In 1958 Hermitte moved to the University of Chicago in the United States, where she assisted with the social systems courses. The following year she was sent to Mexico together with linguist R. Radhakrishnan and interpreter Alberto Méndez Tobilla to conduct field work with the Mayan community of Pinola, Villa Las Rosas in the state of Chiapas.[2] As a result of several years of work and subsequent analysis of "Social mobility in a bicultural community in Chiapas" and "Supernatural power and social control", Hermitte received a Master of Arts in 1965 and Philosophical Doctor in 1964.[3] She received the Roy D. Albert Prize for her master thesis and the Bobbs Merryl Award for her doctoral thesis.
Movilidad Social en una comunidad bicultural, Revista Latinoamericana de Sociología, Centro de Investanciones Sociales del Instituto Torcuato Di Tella, Buenos Aires, 1968.
Poder sobrenatural y control social: en un pueblo maya contemporáneo, Instituto Indigenista Interamericano, México, 1970.
El concepto de nahual en Pinola, México, en Ensayos antropológicos en los Altos de Chiapas. McQuown & Pitt-Rivers comps., Instituto Indigenista Interamericano, México, 1989.
^Guber, Rosana (2011). "La observación participante como sistema de contextualización de los métodos etnográficos: La investigación de campo de Esther Hermitte en los Altos de Chiapas, 1960-1961". Revista Latinoamericana de Metodología de las Ciencias Sociales; Ensenada Vol. 1, Iss. 2, (Dec 2011): 60-90.
^Hermitte, Esther (2004). Poder sobrenatural y control social. Antropofagia.
