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=**Introduction to Cultural Anthropology**= STSS-1510 M, R 10-11:50 J-ROWL 2C13

Prof. Michael Fortun Sage 5112 X6598 Office Hours: M, R 12-2; also by appointment. fortum@rpi.edu

The most recent version of the syllabus can be found at http://introculanthrpi2010.wikispaces.com/


 * Course Goals and Content**

The two main goals of this course are 1) to learn about the theories, practices, and practitioners of cultural anthropology as a discipline, and 2) to learn about other peoples in other cultures, different than "our own" yet illuminating it, and in process defamiliarizing what might seem natural, normal, or universal about what we think and do.

Learning Outcomes
By the end of the course students will:
 * learn what it means to "think anthropologically."
 * learn about the concept of "culture."
 * learn about some of the most noteworthy practitioners of cultural anthropology in the 20th century, and their work.
 * learn how people have invented different ways to organize economies, create families, live with differences of belief and desire, communicate with each other, start or end conflict, and validate knowledge.
 * learn about recent trends and controversies within cultural anthropology.


 * Texts**

The following text is required and should be purchased at the RPI Bookstore:

Barbara Miller, //Cultural Anthropology in a Globalizing World// (2nd edition), Prentice Hall 2010.

Additional readings listed in the syllabus below are also required, and can be found at the links provided here or elsewhere online. I highly recommend that you buy a (paper) notebook for this course, to take notes on readings and during class (see below).


 * Course Requirements and Grading**


 * Quizzes** **(33%)**: there will be five short quizzes over the course of the semester as listed in the syllabus below. These are primarily multiple choice and questions requiring short answers, and are based entirely on the material presented in class and in the readings. If you read the assigned readings regularly and carefully, attend class, and take good notes, you should do well on the quizzes.


 * Seven film or article annotations** **(33%)**: you will write 7 "annotations," on films we see in class or articles we read, by the end of the semester. One possible template for these can be found here. More specific criteria will be discussed as the course progresses.

You may turn these in at any time, but at least three of them are due by the date indicated in the syllabus below, March 10, and all must be completed and turned in by the last day of class, May 5.


 * Class attendance and participation (33%):** informed, respectful, and enthusiastic participation are essential to being a cultural anthropologist; they are also essential to making this a successful and enjoyable course for everyone, and to a good grade for you. You should attend every class, coming to each meeting with the readings you have completed along with your notes, and you should contribute regularly to class discussions. Your final grade will be diminished if you establish a pattern of lateness, silence or non-participation, or unexcused absence.

You cannot earn an A with more than 2 unexcused absences. To get an excused absence, you must present an official university excuse or do work comparable to attendance by writing an additional reading response paper (see above section) that critically examines all readings discussed while you were absent.

Use of laptops, iPads, cell phones, etc. is not permitted during class; IF YOU HAVE AN OPEN LAPTOP DURING CLASS YOU WILL BE CONSIDERED ABSENT. For notetaking during class, use a paper notebook.

Each week, EVERYONE MUST SUBMIT ONE QUESTION BY MIDNIGHT WEDNESDAY, by email to me. I will try to address some of the questions (anonymously) in class, but won’t have the time or knowledge to answer all of them; the main point in any case is to RAISE the question. As you do the readings, you should not have a problem coming up with something that puzzles you, confuses you, or simply makes you wonder about something. It might be about a person, an argument made by an author, an unfamiliar concept or term, or whatever else the course material made you curious about. It doesn’t have to be long, and it doesn’t have to contain exact quotes (although these are always good.) BUT YOUR EMAIL MUST DO 3 THINGS: 1. Refer directly to one of the readings, videos, or lectures. Your questioning should be grounded in the material. 2. Actually frame a question, and one that does not simply ask for my opinion. 3. I would prefer it to be sent Sunday night, but it must be sent by MIDNIGHT WEDNESDAY.

These questions will not be graded, and you are NOT REQUIRED to submit one each week, but you will receive either a 0 or 1 that will count toward your class participation grade. If you do not submit a question for a particular week, if it arrives late, or if I judge it to be a non-serious effort, you receive a zero for that week; otherwise you receive a 1, toward a possible total of 14 for the semester. Sustaining a pattern of thoughtful questions can do a lot, from making up for shyness in discussion to putting you over a borderline grade.

The other way to participate and build up this portion of your grade is to write a post for the Pop Culture Watch page. You can do this occasionally or regularly, but I expect you to do it at least twice this semester. These posts should be brief, and should be based on (and provide the linked to) an entry on one of the anthropology blogs listed on the "Links" page, some other blog post of cultural interest, a newspaper or magazine article, a YouTube clip, or the like. We will discuss guidelines for this more in class, and examples will be forthcoming.


 * Academic Dishonesty Policy**

You should read the Rensselaer Handbook of Student Rights and Responsibilities so that you understand all the acts that constitute a violation of the Institute’s academic dishonesty policy. Plagiarism is the most frequent violation, sometimes because students are unfamiliar with what constitutes plagiarism. You should read the brief but thorough description found at Indiana University's plagiarism page ([|http://www.indiana.edu/~wts/wts/plagiarism.html]).

