Boas to Mead - Nov. 7, 1925:
My dear Margaret,
I have just returned from Europe and find your two letters of September 17th and October 11th. It is very difficult for me to give advice in regard to the question of your relocating with the Holts, in Ta’u, or go to some other place. I am quite sure that you will use your own judgement in regard to the question of how best to keep in close contact with the Samoan girls and at the same time be in a position where you can work advantageously. I know from personal experience how hard it is to find time for serious work in a native house where there are constant interruptions of all sorts and I presume that if you are located with the Holts you will nevertheless be able to spend many hours in succession during the day or the evening with the people. The only danger in such an arrangement is if the behavior of the whites interferes with close and friendly contact with the people on account of their own attitude, but I hardly think that is the case in that family. I have not yet had time to read your reports to Ruth Benedict because I just wading through all the accumulated material that has come in this summer.
I am fully aware that the subject that you have selected is a very difficult one and is, I believe, the first serious attempt to enter into the mental attitude of a group in a primitive society. Great, of course, will be the satisfaction if you succeed in getting even part of what you would like to find and I believe that your success would mark a beginning of a new era of methodological investigation of native tribes. At the same time, I trust you will not feel discouraged if the results are coming slowly and not to the extent you would like to get. Conditions are such that even if you do not get all you want in your principal subject, there are plenty of other aspects in regard to which material will be accumulated all the time that will be of value and many of which will have a bearing on a matter that you really want to investigate.
I am not writing any more to-day because I want reply at once to your question. I shall write, however, again more fully very soon.
With kindest regards.
Yours as ever,
Franz Boas