Undergraduate Courses (Meet Major Area Requirements)
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ANTH 1010 Introduction to Anthropology [Graan]
MoWe 10:00AM - 10:50AM | This course treats anthropology as the critical investigation of everyday life, a means of inquiry into the cultural forms and dynamics that condition humans’ experiences of the social, political, institutional, and personal worlds that they inhabit. As such, this course seeks to develop an analytic toolkit with which to approach the role of culture or “the cultural” in social life. We will accomplish this by examining classic topics in anthropology and by surveying some of the diversity and complexity of cultural formations across the globe. Throughout we will keep an eye toward exploring how the anthropological perspective can enrich our own practical understanding of the cultural worlds in which we live. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 2153 North American Indians [Hantman]
MoWe 14:00PM - 14:50PM | This class is intended to introduce students to the diversity of historical and contemporary experiences of Native Americans. After a review of American Indian history and regional cultural traditions, our texts will be cultural critiques, novels, films, and museum exhibits written and created by indigenous artists. We will consider how Indians and Indian history have been portrayed in popular American culture from the colonial era to the present. Issues of contemporary political action, legislation and sovereignty will also be reviewed. Students must sign up for required discussion section (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 2280 Medical Anthropology [Douglass]
TuTh 11:00AM - 12:15PM | Medical Anthropology is a growing and important new subfield within general anthropology. Medical Anthropology compares different cultures' ideas about illness and curing. Although disease is a concept referring to a pathological condition of the body in which functioning is disturbed, illness is a cultural concept: a condition marked by deviation from what is considered a normal, healthy state. Treatment of illness in Western industrial societies focuses on curing specific diseased organs or controlling a specific virus. In many so-called "traditional" societies greater emphasis is placed on the social and psychological dimensions of illness. In this course we will learn that different cultures, even in the United States have different ways to talk about illness, and that the American medical community is at times as "culture bound" as anywhere. "Science" does not stand outside culture. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 2340 Anthropology of Birth and Death [Khare]
Tu 15:30PM - 18:00PM | Anthropological transnational discussions of changing birth, modern family-food-health, and dying and death related issues under globalization. Pursuing comparative uses of the ethnographic, bio-cultural and medical anthropological approaches, the course will focus on (a) anthropological methods in the studies of human reproduction, surrogacy, child birth and child-rearing issues; (b) changing community life under globalization; (c) modern food ways and the related health issues; (d) gender differences and inequalities; and (e) dying, death, and the quality of life—after life—issues. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 2360 Don Juan and Castaneda [Wagner]
TuTh 9:30AM - 10:45PM | The six books of Carlos Castaneda represent what is perhaps an anthropological ideal--a world in which the native's concepts of power, sorcery, and transformation are "real" rather than the social systems, adaptations, and symbolic processes generally used to explain them. They are not ethnography; in his latest preface Castaneda prefers to treat them as "autobiography." Yet they can be used very effectively to illustrate a wide range of concepts in anthropology and traditional religions, which is what this course is all about. It will not teach you to fly--it may teach you to write--but it will hopefully help you to understand how anthropologists think. The course will be given in an open seminar format, with discussion encouraged. Grades will be based on 3 papers. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 2365 Art and Anthropology [Douglass]
TuTh 15:30PM - 16:45AM | The course will emphasize art in small-scale (contemporary) societies (sometimes called ethnic art or “primitive art”). It will include a survey of aesthetic productions of major areas throughout the world (Australia, Africa, Oceania, Native America, Meso-America). We will also read about and discuss such issues as art (and architecture) and cultural identity, tourist arts, anonymity, authenticity, the question of universal aesthetic cannons, exhibiting cultures, the difference between the bellas artes and arte popular, and the impact of globalization on these arts. The class will visit the Kluge-Ruhe Aboriginal Art Collection, the Inuit Study Gallery, and the Object Study Gallery at the UVA Art Museum. (The student should also try and travel to Washington D.C. to visit the National Museum of the American Indian and the National Museum of African Art [extra credit possible]. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 2400 Language and Culture [Perkowski]
