BA (Hons) Anthropology

What you'll study Year 1 (credit level 4) Year 1 modules Module title Credits. Introduction to Social Anthropology Introduction to Social Anthropology 30 credits

This module introduces basic anthropological concepts of kinship, politics, economics, and religion and the history and theoretical schools of anthropology.

30 credits. Ethnography of a Selected Region Ethnography of a Selected Region 15 credits

You will study either Ethnography of a Selected Region I: Africa or Ethnograqphy of a Selected Region 2: South Asia, depending on timetabling and staff availability.

Ethnography of a Selected Region 1: Africa

Module Convenor: Dr Dominique Santos

Africa has been a key space, both geographically and imaginatively, in the development of the discipline of anthropology. This module is an introduction to anthropological studies on societies and cultures in Africa and the African diaspora. Ethnographic case studies are used to address some of the major themes that have characterised studies of Africa and debates about African identity, including sexuality, gender, colonialism, music, art, magic & sorcery, religion, power and the diaspora. Throughout the module, emphasis is placed on how the idea of Africa is mobilised in different ways for a variety of ideological purposes. In this way, students will be able to make links with wider anthropological debates about the construction of society, changes in ethnographic research and the relationship between anthropology and its subjects. On completion of the module, students will have gained knowledge of key debates in African anthropology and be able to reflect critically on the history of ethnographic engagement with Africa. At the same time, they will have developed an understanding of the diversity and contingencies of everyday life in contemporary Africa.

Ethnography of a Selected Region 2: South Asia

Module Convenor: Dr Martin Webb

This an ethnography led module that introduces students to the anthropology, sociology, history and politics of India. The module begins with an introduction to significant historical events and an overview of the emergence of the post-colonial nation. We move on to consider the anthropological construction of India and then follow key themes of inequality, hierarchy, development and the nation across a series of topics which introduce ethnographies exploring: the state, youth, citizenship, love and friendship, urban lives, public culture and the idea of a global India. While the module focuses on India, where ethnographic threads or literatures connect to scholarship from across south Asia students will be guided and encouraged to follow them.

15 credits. Anthropological Methods Anthropological Methods 15 credits

This module explores aspects of anthropological methods. You study the following areas: data collection techniques and implications of type and quality of data; participant observation: techniques involved, its evolution and change; analytical approaches to primary data, re-analyses of secondary sources; the philosophy of science; value free social science, interaction between observer and observed, perception and ‘fact’.

15 credits. Ethnographic Film Ethnographic Film 15 credits

This module aims to encourage a critical appreciation of ethnographic film, introducing some of the growing literature on visual anthropology, and raising general issues of representation in anthropology as a whole.

15 credits. Anthropology Today Anthropology Today 15 credits

How is anthropology implicated in the debates that shape the contemporary world? How have anthropologists, past and present, contributed to an understanding of power and difference, locality and global interconnection? This module focuses on how anthropologists continue to adapt their research and writing to tackle a range of contemporary issues, including exploitation and wealth, gender inequality, virtual social networking, and illegal immigration.

15 credits. Anthropology in London Anthropology in London 15 credits

How is it possible to begin to understand something as complex as London from an anthropological perspective? Is there really any kind of stable entity or 'thing' we could begin to call 'London', or actually a plurality of 'Londons' – a multitude of different forms, some of which are connected in labyrinthine ways? Does it make any sense to try and make sense of London? What would an anthropology of London need to include? How would it go about collecting the relevant information?

These questions and others will be tackled through a range of field trips, sound walks, and practical documenting exercises, as well as lectures and screenings. This innovative module will take a series of direct experiences of London as the starting points for considering possible anthropological approaches to the city. It will explore the history of London at first-hand, look at its portrayal by artists, writers and filmmakers, and evaluate a range of anthropological ways of tackling its complexity.

15 credits. Anthropological Ideas Anthropological Ideas 15 credits

This module explores the intellectual history of Anthropology, examining key ideas and introducing thinkers that have had significant impact on the discipline. It will focus on a particular sub-field and will explore in depth the ways that different theoretical and methodological approaches are developed in one specific area of research and writing.

15 credits. Year 2 (credit level 5) Year 2 modules Module title Credits. Anthropology of Religion Anthropology of Religion 15 or 30 credits

This module is worth 15 credits if you study it at Level 6 and 30 credits if you study it at Level 7.

