LOUIS CHARLES FARON

Faron, Louis Charles
July 16, 1923 - Sep. 24, 2012
Louis Charles Faron, 89, of Sarasota, Florida, formerly of Stony Brook, Long Island, New York, died at home on September 24, 2012. His survivors include his wife, Sally, his daughter, Amy Faron Levy (Brad), four grandchildren, and three great grandchildren. He was predeceased by his parents, Louis C. and Erna Rost Faron and his son, Kenneth C. Faron.
After service in World War II from 1943-46, Louis earned his A.B. in History and Philosophy from Columbia College in 1949 and the Ph.D in Anthropology from Columbia University in 1954. Specializing in South American studies , he did ethnographic fieldwork among the Mapuche Indians of Chile (1952-54), the Coastal Valleys in Peru (1957-59), Choco Indians of Panama (1960), and the Otomi Indians of Mexico (1963-64).
Among the groups supporting his research were the Doherty, National Science, and Wenner Gren Foundations and several State University of New York Fellowships. In 1970-71, he was awarded a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship. He was also a Fellow of the American Anthropological Association and of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland. His research resulted in eight books and over 50 articles in academic journals written from 1954 to 1993.
Professor Faron's teaching career began at the University of Illinois, Urbana where he was a research associate to Julian Steward and co-authored Native Peoples of South America with him. Subsequent teaching at California State University at Los Angeles, and the University of Pittsburgh led him to the State University of New York at Stony Brook where in 1964 he founded the Department of Anthropology and served as its chair until 1971. He retired in 1986 as Emeritus Professor and moved to Sarasota.
His first love was always his time in the field working with varying ethnic groups. It was his work among the Mapuche, however, for which he achieved an enduring reputation. His material was translated into Spanish (1969, 1982), revised and updated (1986) and in 2011, two of his former graduate students visited an exhibit of the Mapuche and his work among them at the Museo Precolombiano in Santiago, Chile.
At Professor Faron's request, there will be no services but memorial contributions may be made to La Musica, P.O. Box 5442, Sarasota, Florida 34277.