MoWe 12:00PM - 12:50PM | A survey of topics having to do with the relationship between language, culture, and society. We will consider both how language is described and analyzed by linguists and how evidence from language can shed light on a variety of social, cultural, and cognitive phenomena. Topics include: nature of language, origins of language, how languages change, writing systems, use of linguistic evidence to make inferences about prehistory, the effects of linguistic categories on thought and behavior, regional and social variation in language, and cultural rules for communication. Course includes a plus obligatory discussion section. Satisfies the College Non-Western perspectives requirement. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 2430 Language of the World [Dobrin]
MoWe 11:00AM - 11:50AM | This course introduces students to the diversity of human language and the principles of linguistic classification. How many languages are spoken in the world, and how are they related? What features do all languages share, and in what ways may they differ? In surveying the world's languages, we will focus on the structure and social situation of a set of representative languages for each geographic region covered. We will also discuss the global trend of shift from the use of minority languages to large languages of wider communication, and what this means for the future of human diversity. Course work includes problem sets, essays, and a final paper on the linguistic features and social situation of a minor language. Prerequisites: one year of a foreign language or permission of instructor. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 2589 Ancient Maya, Aztec and Mitec, and Zapotec; Peoples of Mesoamerica [Holeman]
TuTh 9:00AM - 9:50AM | The culture area known as Mesoamerica includes a great diversity of cultures and peoples. In this course we will take an in-depth look at the many varied cultures of this area through time, what distinguished different cultures, and what they had in common. From the transition to agriculture and the first villages to the vast urban landscapes of the Classic and Postclassic eras, we will explore what makes this region Mesoamerican and the diversity therein. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 2590-01 White Privilege and Racial Inequity [Holeman]
MoWe 9:00AM - 9:50AM | The culture area known as Mesoamerica includes a great diversity of cultures and peoples. In this course we will take an in-depth look at the many varied cultures of this area through time, what distinguished different cultures, and what they had in common. From the transition to agriculture and the first villages to the vast urban landscapes of the Classic and Postclassic eras, we will explore what makes this region Mesoamerican and the diversity therein. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 2590-01 White Privilege and Racial Inequity [Graan]
MoWeFr 15:00PM - 15:50PM | This course examines the myriad and often contradictory ways in which white privilege is secured and obscured in the contemporary United States in order to examine larger dynamics of identity formation and the structuring of inequality. Building upon a recent surge in critical studies on whiteness, we will investigate how “white” identities are constructed and contested in post-Civil Rights America and how practices and institutions of whiteness bear upon raced and classed forms of exclusion and discrimination. Throughout we will aim to develop critical perspectives and reflexive bearings on how whiteness and white privilege impact the social worlds that we inhabit. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 2590-02 Anthropology of Business [Lopez]
TuTh 9:30AM - 10:20AM | This course is an ethnographic exploration of the business world and the role it plays in Western culture. We will look at some of the most interesting cases of applied anthropology in corporations, and how ethnographic research can help us to better understand the social aspects of marketing, industrial design, finances, and customer service, among others. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 3010 Theory & History Anthropology [Bashkow]
TuTh 11:00AM - 12:15PM | This course is designed for students majoring in anthropology: it presents a broad historical outline of major approaches and debates in the field, and fosters skills in critically reading and discussing social and cultural theory. By reading sample works will learn about the two great streams of western social theory that flow from the Enlightenment, and we will study the unfolding of major approaches and debates in the field. We will be concerned to understand how western social theories have reflected peculiarities of European and American culture, and to see the importance of cultural self-understanding in the anthropological enterprise. The course stresses close reading and analysis of primary texts; it is reading and writing intensive. The discussion session is obligatory. This is a required course for anthropology majors. Students from other majors may join by instructor persmission. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 3129 Marriage, Mortality, Fertility [Shepherd]
TuTh 12:30PM - 13:45PM | This course will explore the ways that culturally formed systems of values and family organization affect population processes in a variety of cultures. Topics to be discussed will include (1) marriage strategies and alternatives, the problem of unbalanced sex ratios at marriageable age, systems of polygamy and polyandry, divorce, widowhood and remarriage; (2) fertility decision making, premodern methods of birth control and spacing, infanticide; (3) disease history, the impact of epidemics and famine, the differential impact of mortality by gender, age, and class, the impact of improved nutrition and modern medicine; (4) migration, regional systems, and variation through time and space in the structure of populations. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 3170 Anthropology of Media [Graan]
