printer friendly pageANTHRO 127C: Anthropology of Sport and the Body
What is sport? Fun? Big money? A tool for freedom... or control?nnThis course will use the work of anthropology and critical studies to probe what exactly sport is, and how it shapes the body. We will begin by looking at various ways in which social theorists have proposed studying sport, and then use these theoretical frameworks to examine contemporary sport, from individual practice to global spectacle. We will probe the social nature of sport- how it molds bodies, makes players, enraptures audiences. We will ask questions like: Is sport good? What do the Olympics Games aim to achieve? Should NCAA players be paid? In doing so we will examine the underlying social and political assumptions that undergird what we have come to think of as sport today.nnAs we think through how contemporary theorists of our time have theorized sport, we too will use their tools to form our own analyses of sport as a social and political powerhouse.nnWe will look also at how sport has historically been used as a technique of both control and resistance across the world. We will read several anthropologists' work on sport across a variety of cultures, particularly as it relates to nineteenth century European colonialism.nnWe will conclude the course with a sustained discussion of the Olympic Games, using the tools we have studied to think through this massive spectacle of global import.nnThis course is ideally suited for anyone interested in how sport can be examined as a form of culture and social exchange and, more broadly, how theory can be used to break open contemporary culture.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3-5
ANTHRO 137D: Political Exhumations. Killing Sites Research in Comparative Perspective (ARCHLGY 137, ARCHLGY 237, DLCL 237, REES 237)
The course discusses the politics and practices of exhumation of individual and mass graves. The problem of exhumations will be considered as a distinct socio-political phenomenon characteristic of contemporary times and related to transitional justice. The course will offer analysis of case studies of political exhumations of victims of the Dirty War in Argentina, ethnic cleansing in former Yugoslavia, the Holocaust, communist violence in Poland, the Rwandan genocide, and the Spanish Civil War. The course will make use of new interpretations of genocide studies, research of mass graves, such as environmental and forensic approaches.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3-5
Instructors:
Domanska, E. (PI)
ANTHRO 138: Medical Ethics in a Global World: Examining Race, Difference and Power in the Research Enterprise (ANTHRO 238, CSRE 138)
This course will explore historical as well as current market transformations of medical ethics in different global contexts. We will examine various aspects of the research enterprise, its knowledge-generating and life-saving goals, as well as the societal, cultural, and political influences that make medical research a site of brokering in need of oversight and emergent ethics.nThis seminar will provide students with tools to explore and critically assess the various technical, social, and ethical positions of researchers, as well as the role of the state, the media, and certain publics in shaping scientific research agendas. We will also examine how structural violence, poverty, global standing, and issues of citizenship also influence issues of consent and just science and medicine.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 5
| UG Reqs: WAY-ER, WAY-EDP
ANTHRO 157: Japanese Popular Culture (ANTHRO 257)
This seminar focuses on the intersection between politics and popular culture in contemporary Japan. It will survey a range of social and political implications of practices of popular culture. Topics include J-pop, manga, anime, and other popular visual cultures, as well as social media. Students will be introduced to theories of popular culture in general, and a variety of contemporary anthropological studies on Japanese popular culture in particular. Prior knowledge of cultural anthropology is required.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
Instructors:
Inoue, M. (PI)
ANTHRO 158: The Anthropology of Social Class (ANTHRO 258)
Course introduces social theory concepts and paradigms for the understanding of class. It then extends and revises those concepts and paradigms by considering anthropological approaches in different cultural and historical settings that consider the entanglements of class with other social hierarchies, especially race, caste, and ideas of "civilization" and "development".
Terms: Spr
| Units: 5
Instructors:
Ferguson, J. (PI)
ANTHRO 166A: Semiotics for Ethnography (ANTHRO 266A)
This workshop-style seminar introduces students to core theories and concepts in linguistic and semiotic anthropology. Examining current theoretical innovations in this field of study, the course explores the multivalent relationships between language and political authority, discourse and technology, and speech and material infrastructures. Emphasis is placed on how semiotic approaches provide tools for ethnographic analysis, and students will learn how to use semiotic concepts for their own research projects.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
Instructors:
Inoue, M. (PI)
;
Tambar, K. (PI)
ANTHRO 184A: Vital Curse: Oil As Culture
Rapidly-evolving technology draws increasing amounts of petroleum from the ground, while wars and friendly agreements move it around the globe, all to occasionally-disastrous result. Pronounced environmental concerns such as fracking, pipelines, plastics, climate change are nearly synonymous with the petroleum industry. And yet, oil is integral to meeting basic human needs like food and water, and integral to meeting modern desires for mobility, energy, and consumer-products on demand. This class approaches the modern world¿s increasingly-reluctant reliance on oil¿from extraction to consumption with problems included¿as a complex cultural practice to be analyzed using anthropology, geography, and environmental studies.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3
Instructors:
Silva, N. (PI)
ANTHRO 186: Culture and Madness: Anthropological and Psychiatric Approaches to Mental Illness (ANTHRO 286, HUMBIO 146, PSYC 286)
Unusual mental phenomena have existed throughout history and across cultures. Taught by an anthropologist and psychiatrist, this course explores how different societies construct the notions of "madness": What are the boundaries between "normal" and "abnormal", reason and unreason, mind and body, diversity and disease? nnOptional: The course will be taught in conjunction with an optional two-unit discussion section.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 3-5
| UG Reqs: WAY-SI, WAY-EDP
ANTHRO 199: Senior and Master's Paper Writing Workshop (ANTHRO 299)
Techniques of interpreting data, organizing bibliographic materials, writing, editing and revising. Preparation of papers for conferences and publications in anthropology. Seniors register for 199; master's students register for 299.
Terms: Win, Spr
| Units: 1-2
| Repeatable
for credit
Instructors:
Can, S. (PI)
ANTHRO 238: Medical Ethics in a Global World: Examining Race, Difference and Power in the Research Enterprise (ANTHRO 138, CSRE 138)
This course will explore historical as well as current market transformations of medical ethics in different global contexts. We will examine various aspects of the research enterprise, its knowledge-generating and life-saving goals, as well as the societal, cultural, and political influences that make medical research a site of brokering in need of oversight and emergent ethics.nThis seminar will provide students with tools to explore and critically assess the various technical, social, and ethical positions of researchers, as well as the role of the state, the media, and certain publics in shaping scientific research agendas. We will also examine how structural violence, poverty, global standing, and issues of citizenship also influence issues of consent and just science and medicine.
Terms: Spr
| Units: 5
Instructors:
Fullwiley, D. (PI)
;
Groupp, E. (TA)
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