Questioning the category of religion, this module will introduce you to the sociological thought which has informed the anthropology of religious phenomena and will highlight the specificity of anthropological approaches which combine comparative, historical and ethnographic methodologies and concerns. Focussing on both ‘world religions’ and more localised cosmologies and practices, you will learn about different anthropological approaches (structuralist, Marxist, phenomenological, symbolic and cognitive) which emphasise different dimensions of religious practice and experience. You will also be encouraged to think about the relevance of these approaches for understanding the continued persistence, salience and transformation of religious ideas and practices in the contemporary world.

15 or 30 credits. Anthropology and the Visual Anthropology and the Visual 15 credits

This module provides a critical introduction to the many ways anthropologists engage with the visual from their use of visual methodologies and analysis of representations to their ethnographic study of everyday visual forms. Focusing on a wide range of visual media from photography, museum exhibitions and popular representations on TV to dress, body art, architecture and other everyday visual and material forms, the module raises issues about the significance of visibility, the politics of representation, the social life of visual and material forms and the relationship between seeing and other senses.

15 credits. Politics, Economics and Social Change Politics, Economics and Social Change 30 credits

Politics, Economics and Social Change introduces you to the core concepts and theories relating to economic and political organisations and the problem of accounting for change, both empirically and theoretically.

To familiarise you with a number of empirical contexts in order that you may be able to conceptualise the complex socio-economic processes that are affecting the peripheral areas that have long been the concern of anthropologists.

To explore a number of contemporary problems relating to such issues as the apparent contradiction between local or national autonomy and globalisation that do not fit easily into definitions of the "economic" or "political".

30 credits. Ethnography of a Selected Region II Ethnography of a Selected Region II 15 credits

This module explores the ethnography of a specific region, which may change from year to year. Through detailed reading of ethnography, as well as films and other relevant media, major themes of anthropology such as identity, community, local and global politics, inequality and processes of social and economic change are explored.

15 credits. Thinking Anthropologically Thinking Anthropologically 15 credits

This module is concerned with key ways of thinking that have shaped and continue to shape the discipline of social anthropology. As such, the module is intended to augment what you have learned in the first year and to help consolidate your sense of how important concepts in social anthropology fit together.

The focus of the module is how the discipline’s main 20th century schools of thought have developed, how they relate to one another and what they have contributed to our understandings of the world.

Our concern is with the different ways in which anthropologists have conceived of ‘culture’ and ‘society’ in their efforts to account for the myriad of ways in which humans live.

We shall explore how these approaches to anthropology compete with, and sometimes contradict, one another and how these dynamics have driven the discipline through the political landscape of the twentieth century to where we are now so that we can, in the last, pause to envisage where we can and should go next.

15 credits. Anthropology at Work Anthropology at Work 15 credits

The aim of the module is to explore some of the different ways that anthropologists use theory in designing and doing research and to create and extend theoretical arguments in and through ethnography. In doing so we seek also to further foreground the possibility for both ‘other’ anthropologies and anthropologies ‘otherwise’.

15 credits. Year 3 (credit level 6)

In your third year you also take either:

• an individual project (30 credits) examined by an 8,000-word dissertation

or

• an extended individual project (45 credits) examined by a 12,000-word dissertation

Both of these modules are research projects of your own choosing and design, the topic to be agreed with the member of the department who acts as supervisor.

In addition you take modules totalling 120 credits. Options that have been available recently include:



Module title Credits. Anthropology of Art Anthropology of Art 15 credits

This module introduces some of the key issues in the anthropology of art. It begins with an examination of the contested concept of 'art' in Western thought and questions its applicability in different cultural contexts.

The module covers such issues as conflicting definitions of art and aesthetics; modes of seeing within and across cultures; creativity, inspiration and the category of the artist; the body as art; issues of gender and ideology; the politics of the ownership and display of non-Western art works; imaging nationality and ethnicity through art; primitivism and the construction of the other.

15 credits. Anthropology of Art II Anthropology of Art II 15 or 30 credits

This module is worth 15 credits if you study it at Level 6 and 30 credits if you study it at Level 7.