MoWeFr 12:00PM - 12:50PM | The globe over, mass media are central to contemporary social and cultural worlds. On a basic level, mass media and mass media technologies affect how people relate to one another, not only interpersonally, but also as members of communities and collectivities that range from the village to the nation and beyond. At the same time, cross-cultural analysis demonstrates that the uses to which mass media are put vary widely across social contexts. This course elaborates a conceptual framework through which to explore how mass media shape—and are shaped by—cultural and social processes. Throughout, we will examine anthropological writings on media in context in order to consider ethnographic and theoretical perspectives on the practices, institutions, and ideologies that constitute the backdrop for media production, circulation, and reception. Several questions will guide the readings: how can media and media technologies usefully be considered as ethnographic objects? How do social and political meanings of media texts emerge and transform across sites of production and interpretation? How do media processes illuminate contemporary forms of cultural identity and belonging? Case studies will cover both traditional mass media (e.g., film, print, television and radio) as well as more recent media forms (e.g., social media, brands and text messaging). (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 3490 Language and Thought [Danziger]
WeFr 9:00AM - 9:50AM | There is almost always more than one way to think about any problem. But could speaking a particular language make some strategies and solutions seem more natural than others to individuals? Can we learn about alternative ways of approaching the external world by studying other languages? The classic proposal of linguistic relativity as enunciated by Benjamin Lee Whorf is examined in the light of recent cross-cultural psycholinguistic research. This class fulfills the Linguistics requirement for Anthropology and for Cognitive Science majors. It fulfills the Theory requirement for Linguistics majors. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 3550 Ethnography [Metcalf]
MoWe 17:00PM - 18:15PM | Ethnographies are the characteristic mode of presenting the result of research in social and cultural anthropology. They constitute a literary genre, and they provide the basis of whatever truth claims we make. Yet they vary enormously in style, accuracy, insight, credibility, and agenda. Consequently, it is crucial that we read them critically, appreciating both their strengths and weaknesses. This course is designed to promote such critical readings. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 3589 Archaeological Monographs [Laviolette]
TuTh 12:00PM - 13:45PM | This course is designed to engage students in reading and discussion of excellent and approachable book-length studies of archaeological topics ranging from human origins to historical archaeology of the modern period. It is intended for students who have taken at least one other archaeology course and who are interested in exploring great case studies in a seminar format. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 3590 Taiwan: History, Society, and Religion [Shepherd]
We 13:00PM - 15:30PM | Prerequisite: Previous course in Anthropology/Sociology or China studies (political science, history, literature). This course will introduce recent work in ethnography, history and religious studies dealing with changes in Taiwanese society and culture (including aboriginal cultures), and the construction thereof by historians and politicians. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 3600 Sex Gender and Culture [Starr]
MoWeFr 11:00AM - 11:50AM | This course examines how ideas about sex, gender, and sexuality are constructed and experienced differently cross-culturally and how these ideas are then theorized within cultural anthropology. Specifically, we will examine the following issues: (1) what it means to suggest that something is ‘culturally constructed’ as opposed to ‘biological’ and how this has influenced anthropologists in their studies of sex and gender; (2) the relationship between categories and power relationships and how this relates to ideas about social change; and (3) intersectionality, or looking at how gender, sexuality, ethnicity, race, and religion intersect to influence a person’s experience and understanding of the world. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 3885 Archaeology of Europe [Laviolette]
TuTh 9:30AM - 10:45AM | This lecture course covers a selection of topics in the archaeology of Europe that cross-cut time periods, regions, and major transformations including: the peopling of Europe and Neanderthal debate; interpretation of cave art and other early modern cultural achievements; emergence of village life and food production; megalithic monuments and the motivations and technologies for building them; the use of metals and their impact on society; emergence of social classes, economic and political networks, palace societies, and urban centers of the Bronze Age; the Greek and Roman impact on western Europe and the societies of Barbarian Europe; the Iron Age; and the Vikings and their contemporaries. Emphasis will be on cultural and social transformations and the ways archaeologists piece them together based on the archaeological record. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 3890 Archaeology of the American Southwest [Plog]
