11 - 20 of 204 results for: ANTHRO

The Stanford Medical Humanities Reading Seminar is a student-initiated class, bringing together students of various disciplines to discuss one book per quarter. Students will engage in a reading schedule throughout the quarter and meet once per week to discuss chapters of the book Everything is Tuberculosis by John Green (Spring 2026). This is a great opportunity to explore the Medical Humanities outside the classroom, engage with peers in diverse fields, and explore the many perspectives and stories surrounding medicine, illness, and healing.

Policy makers often ask whether Muslims can be integrated into Europe. The question itself presumes, often without justification, that Islam as such is foreign to Europe. This course seeks to challenge this presumption. What if the very idea of Europe was already shaped by the history of Muslim societies? How will we need to revise our basic assumptions about western civilization, especially with respect to its racial and religious foundations? We will explore these questions from a range of sites, from southern Spain, which witnessed eight centuries of Muslim rule, to the efforts of German converts to Islam who are rethinking their understandings of European enlightenment, and finally to those in France who claim belonging both as Europeans and as devout Muslims. Course materials will include readings in Anthropology, as well as several film screenings.

This course uses the diverse parks and reserves of Patagonia as a laboratory for understanding the pros and cons of protected area conservation as they impact flora, fauna, and local people. We will explore national parks and protected areas (PAs) in both Argentina and Chile, as well as the flourishing establishment of private parks and reserves in the region. We will use a series of case studies to ask: (1) What approach to protected area (PA) conservation has been taken in each case? Who are/were the key proponents and what are/were their main objectives? Was climate change taken into account and if so, how? (2) What have been the main costs and benefits of the PA, and who has received them? Where benefits are not commensurate to costs what is being done to address the imbalance? And (3) Are there alternatives or variations-on-the-theme of protected area conservation that would be more beneficial for wildlife and local people? How could the interests of parks and people be made more compatible in each case? Throughout the course we will look for ways to achieve conservation in a manner that is socially just, biologically successful, and beneficial to local livelihoods. The class will begin on the Stanford campus on August 30, same as other Sophomore College courses. But on Sept. 7 we depart on an intensive thirteen-day expedition (at no extra cost) to Argentina and Chile to observe firsthand many of the conservation issues and successes discussed in class. For this portion of the class, undergraduates will be joined by a group of Stanford alumni and friends in a format called a Stanford "Field Seminar," whose travel is organized by the professionals in Stanford Alumni Association Travel-Study Program. Because class time on campus is thus limited to one week before travel, students will be required to complete all course readings over the summer. Both on campus and in South America, the course emphasizes student contributions and presentations. Students will be asked to lead discussions and carry out literature research on the conservation challenges of particular Patagonian protected areas and species. The final assignment for the seminar is to complete a paper at least eight pages long on their findings and to present a summary of that paper in a joint seminar of undergrads and alumni as we travel in Patagonia. The class is also an experiment in intergenerational learning. For a few days on campus, and for all travels, we will be joined by 20+ Stanford alumni and friends who will share in our educational activities. For many alums, this class will be their first experience back in the Quad classrooms since their days as students, and much has changed at Stanford in the meantime. The class requires an attitude of mutual respect and a willingness to learn from each other on the part of each person in both groups, students and alumni. We will ask you to demonstrate that you respect each other's perspectives by listening carefully and sharing what you are learning from each other; and by communicating about and striving to work through inter-personal challenges that may arise as a diverse, inter-generational group lives, learns, and travels together. Signing up for this class means you accept this requirement. Important Logistics: Students will arrive on campus and will be housed at Stanford until we leave for Patagonia. The travel components of the course are organized and managed by the Travel/Study Program of the Stanford Alumni Association. The costs of the trip (except incidentals) are included, thanks to the support of the Stanford Field Seminar Fund and generous donors. Students will return to campus on Sunday, September 20, the day before the fall term begins. Application Alert! This course uses interviews as part of the application process - keep a close eye on your email after you submit your application.

Ethnicity is one of the most compelling and most modern ways in which people - in the midst of considerable global and local uncertainty - all across the world imagine and narrate themselves. This seminar will take an anthropological look at both the modernity and the compulsions of ethnic allegiance, and, why struggles over ethnic identity are so frequently violent. Our questions will be both historical; how, why and when did people come to think of themselves as possessing different ethnic identities - and contemporary; how are these identities lived, understood, narrated, and transformed and what is the consequence of such ethnicisation. We follow this through anthropological perspectives which ask persistently how people themselves locally narrate and act upon their experiences and histories. Through this we will approach some of the really big and yet everyday questions that many of us around the world face: how do we relate to ourselves and to those we define as others; and how do we live through and after profound violence? The seminar will take these larger questions through a global perspective focusing on cases from Rwanda and Burundi, India, Sri Lanka, Northern Ireland, Guatemala, and the countries of Former Yugoslavia among others. These cases cover a broad canvas of issues from questions of historicity, racial purity, cultural holism, and relations to the state, to contests over religious community, indigeneity, minority identities, globalization, gender, and generation.

