |
| Fields: | Anthropology, archaeology |
| Workplaces: | Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute |
| Birth Place: | David, Panama |
| Alma Mater: | Harvard University |
| Thesis Year: | 1964 |
Olga Francesca Linares (November 10, 1936 – December 2, 2014; formerly Olga Linares de Sapir) was a Panamanian–American academic anthropologist and archaeologist, and senior staff scientist (emerita) at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) in Panama, who supported much of her research throughout her career. She is well known for her work on the cultural ecology of Panama, and more recently in the Casamance region of Southern Senegal. She is also concerned with the social organization of agrarian systems as well as the relationship between "ecology, political economy, migration and the changing dynamics of food production among rural peoples living in tropical regions".[1]
Olga Linares was born November 10, 1936, in the city of David, Panama,[2] the daughter of Francisco (Frank) Esteban Linares and Olga Tribaldos de Linares.,[3] She married her second husband Martin Moynihan, founding director of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) and animal behaviorist, in 1973. Moynihan died on December 3, 1996. After having been widowed for many years, Linares married Fenwick “Fen” C. Riley in 2006 and lived in Panama until their deaths a few months apart in 2014.[4]
Linares received her B.A. in Anthropology from Vassar College in 1958 and later completed her Ph.D. in anthropology from Harvard University in 1964.
Linares served as an instructor of anthropology at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1964 and a lecturer of anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia from 1966 to 1971. She also was a visiting associate professor at the University of Texas, Austin in 1974. Linares worked as a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study at Stanford University in California, from 1979 to 1980 and as a visiting professor in 1982. Later she was a fellow at St. John's overseas at Cambridge University in England from 1986 to 1987. In 2002 she was a trustee for the International Plant Genetic Resources Institute in Rome in 2002.
Linares retired in 2008, as senior research scientist at STRI, after an association at the institute lasting some 35 years.[5] She retained status as scientist emerita with the STRI scientific faculty.[6]
Linares began her career as an archaeologist mainly focused on studying lower Central America, in particular Panama. In part, her research was an effort to bring to light the validity or invalidity of popular assumptions that this region served solely as a corridor between Mesoamerica and South America. She deduced that historically, there were populations that lived, hunted and farmed in these regions, and that it was not merely a pathway connecting Central America to South America.[7]
One of Linares' earliest ventures was exploring occupation sequences in the Gulf of Chiriqui in central Panama from AD 300 to the 'Classic' Chiriquí Province culture. This was the first effort to establish a chronology of the Chiriqui based on stratified refuge deposits. She did this by studying changing ceramic techniques of four excavation sites in the region which presented a sequence of occupation which she then related to other central Panamanian provinces and in Costa Rica.[8]
Linares later studied 'adaptive radiation' in prehistoric populations in Western Panama. To do this, she looked at the archaeological evidence of two differing environments present at the same time, one humid while the other was more seasonal, to explain the divergence of a people with a single origin. Related to the different environments was the emergence of different agricultural practices: vegeculture versus seed culture. By looking at what may have happened when an ancient population migrated and colonized a new territory, Linares is essentially developing theories of patterns of the peopling of the Americas.[9]
Linares also examined "Ecology and the arts in ancient Panama." During this research she studied the culture and art of ancient populations of the central provinces of Panama. Much of her research was done at Sitio Conte where she collected artifacts in order to better understand the 'meaning and function' of the arts. This included a study of trade practices and social structures of power during the 16th century of the Cocle and Cuna cultures.[10]
