Romanticism and Anthropology
AS.070.687 (01)

The word "romantic" has long carried negative connotations within anthropology meaning the tendency to idealize, exoticize, or seek out the irrational. Instead, through a focus on the themes of magic, art, myth, nature and creativity, we suggest that romantic philosophy has offered and continues to offer much of interest for contemporary anthropology. Drawing on select readings in philosophy and anthropology, we will explore the suppressed romantic legacy of anthropology. This is an undergraduate and graduate combined course. Recommended Course Background: Undergraduates have to have taken at least one anthropology course (any level) to register. Or else they need the permission of the instructor.

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times: W 1:30PM - 4:00PM
• Instructor: Khan, Naveeda
• Room: Mergenthaler 439
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 4/7

Methods
AS.070.617 (01)

The seminar will offer a forum for students to reflect on preliminary field research and think further about problems of ethnographic method. We will proceed in the manner of a workshop for ongoing projects. Open to anthropology graduate students only.

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times: W 11:00AM - 1:00PM
• Instructor: Poole, Deborah
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 7/10

Readings in Anthropology
AS.070.682 (01)

This course introduces classical texts from the anthropological archives in relation to contemporary debates in the discipline. In this year’s iteration, our readings and discussion will explore the idea of a public and engaged anthropology.

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times: M 2:00PM - 4:00PM
• Instructor: Pandian, Anand
• Room: Mergenthaler 439
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 6/10

Dissertation Research
AS.070.801 (02)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Das, Veena
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 4/5

Dissertation Research
AS.070.801 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Guyer, Jane
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Proposal Writing
AS.070.659 (01)

The seminar will offer a forum for students to discuss research projects, prepare grant proposals and think further about issues of ethnographic methodology and writing. Open to Anthropology graduate students only.

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times: T 10:00AM - 12:00PM
• Instructor: Ozden-schilling, Thomas
• Room: Mergenthaler 439
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 2/6

The Anthropological Tone in Philosophy
AS.070.691 (01)

This course will ask: what constitutes an anthropological tone in philosophy? We will take up classical topics such as rule following, everyday life, skepticism, concept formation, realism, and signification in selected texts of anthropology and philosophy for understanding if these crisscross and overlap.

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times: F 2:00PM - 4:00PM
• Instructor: Das, Veena
• Room: Mergenthaler 439
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 7/15

Normal and Pathological
AS.070.624 (01)

This seminar explores the shifting lines of the normal and the pathological and the constitution of disease in the complex of medicine, public health, and the social. Readings include the works of Canguilhem and Foucault, historical monographs and ethnographies. Students will have the opportunity to develop substantial research or review papers throughout the course of the seminar.

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times: T 1:30PM - 4:00PM
• Instructor: Greene, Jeremy, Han, Clara
• Room: Mergenthaler 431
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 1/7

Dissertation Research
AS.070.801 (04)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Haeri, Niloofar
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Dissertation Research
AS.070.801 (05)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Khan, Naveeda
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 4/5

Dissertation Research
AS.070.801 (03)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Poole, Deborah
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Dissertation Research
AS.070.801 (06)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Pandian, Anand
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Directed Reading and Research
AS.070.869 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Pandian, Anand
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Directed Reading and Research
AS.070.871 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Das, Veena
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 4/5

Directed Reading and Research
AS.070.867 (02)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Khan, Naveeda
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 4/5

Directed Reading and Research
AS.070.883 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Haeri, Niloofar
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Dissertation Research
AS.070.801 (08)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Cervone, Emma
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Dissertation Research
AS.070.801 (07)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Han, Clara
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Directed Reading & Research
AS.070.867 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Han, Clara
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 3/5

Directed Reading and Research
AS.070.893 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Obarrio, Juan M
• Room:  
• Status: Canceled
• Seats Available: 5/5

Directed Reading and Research
AS.070.885 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Poole, Deborah
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Dissertation Research
AS.070.801 (09)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Obarrio, Juan M
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Media Theory in the Age of Big Data
AS.211.748 (01)

This seminar will explore some key themes in contemporary media theory in an age when five tech giants have succeeded in infiltrating the daily lives of global citizens to an unprecedented degree in history. We will study the impact of this saturation on socioeconomic inequality as well as the implications of an almost total loss of privacy. Among the strategies of resistance to the capacity for surveillance these companies have developed we will focus in particular on current examples of feminist media art and voices from the global and cultural periphery as well as tendencies in these practices to emphasize a return to interpersonal connections and the embodied here and now. As case studies we nay include #metoo, slo-film movements from Southern Bahia in Brazil, and the financing and distribution of art films by mega media companies like Netflix.

