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Margaret Mead Quotes

All Quotes Acceptance Age Anxiety Art Change Childhood Children Choices Country Culture Discipline Diversity Divorce Earth Education Elders Equality Evil Failing Family Feelings Fighting Freedom Funny Giving Grief Growing Up Home House Human Nature Humanity Husband Imagination Inspirational Justice Laughter Learning Life Lying Manners Marriage Motivational Nature Opportunity Passion Past Peace Purpose Quality Reality Responsibility Retiring Running School Science Sisterhood Sleep Society Study Success Suffering Survival Teaching Technology Training War Water Writing
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.

Margaret Mead
Inspirational, Life, Friendship
Margaret Mead, Robert B. Textor (2005). “The World Ahead: An Anthropologist Anticipates the Future”, p.12, Berghahn Books

Children must be taught how to think, not what to think.

Margaret Mead
Education, Teacher, Children
Margaret Mead (1973). “Coming of Age in Samoa”

Never depend upon institutions or government to solve any problem. All social movements are founded by, guided by, motivated and seen through by the passion of individuals.

Margaret Mead
Freedom, Passion, Government
Attributed to Margaret Mead in Michael S. Matthews, Ph.D. and Jaime A. Castellano, Ed.D. "Talent Development for English Language Learners: Identifying and Developing Potential", November 15, 2013.

Always remember that you are absolutely unique. Just like everyone else.

Margaret Mead
Inspirational, Funny, Inspiring

Ninety-nine percent of the time humans have lived on this planet we've lived in tribes, groups of 12 to 36 people. Only during times of war, or what we have now, which is the psychological equivalent of war, does the nuclear family prevail, because it's the most mobile unit that can ensure the survival of the species. But for the full flowering of the human spirit we need groups, tribes.

Margaret Mead
Change, War, Ninety Nine

the people of one nation alone cannot save their own children; each holds the responsibility for the others' children.

Margaret Mead
Children, Responsibility, People

All social change comes from the passion of individuals.

Margaret Mead
Passion, Serious, Individual

Never underestimate the ability of a small group of committed individuals to change the world.

Margaret Mead
Groups, World, Underestimate

we came to realize that a civilization which rode roughshod over the way of life of other peoples was incorporating evil in its own way of life.

Margaret Mead
Civilization, Evil, Way

Where we choose to put our attention changes our brain, which in time can change how we see and interact with the world.

Margaret Mead
Brain, Attention, World

For the human species to evolve, the conversation must deepen.

Margaret Mead
Conversation, Evolve, Humans

Every act of motherhood contains a dual intent, as the mother holds the child close and prepares it to move way from her, as she supports the child and stands it firmly on its own feet, and as she guards it against danger and sends it out across the yard, down by the stream, and across the traffic-crowded highway. Unless a mother can do both - gather her child close and turn her child out toward the world - she will fail in her purpose.

Margaret Mead
Mother, Children, Moving

No society that feeds its children on tales of successful violence can expect them not to believe that violence in the end is rewarded.

Margaret Mead
Children, Believe, Successful

We won't have a society if we destroy the environment.

Margaret Mead
Nature, Carpe Diem, Society

The need to find meaning...is as real as the need for trust and for love, for relations with other human beings.

Margaret Mead
Inspirational, Real, Needs

Those social behaviors which automatically preclude the building of a democratic world must go - every social limitation of human beings in terms of heredity, whether it be of race, or sex, or class. Every social institution which teaches human beings to cringe to those above and step on those below must be replaced by institutions which teach people to look each other straight in the face.

Margaret Mead
Sex, Equality, Race
Margaret Mead (2000). “And Keep Your Powder Dry: An Anthropologist Looks at America”, p.161, Berghahn Books

in all cultures, human beings - in order to be human - must understand the nonhuman.

Margaret Mead
Order, Culture, Humans
Margaret Mead (1972). “Twentieth century faith: hope and survival”, Harper & Row Barnes & Noble Import Division

What people say, what people do, and what they say they do are entirely different things.

Margaret Mead
Life, Commitment, Confusion
Attributed to Margaret Mead in "Teaching Music Through Performance In Band, Volume 3" edited by Larry Blocher, Eugene Corporon, Ray Cramer, Tim Lautzeheiser, and others (p. 13), 2000.

It is an open question whether any behavior based on fear of eternal punishment can be regarded as ethical or should be regarded as merely cowardly.

Margaret Mead
Fear, Fog, Punishment

An ideal culture is one that makes a place for every human gift

Margaret Mead
Culture, Humans, Ideals

where families suffer from disasters that are preventable, this is a measure of a whole nation's neglect. A society imperils its own future when, out of negligence or contempt, it overlooks the need of children to be reared in a family ... or when, in the midst of plenty, some families cannot give their children adequate food and shelter, safe activity and rest, and an opportunity to grow into full adulthood as people who can care for and cherish other human beings like themselves.

Margaret Mead
Family, Children, Opportunity

Human beings do not carry civilization in their genes. All that we do carry in our genes are certain capacities- the capacity to learn to walk upright, to use our brains, to speak, to relate to our fellow men, to construct and use tools, to explore the universe, and to express that exploration in religion, in art, in science, in philosophy.

Margaret Mead
Art, Philosophy, Men

No country that permits firearms to be widely and randomly distributed among its population - especially firearms that are capable of wounding and killing human beings - can expect to escape violence, and a great deal of violence.

Margaret Mead
Country, Escaping, Population

What we lack is not so much leisure to do as time to reflect and time to feel. What we seldom "take" is time to experience the things that have happened, the things that are happening, the things that are still ahead of us.

Margaret Mead
Leisure, Feels, Stills
Margaret Mead, Rhoda Bubendey Métraux (1970). “A way of seeing”

Humanity . . . lies in man's capacity to question the known and imagine the unknown.

Margaret Mead
Lying, Men, Humanity
Margaret Mead, Robert B. Textor (2005). “The World Ahead: An Anthropologist Anticipates the Future”, p.250, Berghahn Books