MoWe 11:00AM - 11:50AM | The northern section of the American Southwest offers one of the best prehistoric contexts for examining the evolution of ritual, social organization, economics, technology, and trade from the prehistoric to the historic period. Readings and discussion focus on both archaeological and ethnographic studies of the desert (Hohokam), mountain (Mogollon), and plateau (Ancestral Pueblo) cultures. We will consider the initial colonization of the region by Paleo-indian groups at the end of the Pleistocene up to the Spanish entry into the region in the mid-16th century. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 4559 Human Impact of the Environment [Most]
Th 13:00PM - 15:30PM | Using methods and theories from environmental sciences and archaeology, this class will examine the impact of humans on the environment during various time periods in prehistory and history. We will examine the impact of plant and animal domestication, the introduction of non-indigenous species, climate change, water rights, and monoculture. Examples of environmental collapse and ecocide will be closely examined. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 4591-01 Social Inequalitites Amid Globalizations [Khare]
Th 15:30PM - 18:00PM | Anthropological discussions of complex social inequalities under unequal forces, processes and consequences of globalization. Focusing on diverse socio-economic, religious, cultural, and political factors in such differently globalizing major world regions or countries as India and America, this course, with appropriate topical workshops, will explore (a) the class-race-caste-ethnic inequalities in the US and India; (b) the changing middle class and its problems; (c) coping with the gender, age, food and health related differences; and (d) major religious ideological issues and their representational cultural politics. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 4591-02 Native Ameriecan Prehistory [Plog]
TuTh 11:00AM - 12:15PM | A comparative study of three areas of North America--the Cahokia region of the Midwest, the Powhatan area of the Mid-Atlantic, and the Chaco region of the American Southwest--where complex polities evolved and significant social differentiation evolved. We will examine general theories regarding such patterns of culture change and then will consider case studies from each of the three areas. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 5210 Reconfiguring Kinship Studies [McKinnon]
We 15:30PM - 18:00PM | This course is the sequel to ANTH 5200 (The History of Kinship Studies). It focuses on two aspects of what has come to be called the “new kinship” studies. First, in response to the critique of assumptions concerning the universal biological basis of kinship, the course will consider not only forms of kinship that stress “doing” over “being,” but also the diverse (non-bio-genetic) ways in which kinship relations are materialized and “naturalized.” Here we will consider processes relating to choice, work, residence, exchange, worship (and other spiritual activities), and memory, as well as the material logics of food, land, trees, houses, valuables, and documents, etc. Second, in response to the critique of the place of kinship in narratives of modernity (where it is assumed either to be prior or subordinate to state and market formations), we will investigate the role of kinship and marriage in contemporary nation-states, corporations, and structures and flows of the global cultural and political economy. In all of this, we will also attend to the gendered and racialized politics of hierarchy and equality in both the local and global arenas. This course is open to graduate students and upper-level undergraduates (who have taken at least one other lower-level kinship course). Each student will research a topic related to the themes of the course and write a 20-page paper. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 5360 World Mental Health [Merkel]
We 18:30PM - 21:00PM | The purpose of this class is to bring together social science and medically oriented students to try and learn from and with each other about the role of culture in mental illness. There is an increasing realization that mental health issues are among the most frequent public health issues facing the world today. Yet it is also becoming clear that present day health care system, including psychiatry, is not prepared to meet this need. Many question the appropriateness and effectiveness of western based mental health care in non-western societies. On the other hand, some of the largest barriers to adequate mental health care are cultural. Both social science, especially anthropology, and biomedical science, including psychiatry, have valuable perspectives on these issues and both are needed, if the world is to improve the quality of life for those with mental illness. However, this is a very complicated area and historically anthropologic and psychiatric perspectives have not always been compatible. It is therefore hoped that this course may contribute to the increasing dialogue that is occurring in this area. This course will examine mental health issues from the perspectives of both biomedicine and anthropology, emphasizing local traditions of illness and healing as well as evidence from epidemiology and neurobiology. Included topics will be psychosis, depression, PTSD, Culture Bound Syndromes, and suicide. Issues of racism, social inequality and structural violence in relation to mental health will be explored. We will also examine the role of pharmaceutical companies in the spread of western based mental health care, as well as examine culturally sensitive treatment efforts, combining western biomedical treatments with traditional methods. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 5395 Mythodology [Wagner]