Is the middle class shrinking? How do people who live at the extremes of American society- the super rich, the working poor and those who live on the margins, imagine and experience "the good life"? How do we understand phenomena such as gang cultures, addiction and the realignment of white consciousness? This class uses the methods and modes of ethnographic study in an examination of American culture. Ethnographic materials range from an examination of the new American wealth boom of the last 20 years (Richistan by Robert Frank) to the extreme and deadlyworld of the invisible underclass of homeless addicts on the streets of San Francisco (Righteous Dopefiend by Phillipe Bourgois and Jeff Schonberg). The experiences of Hispanic immigrants and the struggle to escape gang life in Los Angeles are highlighted in the story of Homeboy Industries a job creation program initiated by a priest working in LA's most deadly neighborhoods (G-Dog and the Homeboys by Celeste Fremon). Finally in Searching for Whitopia: an improbable journeyinto the heart of White America, Rich Benjamin explores the creation on ethnic enclaves (whitopias) as fear over immigration and the shrinking white majority redefine race consciousnessin the 21st century. Each of these narratives provides a window into the various ways in which Americans approach the subjects of wealth and the good life, poverty and the underclass, and theconstruction of class, race, and gender in American society. Students will not be required to have any previous knowledge, just curiosity and an open mind.

How do we talk about Palestine and Palestinian life in the midst of devastation and genocide? Through literature, poetry, visual and material culture, critical theory, and history, this team-taught course will provide context and generate discussion about Palestine's past, present, and future. Each session will be led by a professor with different expertise and disciplinary tools. These diverse perspectives offer students both a wide range of materials and an array of interpretive tools as we consider together how Palestine and Palestinians have figured and figured themselves in global imaginaries and geopolitics. The class covers history, anthropology, education, heritage, ethnic studies, poetry, literature, and film.

Designed as an invitation to explore Anthropology through the theme of placemaking, this course emphasizes the making and un-making of place. The idea of "edgelands" inspires this course design as we explore the spaces beyond economically dynamic areas. Often represented as places outside development and progress, edgelands may once have been the center of an industry. What is the relationship of contemporary cities to these zones of difference? The course readings draw inspiration from dialogues among anthropologists, geographers, environmental humanists, and others whose works detail the changing nature of places, economies, and environments.

In recent decades genes have increasingly become endowed with the cultural power to explain many aspects of human life: physical traits, diseases, behaviors, ancestral histories, and identity. In this course we will explore a deepening societal intrigue with genetic accounts of personal identity and political meaning. Students will engage with varied interdisciplinary sources that range from legal cases to scientific articles, medical ethics guidelines, films, historical works, and contemporary ethnographies (detailed anthropological analyses). We will explore several case studies where the use of DNA markers (as proof of heritage, disease risk, or legal standing) has spawned cultural movements that are biosocial in nature. We will also explore the science of sexing chromosomes and how societal racial and gender beliefs influence genetic research.

This course is specifically designed for social science and humanities students who want to learn how to use art to expand their research questions and/or develop an art practice, and for arts students who want to find ways to deeply engage social science and humanities research in their practice. The course will: 1. Introduce students to the work of artists who used their practice to deeply engage social issues (Ian Rowland, Cornelia Parker, Fred Wilson and many others). These artists will be contextualized with readings including: critical commentaries on their work; theoretical literature; and primary literature on the issues they address (in these examples, slavery, material culture, museum studies). Critical questions will include: Why did the artist select particular media for their work? How does the art provide a different perspective on, engagement with, or relationship to the issues they address? How does the meaning of the art change with or without contextualization? How does this artist draw on and expand art history and other artists' work? Are there critical issues the work raises but is underpowered to address? 2. Provide support for students to work on their own quarter-length independent projects and research based in drawing, photography, creative writing, or other art practice which may shift according to research findings in the duration of the course. Part of the syllabus will be contingent on student projects. Regular group crit/support sessions will be held in class based on clear deadlines. 3. Introduce students to various methods of working with primary and source materials for arts-based projects, such as improvisation, juxtaposition, performance, role-play, "moment work" and scenography. "Makers" workshops will be held to introduce students to arts methods and may include: wax casting, life drawing, graphic art, etc. (The instructor will apply for Maker's funding to support these workshops.) Students will complete the course with a solid introduction to at least 20 contemporary artists and an understanding of how to discuss and contextualize artwork in the context of several disciplines: art, social science theory, and art criticism. They will also have experience in building and completing their own project and learn how to justify their work, understand how different art media impact their exploration and ultimate product, and work through various challenges in the process. They will also gain experience in crit sessions, which will be directed by the profession with a question-based format, in both giving and receiving feedback. They will document their work and learn how to produce a portfolio of the project.