Course Category: Anthropology

This course provides an introduction to cultural anthropology: in particular, the concept of culture and how it interpenetrates various domains of organization and activitiy - such as adaptation, subsistence, economy, politics, and kinship - in a wide variety of societies and groups. Changing theoretical approaches, fieldwork, ethnography, cross-cultural analysis and comparisons, complex society, and local-regional-global perspectives will all be addressed. This course meets the cultures or social science general education requirement, but not both.

This course pursues themes in cultural anthropology from a variety of domains to focus on how these compare and, especially, contrast in different cultures. Some of the topics to be addressed will include political systems, gender practices, religious beliefs, artistic performance and expression, and reactions to globalization. The main goals are for students to develop an appreciation of diversity among cultures and cultural groups, and understand differences in life conditions. Meets the cultures or social science general education requirement, but not both.

This course will explore the worlds of different cultures, and how they have been portrayed, primarily through the medium of ethnographic film. The films will be about different cultures and situations, by different filmmakers, and stylistically different. A wide variety of topics will be covered, including: the ways that anthropologists and filmmakers have collaborated, how cultures are represented on film, what happens when anthropology comes to television, and changes in who is represented, by whom, and how. Examples of themes that could be dealt with in the films include: hunting and gathering, migration, music, refugees, and gender issues. Meets the cultures or social Science general education requirement, but not both.

This course will focus on the variety of political understandings, processes, and systems that have existed and exist in non-state societies, and state societies at both the centers and the margins of power. Agents, structures, and institutions of power will be looked at to highlight cultural variability in the practice of politics. Meets the cultures or social science general education requirement, but not both.