matter of fact the
Africans are the only contemporaneous primitive people who have
anywhere achieved race consciousness and civilization without losing
their racial identity. As a consequence almost every fundamental
process and stage of civilization, from the most primitive to the most
cosmopolitan man, is somewhere represented in the contemporary life of
the Negro in Africa and America. It is this fact which lends
significance to the present volume, since these studies propose to
cover eventually the whole range of Negro life in Africa and America,
so far as that can be done within the limits of the anthropological
sciences. An editorial note at the end of this first volume describes
the plan and scope of the proposed series of publications.

The Harvard African Studies is designed to consist of annual
volumes--under the title of Varia Africana--made up of
miscellaneous papers, and of occasional monographs presenting the
results of original field or laboratory research.

The scope of the volumes may be defined as African anthropology
in the widest sense. Only original papers are desired, but these
may be of any length compatible with their presentation in a
volume which is essentially in the nature of a journal, and may
deal with any of the following subjects: psychology, archaeology,
ethnography, linguistics, sociology, ethno-geography, religion,
folklore, or technology. A range so wide must perforce be limited
in some directions, and the editors have therefore decided upon
the exclusion of purely historical papers, even when the latter
embody the political records of native tribes. As an exception to
this rule, the editors may be willing, under certain
circumstances, to accept historical material which, by
establishing the presence of this or that group of people in a
certain locality, or by throwing light on the nature or date of a
migration, bears on racial questions and problems of primitive
culture.

The series is open to papers of a non-controversial character
dealing with a topic sadly in need of more scientific
treatment--we refer to the question of the American Negro. The
anthropometrist, the sociologist, and the folklorist have in this
direction a field of research which, if approached with adequate
knowledge, can be made to yield invaluable results. As these
results ca