The crucial differences which distinguish human societies and human beings are not biological. They are cultural.

- Ruth Benedict

I have always used the world of make-believe with a certain desperation.

- Ruth Benedict

No man ever looks at the world with pristine eyes. He sees it edited by a definite set of customs and institutions and ways of thinking.

- Ruth Benedict

We do not see the lens through which we look.

- Ruth Benedict

liberty is the one thing no man can have unless he grants it to others.

- Ruth Benedict

The purpose of anthropology is to make the world safe for human differences.

- Ruth Benedict

I long to speak out the intense inspiration that comes to me from the lives of strong women.

- Ruth Benedict

The life-history of the individual is first and foremost an accommodation to the patterns and standards traditionally handed down in his community. F…

- Ruth Benedict

It is my necessary breath of life to understand and expression is the only justification of life that I can feel without prodding.

- Ruth Benedict