TuTh 12:30PM - 13:45PM | This course offers experience in using and understanding a very simple format for the analysis of a myth or story (any myth or story), called obviation. Following an introductory explanation, students will each select one or more myths or stories, and present and explain its obviation in class. Grading will be based on the student's expertise in doing so. The course grade is based on a final paper plus class participation. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 5410 Phonology [Dobrin]
TuTh 12:30PM - 13:45PM | Phonology is concerned with the way speech sounds are organized as systems. Which sounds occur in a given language? What are the rules for their combination? How are they realized in different positions of a word or phrase? In order to answer these kinds of questions, we look not only at the patterning of segments, but also at the way that patterning is explained in terms of more basic properties, features. We look at higher level prosodic structures like syllables that group sounds into larger units. We also study aspects of the speech signal that are in principle independent of the segment, like stress, tone, and rhythm. In this course students gain experience analyzing phonological systems in a theoretically informed way. They learn to appreciate what kinds of problems the field of phonology aims to account for, to argue for solutions to such problems, and to understand the significance of their analyses in terms of the broader concerns of phonological theory. Coursework involves reading, class discussion, and solving homework problems. Prerequisite: LNGS 3250 or permission of instructor. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 5590-01 Neoliberalism [Alexy]
Th 15:30PM - 18:00PM | This course offers an introduction to a newly omnipresent term in anthropology and the social sciences - neoliberalism. Referring to political, economic, and social structures, neoliberalism describes a preference for private, individual, or non-governmental responsibilities. Far from taking the term's new centrality for granted, this course investigates the rise of neoliberalsm, both politically and in academic contexts. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 5590-02 Medical Anthropology: Theoretical and Methodological Frameworks [Fraser]
Th 19:00PM - 21:30PM | This course will provide an overview of theoretical frameworks and methods in medical anthropology situated so that students understand the key assumptions, kinds of questions asked and data used within each framework, something of their histories and exemplars from research studies. Students will become informed and critical readers and will initiate a small research project of their own. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 5590-03 Study of Spirituality [Turner]
We 17:00PM - 19:30PM | The seminar will explore the cross-cultural commonalities of spirituality, and the variations in spiritual practice, along with the recent changes in the point of view of researchers who now support the all-inclusiveness of what they term perspectivism. We will use primary sources from active seers and spiritual leaders from the widest human groups. We will attempt radical empathy in understanding the relevant history and context of the spiritual activity, which includes the effect of the presence of spirits. The students’ own discussion will be foremost. The work of anthropologists who have been involved in crossing such boundaries will be available, those by Jean-Guy Goulet, George Mentore, Jo Wreford, Joan Koss-Chioino,Ter Ellingson, Duncan Earle, and others. These had unwittingly taken on the role of shamans themselves. Class members will conduct local field research to engage in spirituality in milieus suggested in the class. We will respectfully enact rituals. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 5620 The Middle East in Ethnographic [Lefkowitz]
TuTh 14:00PM - 16:30PM | This course provides an introduction to the anthropological literature on the Middle East and North Africa and addresses the question ‘How can anthropology help us understand the recent dramatic transformations (called the “Arab Spring”) in the region. Course readings will be dominated by recent anthropological monographs on many of the countries undergoing revolutionary movements. These will be supplemented with some older “classics” and some landmark critical scholarship that will provide historical and critical perspective. These readings will guide us in a discussion of how anthropological findings, methods, and theories can inform our understanding of the dramatic socio-cultural, linguistic, and political changes as they unfold. This course requires significant prior background in either Middle Eastern Studies or Cultural Anthropology. (3.0 Units)
Course Number Index
Courses that meet Major Area Requirements:
Prin. of Social AnalysisEthnographyArchaeologyLinguistics
2280, 2340, 2360, 2365, 2590-01, 2590-02, 3010, 3129, 3170, 3590, 5210, 5360, 5395, 5590-01, 5590-02, 5590-03
2153, 3550, 3590
2589, 3885, 3890, 4559
2400, 2430, 3490, 5410, 5620
Major Requirements
3010
Beyond the West
(for the major: note that some of these courses do not meet the College's Nonwestern requirement)
1010, 2153, 3550,3590, 3600
Senior Seminars
4591-01, 4591-02
Graduate Courses
