Dean Fansler, also Dean S. Fansler, was an American professor. He was a teacher of English at Columbia University in the early 20th century and brother of Priscilla Hiss (wife of Alger Hiss),[1] who, as a "noted folklorist" helped preserve Filipino folklore culture in the early 20th century, after centuries of Spanish and American domination.[2]
Dean Spruill Fansler was born in 1885. His father was Thomas Lafayette Fansler, mother Willa Roland Spruill, and younger sister Priscilla Hiss, born Priscilla Harriet Fansler.[1] [3] [4] In 1906, he received a BA from Northwestern University and MA (1907) and doctorate (1913) from Columbia.[5]
In 1908, Fansler started working at the University of the Philippines. From then through 1914, he collected Filipino folklore tales.[6]
By 1914, Fansler appears in the Columbia College catalog as an assistant professor of English.[5] In the early 1920s, Fansler was a professor at Columbia College and receives mention as an acquaintance (probably teacher) in the first autobiography of Mortimer J. Adler.[1]
Franz Boas recommended that Fansler earn his doctorate and inspired him to prepare Philippine material for publication.[7]
In 1956, the "most widely known collection of Philippine folktales" was Dean Fansler's Filipino Popular Tales.[8]
*
. Mortimer J. Adler . Philosopher at Large: An Intellectual Autobiography . Macmillan . registration . 66 . 1977 . 12 January 2018.
Traditions and Texts from around the World ]
. ABC-CLIO . 1,195 . 2016 . 12 January 2018. 9781610692540 .. Dean Fansler . Chaucer and the 'Roman a la Rose' . Columbia University Press . 1914 . 12 January 2018.
. Dean Fansler . Filipino Popular Tales . American Folk-Lore Society . 1921 . 12 January 2018.