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times: F 2:00PM - 4:00PM
• Instructor: Wegenstein, Bernadette
• Room: Gilman 479
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 18/25

Dissertation Research
AS.070.802 (04)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Poole, Deborah
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Anthropology of Design
AS.070.642 (01)

From casinos to canoes, algorithms to animal traps, our worlds are bursting with intentional objects. The word design has come to evoke the prestige of such objects, and their power to shape our collective habits and sensations. This course explores the anthropology of designed artifacts and their complex social trajectories. Beginning with philosophical investigations into the relationship between materials, form, and craft, we will proceed through ethnographic case studies of design as expert discourse and ordinary practice. Ultimately we will consider the affinities between the ethnography and design as open-ended and not entirely predictable engagements with the world.

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times: M 1:30PM - 4:00PM
• Instructor: Degani, Michael, Pandian, Anand
• Room: Mergenthaler 439
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 6/6

Concepts: How to Read Hindu and Islamic Texts
AS.070.665 (01)

What is the nature of anthropological concepts and what relations do they bear to concepts internal to a society? We invite students to think with key ideas from Hindu and Islamic traditions, asking if anthropological concepts are best seen as abstractions from the particular or as intertwined with ongoing lines of inquiry, say into the nature of the real and continual efforts to test it? Topics in ritual theory, grammar, aesthetics, translation, revelation, luminosity, figuration and the mythological among those to be considered.

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times: F 2:00PM - 4:30PM
• Instructor: Das, Veena, Khan, Naveeda
• Room: Mergenthaler 439
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 10/10

Dissertation Research
AS.070.802 (03)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Ozden-schilling, Thomas
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Dissertation Research
AS.070.802 (05)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Khan, Naveeda
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Dissertation Research
AS.070.802 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Das, Veena
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Kinship: Old and New
AS.070.639 (01)

We will track the transformations in kinship theory in relation to wider changes in legal theory, biomedicine, and the relation between state and family. In particular, we will ask how the concepts of sovereignty, gift, exchange, human and non-human milieus affect notions of relations. Open to undergraduate anthropology majors with instructors approval.. Co-listed with AS.070.426

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times: Th 1:30PM - 4:00PM
• Instructor: Das, Veena
• Room: Mergenthaler 439
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 6/7

Proseminar
AS.070.616 (01)

This course will consist of close reading of anthropological and philosophical texts to trace some important aspects of the underlying presuppositions of social theory. We will try to see how regions generate both data and theory; and also see how some abiding concerns around the relation between structural formations and formations of subjects are expressed in classical and current anthropological thought.

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times: T 10:00AM - 12:00PM
• Instructor: Khan, Naveeda
• Room: Mergenthaler 439
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 9/10

Defining Region
AS.070.698 (01)

This course is open to anthropology graduate students only and is to be run on a workshop model. It is to help those students writing their regional essay for the comprehensive exams to acquire expertise in regional debates and literature relevant to their field research. Our understanding of regions is one of cross-cutting concepts and questions rather than geographical framings alone. After identifying a concept or question, each student will create an annotated bibliography, trace the shape of arguments as they emerge within the readings, create an outline and work toward a draft of the final essay.

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times: W 2:00PM - 4:00PM
• Instructor: Angelini, Alessandro, Han, Clara
• Room: Mergenthaler 439
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 10/10

Dissertation Research
AS.070.802 (07)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Han, Clara
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Directed Reading and Research
AS.070.867 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Han, Clara
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 10/10

Directed Readings and Research
AS.070.866 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Pandian, Anand
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Dissertation Research
AS.070.802 (06)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Haeri, Niloofar
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Directed Readings and Research
AS.070.892 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Khan, Naveeda
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Directed Readings and Research
AS.070.872 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Das, Veena
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Dissertation Research
AS.070.802 (08)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Pandian, Anand
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Directed Readings and Research
AS.070.870 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Degani, Michael
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Dissertation Research
AS.070.802 (02)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Degani, Michael
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Directed Readings and Research
AS.070.874 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Haeri, Niloofar
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Directed Readings and Research
AS.070.886 (01)

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times:
• Instructor: Poole, Deborah
• Room:  
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 5/5

Seminar: Near East Archaeology
AS.131.635 (01)

Topic varies but can include the archaeology of Mesopotamia, Syria, or Palestine, or thematic discussions (e.g., on ideology, state collapse, etc.).

• Credits: 0.00
• Level: Graduate
• Days/Times: W 10:00AM - 12:00PM
• Instructor: Schwartz, Glenn M
• Room: Gilman 130G
• Status: Open
• Seats Available: 19/20