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ANTH 5210 Reconfiguring Kinship Studies [McKinnon]
We 15:30PM - 18:00PM | This course is the sequel to ANTH 5200 (The History of Kinship Studies). It focuses on two aspects of what has come to be called the “new kinship” studies. First, in response to the critique of assumptions concerning the universal biological basis of kinship, the course will consider not only forms of kinship that stress “doing” over “being,” but also the diverse (non-bio-genetic) ways in which kinship relations are materialized and “naturalized.” Here we will consider processes relating to choice, work, residence, exchange, worship (and other spiritual activities), and memory, as well as the material logics of food, land, trees, houses, valuables, and documents, etc. Second, in response to the critique of the place of kinship in narratives of modernity (where it is assumed either to be prior or subordinate to state and market formations), we will investigate the role of kinship and marriage in contemporary nation-states, corporations, and structures and flows of the global cultural and political economy. In all of this, we will also attend to the gendered and racialized politics of hierarchy and equality in both the local and global arenas. This course is open to graduate students and upper-level undergraduates (who have taken at least one other lower-level kinship course). Each student will research a topic related to the themes of the course and write a 20-page paper. (3.0 Units)
Expand content
ANTH 5360 World Mental Health [Merkel]
We 18:30PM - 21:00PM | The purpose of this class is to bring together social science and medically oriented students to try and learn from and with each other about the role of culture in mental illness. There is an increasing realization that mental health issues are among the most frequent public health issues facing the world today. Yet it is also becoming clear that present day health care system, including psychiatry, is not prepared to meet this need. Many question the appropriateness and effectiveness of western based mental health care in non-western societies. On the other hand, some of the largest barriers to adequate mental health care are cultural. Both social science, especially anthropology, and biomedical science, including psychiatry, have valuable perspectives on these issues and both are needed, if the world is to improve the quality of life for those with mental illness. However, this is a very complicated area and historically anthropologic and psychiatric perspectives have not always been compatible. It is therefore hoped that this course may contribute to the increasing dialogue that is occurring in this area. This course will examine mental health issues from the perspectives of both biomedicine and anthropology, emphasizing local traditions of illness and healing as well as evidence from epidemiology and neurobiology. Included topics will be psychosis, depression, PTSD, Culture Bound Syndromes, and suicide. Issues of racism, social inequality and structural violence in relation to mental health will be explored. We will also examine the role of pharmaceutical companies in the spread of western based mental health care, as well as examine culturally sensitive treatment efforts, combining western biomedical treatments with traditional methods. (3.0 Units)
Expand content
ANTH 5395 Mythodology [Wagner]
TuTh 12:30PM - 13:45PM | This course offers experience in using and understanding a very simple format for the analysis of a myth or story (any myth or story), called obviation. Following an introductory explanation, students will each select one or more myths or stories, and present and explain its obviation in class. Grading will be based on the student's expertise in doing so. The course grade is based on a final paper plus class participation. (3.0 Units)
Expand content
ANTH 5410 Phonology [Dobrin]
TuTh 12:30PM - 13:45PM | Phonology is concerned with the way speech sounds are organized as systems. Which sounds occur in a given language? What are the rules for their combination? How are they realized in different positions of a word or phrase? In order to answer these kinds of questions, we look not only at the patterning of segments, but also at the way that patterning is explained in terms of more basic properties, features. We look at higher level prosodic structures like syllables that group sounds into larger units. We also study aspects of the speech signal that are in principle independent of the segment, like stress, tone, and rhythm. In this course students gain experience analyzing phonological systems in a theoretically informed way. They learn to appreciate what kinds of problems the field of phonology aims to account for, to argue for solutions to such problems, and to understand the significance of their analyses in terms of the broader concerns of phonological theory. Coursework involves reading, class discussion, and solving homework problems. Prerequisite: LNGS 3250 or permission of instructor. (3.0 Units)
Expand content
ANTH 5590-01 Neoliberalism [Alexy]
Th 15:30PM - 18:00PM | This course offers an introduction to a newly omnipresent term in anthropology and the social sciences - neoliberalism. Referring to political, economic, and social structures, neoliberalism describes a preference for private, individual, or non-governmental responsibilities. Far from taking the term's new centrality for granted, this course investigates the rise of neoliberalsm, both politically and in academic contexts. (3.0 Units)
Expand content