From the 1980s until present, Linares began extensive research in the Casamance region of Southern Senegal, the region located below the Gambia. More specifically, this research focused on social organizations and food production of the Jola people (also spelled Diola.) She looks at the varying techniques of wet rice production and compares them with different modes of cultivation in the region. She also examines how social organization shapes these differing methods.[11]
One example of this is the role gender plays in the production of cash crops versus subsistence crops. Here, she looks at the effects of colonial influence on the practices of the Jola, and how traditional cultivation differs from modern cultivation of crops purely for export.[12]
In addition to rural food cultivation practices, Linares explores a new form that she refers to as "urban farming" that has developed in the age of post-colonialism. With much migration to larger cities, traditional practices of subsistence growing have led to backyard farming in urban areas, providing not only another source of food, but also a way to maintain and strengthen friendship, "inter-ethnic" cooperation, as well as to enrich the environment.[13]
Furthermore, she discusses the role the government has played in agricultural failures due to drought in the Basse Casamance region. According to Linares, drought and other uncontrollable factors are not the sole reason for subpar agricultural performance, but also the state's inability to respond effectively and appropriately to these environmental stresses.[14]
Grantee National Science Foundation, 1965, 1970—73[15]
Fellow: American Association for the Advancement of Science; mem.: National Academy of Sciences, Royal Anthropology Institute, Am. Anthropology Association (member ethics committee 1992—93).[2]
Book: Cooke, Richard G. . Luis Alberto Sánchez . 2004 . Arqueología en Panamá (1888-2003) . http://stri.si.edu/cooke/PDF/cien_anos.pdf . Comisión Universitaria del Centenario de la República. Panamá: Cien años de República . online revised and repaginated version, with corrections and addition of bibliography to original 1st print . Panamá . . 1–104 [repag. from original] . 978-9962-608-39-4 . 56844445. es.
Linares, Olga F. . 1968a . Ceramic Phases for Chiriqui, Panama, and Their Relationship to Neighboring Sequences . . 33 . 2 . 216–225 . 0002-7316 . 1479302 . 10.2307/278524. 278524 . 245676400 .
Book: Linares, Olga F. . 1968b . Cultural Chronology of the Gulf of Chiriquí, Panama . PDF online reproduction by publisher . Smithsonian contributions to anthropology series, no. 8 . Washington DC . . 3218.
Linares, Olga F. . 1977a . Adaptive Strategies in Western Panama . . 8 . 3, Human Biogeography . 304–319 . 0043-8243 . 48535549 . 10.1080/00438243.1977.9979675.
Book: Linares, Olga F. . 1977b . Ecology and the Arts in Ancient Panama: On the Development of Social Rank and Symbolism in the Central Provinces . Studies in Pre-Columbian Art & Archaeology, no. 17 . 2nd printing [2000]. Washington, DC . . 9780884020691 . 3436901.
Linares, Olga F. . October 1979 . What is Lower Central American Archaeology? . . 8 . 21–43 . 10.1146/annurev.an.08.100179.000321 . 0084-6570 . 1783647.
Linares, Olga F. . 1981 . From Tidal Swamp to Inland Valley: On the Social Organisation of Wet Rice Cultivation among the Diola of Senegal . . 51 . 2, Rice and Yams in West Africa . 557–595 . 0001-9720 . 318415907 . 10.2307/1158828. 1158828 . 145636534 .
Linares, Olga F. . April 1985 . Cash Crops and Gender Constructs: The Jola of Senegal . . 24 . 2 . 83–93. 10.2307/3773551. 0014-1828 . 42703842. 3773551 .
Linares, Olga F . 1996 . Cultivating Biological and Cultural Diversity: Urban Farming in Casamance, Senegal . . 66 . 1, The Social Shaping of Biodiversity: Perspectives on the Management of Biological Variety in Africa . 104–121 . 0001-9720 . 37265969 . 10.2307/1161514. 1161514 . 143475685 .
Linares, Olga F. 2005 Jola Agriculture at a Crossroads. Canadian Journal of African Studies, Vol. 39, No. 2, Contested Casamance / Discordante Casamance, Canadian Association of African Studies, pp. 230–252
Book: Sleeman, Elizabeth . 2001 . Linares, Olga F. . The International Who's Who of Women 2002 . 3rd . Europa Biographical Reference series . London . . 333–334 . 978-1-85743-122-3 . 59532283.
Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute . November 28, 2008 . Olga F. Linares retires . PDF online publication . STRI News. Panama . STRI Office of Communication and Public Programs . 2009-10-13.
Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute website. https://web.archive.org/web/20090212133207/http://stri.org/english/scientific_staff/staff_scientist/scientist.php?id=24