This module is designed to offer students the opportunity to conduct a short piece of research in the field broadly defined as the Anthropology of Art. Picking up on theoretical issues introduced in Anthropology of Art I, you will be expected to select your own topic for fieldwork. You may wish to analyse the practice of a particular artist (especially one whose work relates to ethnography in some way), concentrate on aspects of art institutions in London (techniques of display, audiences, exhibitions), or on lives of art objects (their production, consumption, circulation, interpretation). Key issues include: aesthetics and the culture industry: the role of the avant-garde: Frankfurt School critical theory: popular art, resistance and accommodation: the rise of film criticism: museums and collecting.

15 or 30 credits. Anthropology of Development Anthropology of Development 15 credits

This core module will enable you to explore the theoretical concepts underpinning development, the history of development and its institutions – from NGOs to the World Bank and IMF, while considering diverse case studies from around the world. You will also explore the historical role of anthropology’s involvement in development, as official mediators between ‘the West and the rest’ through imperial conquest, colonial administration and a post-war development industry.

As a central component of the module you will critically analyse current trends that have emerged to dominate the field of global political and economic interventions and/or policies – ‘participation and empowerment’, ‘gender awareness’, ’sustainable development’, ‘community development’, ‘NGOs’, and ‘environmental conservation’.

15 credits. Anthropology and the Environment Anthropology and the Environment 15 credits

The module examines anthropological understandings of human-environment relations and their bearing on public discourses of environmentalism. It deals with: different ways of encountering biophysical surroundings across societies; European traditions of environmental thought and their impacts; management practices, colonialism, and cultural elaboration of the idea of nature; environmental social movements, identity politics and social justice in environmentalism.

15 credits. Anthropology and Gender Theory Anthropology and Gender Theory 15 or 30 credits

This module is worth 15 credits if you study it at Level 6 and 30 credits if you study it at Level 7.

This module explores the inter-relationship of gender, sexuality and the body both within western cultures and western social theory, and in a range of other cultural and historical contexts. Emphasising the ways in which the body and gender have been produced/imagined differently in diverse times and places, it focuses on both classical and current anthropological topics including:

• The status of the body – biological or cultural
• Decoration, modification and transformation of bodies
• Distinctions between sex and gender
• Alternative sex and gender systems
• Kinship, marriage and chosen families
• New reproductive technologies
• Identity politics and queer theory
• Theories of performance/practice
• Violence, resistance and power politics
15 or 30 credits. Anthropology of Violence Anthropology of Violence 15 credits

This module examines a variety of anthropological approaches to the study of violence, ranging from evolutionary explanations for male aggression to studies of changing American attitudes toward terrorism in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. It looks critically at the theoretical, methodological and ethical questions raised in studies of violence through ethnographic case studies from around the world.

The module considers attempts to define violence as a concept in the social sciences and explores the possible causes, meanings, and uses of violent practices from a variety of different cultural contexts and perspectives. It gives particular attention to the political and economic conditions that promote war and other violent behaviour as well as specific cultural expressions within violent practices.

We will also discuss ethnographic descriptions of “peaceful societies” and examine the ways in which peace is made in the aftermath of conflict. In addition to the required and additional readings, the module will also include a number of films that coincide with weekly topics.

15 credits. Anthropology and the Visual 2 Anthropology and the Visual 2 15 credits

This module explores the role of visual representation in anthropology in terms of both the history of its use within the discipline, and also the potential it holds for new ways of working. It looks at work in a wide range of media – photography, film/video, performance – and the ways in which they might be used in an anthropological context, and this will involve looking at work from outside anthropology such as photojournalism and contemporary art, as well as the work of visual anthropologists.

15 credits. Anthropology and the Visual: Production Course Anthropology and the Visual: Production Course 15 credits

Following on from Anthropology and the Visual II, this is a practically based module in which you will explore the techniques of video-making/photography.

15 credits. The Anthropology of Rights The Anthropology of Rights 15 credits

This module encourages you to engage critically with the rights discourses that underpin development agendas in the contemporary world. You will consider the historical evolution of rights discourses, the institutions that have been established to uphold rights, the language of Human Rights used in international law, as well as the concept of rights as understood by development organisations, governments and multilaterals (such as the UN).

You will also analyse the cross-cutting – and often competing – claims made in the name of, for example, gender