ANTH 5590-02 Medical Anthropology: Theoretical and Methodological Frameworks [Fraser]
Th 19:00PM - 21:30PM | This course will provide an overview of theoretical frameworks and methods in medical anthropology situated so that students understand the key assumptions, kinds of questions asked and data used within each framework, something of their histories and exemplars from research studies. Students will become informed and critical readers and will initiate a small research project of their own. (3.0 Units)
Expand content
ANTH 5590-03 Study of Spirituality [Turner]
We 17:00PM - 19:30PM | The seminar will explore the cross-cultural commonalities of spirituality, and the variations in spiritual practice, along with the recent changes in the point of view of researchers who now support the all-inclusiveness of what they term perspectivism. We will use primary sources from active seers and spiritual leaders from the widest human groups. We will attempt radical empathy in understanding the relevant history and context of the spiritual activity, which includes the effect of the presence of spirits. The students’ own discussion will be foremost. The work of anthropologists who have been involved in crossing such boundaries will be available, those by Jean-Guy Goulet, George Mentore, Jo Wreford, Joan Koss-Chioino,Ter Ellingson, Duncan Earle, and others. These had unwittingly taken on the role of shamans themselves. Class members will conduct local field research to engage in spirituality in milieus suggested in the class. We will respectfully enact rituals. (3.0 Units)
Expand content
ANTH 5620 The Middle East in Ethnographic [Lefkowitz]
TuTh 14:00PM - 16:30PM | This course provides an introduction to the anthropological literature on the Middle East and North Africa and addresses the question ‘How can anthropology help us understand the recent dramatic transformations (called the “Arab Spring”) in the region. Course readings will be dominated by recent anthropological monographs on many of the countries undergoing revolutionary movements. These will be supplemented with some older “classics” and some landmark critical scholarship that will provide historical and critical perspective. These readings will guide us in a discussion of how anthropological findings, methods, and theories can inform our understanding of the dramatic socio-cultural, linguistic, and political changes as they unfold. This course requires significant prior background in either Middle Eastern Studies or Cultural Anthropology. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 7020 History of Anthropology Theory II [Metcalf]
MoWe 14:00PM - 15:15PM | This course continues the program of ANTH 7010, bringing the review of anthropological theory from the mid-twentieth century to the present. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 7129 Marriage, Mortality, Fertility [Shepherd]
TuTh 12:00PM - 13:45PM | This course will explore the ways that culturally formed systems of values and family organization affect population processes in a variety of cultures. Topics to be discussed will include (1) marriage strategies and alternatives, the problem of unbalanced sex ratios at marriageable age, systems of polygamy and polyandry, divorce, widowhood and remarriage; (2) fertility decision making, premodern methods of birth control and spacing, infanticide; (3) disease history, the impact of epidemics and famine, the differential impact of mortality by gender, age, and class, the impact of improved nutrition and modern medicine; (4) migration, regional systems, and variation through time and space in the structure of populations. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 7400 Linguistic Anthropology [Lefkowitz]
Th 14:00PM - 16:30PM | This is an advanced introduction to linguistic anthropology, a sub-field of anthropology that looks at language as a socio-cultural phenomenon and at society and culture as discursive phenomena. Linguistic anthropologists are interested both in how the study of language can help address issues of social structure and cultural change, and in how the study of social context can inform the description of linguistic systems. This course mirrors the field’s duality in that the readings, lectures, and practical exercises combine linguistic description and analysis with ethnographic interpretation. One goal of the course is to provide anthropology students with the ability to interpret language use as a social practice wherever they conduct research. No prior coursework in linguistics is expected, but the course is aimed at graduate students who will use what they learn in their own anthropologically-oriented research. Fulfills the Linguistics requirement for the Anthropology graduate program and counts toward the Theory requirement for the M.A. in Linguistics. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 7550 Ethnographic Data Analysis and Writing [Danziger]
Mo 15:30PM - 18:00PM | A seminar and writing workshop exploring approaches to literature review, methods of qualitative data analysis, styles of ethnographic description, and problems of research design. Students apply these techniques to a research-oriented professional writing project of their own. Instructor permission. (3.0 Units)
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ANTH 7589 Archaeology and Civic Engagement [Hantman]
Th 15:30PM - 18:00PM | Graduate seminar investigating the role of archaeological research in community heritage and representation; indigenous and collaborative archaeology; multivocality and community politics. Case studies will structure the course. (3.0 Units)