I have a policy of zero tolerance for plagiarism or any other act of academic dishonesty. If you commit any such act, you will – at minimum – receive an F for that assignment and be subject to RPI’s judicial process. Failure of the entire course is also within my rights as instructor.

(See this recent New York Times article -- http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/02/education/02cheat.html -- for a view of the "culture of plagiarism.")


 * WEEK 1** **Got Culture?**

__Jan 24__

__Jan 27__

READ: Horace Miner, "Body Ritual Among the Nacirema," American Anthropologist 58/3 (1956): https://www.msu.edu/~jdowell/miner.html or here: Joe Bageant, "Escape from the zombie food court," []

__Jan 31__ READ: Miller, Chapter 1 Wikipedia entry for Cultural Anthopology Excerpt from Raymond Williams' //Keywords//: "[|Culture]"
 * WEEK 2** **Malinowski and Mead: Fieldwork and Interpretive Differences**

__Feb 3__ READ: Miller, Chapter 2 Greg Downey, "Vital Topics Forum in AA: "Nature and the Human," []


 * WEEK 3 Economies: Consumption and Circulation**

__Feb 7__ __READ:__

Annette B. Weiner, "Ethnographic Determinism: Samoa and the Margaret Mead Controversy," [|American Anthropologist], New Series, Vol. 85, No. 4 (Dec., 1983), pp. 909-919 http://www.jstor.org.libproxy.rpi.edu/stable/679591?seq=8

__Feb 10__ READ: Miller, Chapter 3


 * WEEK 4 Reproduction, Gender, and Development**

__Feb 14__ __READ:__ Miller, Chapter 4 Lila Abu-Lughod, "The Muslim Woman", []

__Feb 17__ __**QUIZ 1**__ __READ:__


 * WEEK 5 Health, Illness, and Healing Systems**

__Feb 21 No class -- President's Day__

__Feb 24__ __READ:__ Miller, Chapter 5 Nancy Scheper-Hughes, "The Global Traffic in Human Organs," (2001) []


 * WEEK 6 Kinship and Social Groups**

__Feb 28__ __READ:__ Miller, Chapter 6

__Mar 3__ __READ:__ Miller, Chapter 7 Laura Nader, "Up the Anthropologist"


 * WEEK 7** **Political and Legal Systems**

__Mar 7__ __READ:__ Miller, Chapter 8

__Mar 10__ __READ:__
 * QUIZ 2**

[March 18 is last day to drop a course.]


 * SPRING BREAK**


 * WEEK 8 Language and Communication**

__Mar 21__ __READ:__ Miller, Chapter 9

__Mar 24__ __READ:__ David Thomson, [|"Worlds Shaped by Words"] Benjamin Lee Whorf, "Language Mind and Reality" (1952) Guy Deutscher, "Does Language Shape the Way You Think?", New York Times, August 29.2010, []


 * WEEK 9 Religious Practices and Beliefs**

__Mar 28__ __READ:__ Miller, Chapter 10

__Mar 31__ __**QUIZ 3**__ __READ:__ Anne Meneley, "Fashions and Fundamentalisms in Fin-de-Siecle Yemen: Chador Barbie and Islamic Socks, Cultural Anthropology 22(2), 2007. http://www.anthrosource.net/standardtps.aspx?doi=10.1525/can.2007.22.2.214&type=pdf


 * WEEK 10 Arts, Games, and Expressive Culture**

__Apr 4__ Miller, Chapter 11

__Apr 7__ __READ:__ Brent Luvaas, "Dislocating Sound: The Deterritorialization of Indonesian Indie Pop," Cultural Anthropology 24:2 (2009). [| http://www.anthrosource.net/Abstract.aspx?issn=0886-7356&volume=24&issue=2&doubleissueno=0&article=259892&suppno=0&jstor=False] See the supplemental page at [| http://culanth.org/?q=node/223]


 * WEEK 11**

__Apr 11__ __READ:__ Dominic Boyer and Alexei Yurchak, "AMERICAN STIOB: Or, What Late-Socialist Aesthetics of Parody Reveal about Contemporary Political Culture in the West," Cultural Anthropology 25:2 (May 2010): 179-221; http://www.anthrosource.net/Abstract.aspx?issn=0886-7356&volume=25&issue=2&doubleissueno=0&article=308918&suppno=0&jstor=False&cyear=2010 See the supplemental page at http://culanth.org/?q=node/322

__Apr 14__
 * QUIZ 4**


 * WEEK 12** **Migrations, Refugees, and Humanitarianism**

__Apr 18__ __READ:__ Miller, Chapter 12

__Apr 21__ __READ:__

Nina Glick Schiller et al, "Beyond the Ethnic Lens: Locality, Globality and Born-Again Incorporation," American Ethnologist 33:4 (November 2006): 612-633;


 * WEEK 13** **Development and Change**

__Apr 25__ __READ:__ Miller, Chapter 13

__Apr 28__ __READ:__ Nosheen Ali, "Books vs Bombs? Humanitarian development and the narrative of terror in Northern Pakistan," Third World Quarterly 31:4 (June 2010):541-559


 * WEEK 14**

__May 2__ __READ:__
 * QUIZ 5**

__May 5__ __READ:__