ANTH 360 - Problems in Cultural Analysis

Semester Offered: Fall and Spring
1 unit(s)

May be repeated for credit if topic has changed.

Topic for 2023/24a: Decolonizing Rituals. (Same as ASIA 360 ) Focusing on political rituals of the decolonization era, this course examines the power of symbols in shaping world history. While referring to classic works on ritual, the course draws its theoretical questions from scholarship on ritual and agency (with special attention to the anthropology of new rituals) and from scholarship on decolonization and the nation-state. Following a section on colonial rituals, the course considers six kinds of decolonizing rituals: anti-colonial rituals, independence and national rituals, end of empire rituals, rituals of global governance, rituals of rights struggles (for example activist  rituals and NGO rituals) and rituals of emerging world powers ( for example corporate and anti-corporate rituals and state rituals). The course thus also includes study of specific histories of colonialism and postcoloniality, particularly in East, South and Southeast Asia, the Americas, and the island Pacific. It comparatively considers transformations in the former British empire generally, and also considers new and emerging rituals of global scope. Students may address areas and decolonizing ritual histories of special interest to them through research papers and group class presentations. Martha Kaplan.

Prerequisite(s): Previous coursework in Asian Studies, Anthropology, or permission of the instructor. Interested juniors and seniors from many majors are welcome.

One 3-hour period.

Topic for 2023/24a: Anthropology of Displacement, Migration, and  Transnationalism. It has become a basic truism to say that we are living in an age of “migration crisis.” But what exactly does it mean to be displaced? How have certain forms of migration come to be labeled “illegal”? Why are some forms of migration deemed “voluntary” in contrast to others? Where do these distinctions come from and how do they matter in everyday life? This advanced seminar sets out to address such questions, among many others, by introducing students to the anthropological study of displacement, migration, and transnationalism. Through scholarly texts, film, and literature across a wide range of regional contexts, we pursue two interrelated tracks of inquiry, as students develop semester-long independent writing projects. One track is historical: we examine imperial legacies of the native-migrant divide, the postcolonial partition of nation-states, the uneven development of a globalized division of labor across the world, and how these fraught histories endure within the present. Our second line of inquiry is primarily ethnographic: it concerns the paradoxes of displacement in everyday human experiences, such as waiting in transit, making a home in exile, and the striking capacity of borders to appear invisible or real to the point of being deadly, depending on who or what crosses them, and how. Taken together, the course offers advanced students a multidisciplinary and multidimensional understanding of how human (im)mobilities are governed, contested, and experienced across the world – and how these conditions shape the possibilities and limits of transnational solidarity today. China Sajadian.

One 3-hour period.

Topic for 2023/24b: Visual Ethnography, Ethnography of the Visual. (Same as MEDS 360 ) This seminar concerns ways of knowing that are made available through the visual. In it we explore ethnographers’ use of media to represent what they come to know as well as how the visual is used in various cultures to make meaning. We examine multiple visual media including illustration, photography, film, and video produced by ethnographers as well as by communities who are often the subject of ethnographic study. Exploring visual ethnographic representation enables us to reflect on the process of ethnographic representation more generally, and to address issues of subjectivity, ethnographic authority, situated knowledge, and meaning-making embodied in these forms of communication. Exploring the visual in other cultures expands our understanding of sensory world-making and demonstrates the power of visual media in claims for self-representation and visual sovereignty. Course materials include an ethnographic graphic novel, ethnographic photographs and films, and indigenous art, films and videos. These materials are critically engaged through discussion, written critiques, and the use of various visual media themselves to produce an ethnographic representation. Colleen Cohen.

One 2-hour period plus outside screenings.

Course Format: CLS