Fall 2006

ANT 302 • Cultural Anthropology

Course Description

This course is an introduction to Cultural Anthropology. The course is organized around central questions in the study of human societies, including problems of societal development and definitions of progress; language and symbolism; family and kinship; social hegemony and resistance; nationalism, peace, and violence; and modernization and globalization. The instructors' aim is for students to emerge from the course with an enhanced understanding of their own experiences as social and cultural beings; an appreciation of the complexity and diversity of cultures and societies; and an awareness of various approaches to communication, interpretation, and representation across cultures.

The development of critical and analytical thinking skills is also a central aim of the course. Key concepts to be introduced in the course include participant observation; cultural construction; cultural relativism; situated knowledge; cultural identity; social inequality; modernization and globalization; social and cultural change; conformity and conflict; creativity and agency; and ethnographic representation.

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