| Course
Description: This course is about the practice of anthropology using
archaeological and ethnohistorical data conjointly. Our goal, on one level,
is to explore methodologies which combine ethnohistorical and archaeological
data and research strategies in ways which produce greater anthropological
understanding than either strategy or data set would allow of itself. Such
conjoint methodologies are still rather poorly defined. At another level,
our task is to understand the relationships among the disciplines of social
or cultural anthropology, history, and archaeology, broadly defined. Upon
what kinds of analytical constructs, data, theory, epistemologies, research
strategies, and intellectual traditions are these disciplines based? Where
among them does "ethnohistory" fit in, leaving aside for the moment the
myriad "compound" disciplines of historical archaeology, historical geography,
ethnoarchaeology, archaeo-ethnology, historical sociology, and historical
anthropology?
Requirements:
- 25% of the final grade will be based on participation, attendance,
discussion, and contributions of the following sort: each week, by Thursday
night, you should email me a discussion question based on the readings
for that Friday. You can also include comments, reactions, and connections
to other topics discussed in class. That will form the basis for a discussion
agenda for Friday morning.
- 25% will be based on a preliminary report and presentation. The presentation
should be a roughly 10-minute discussion that focusses on a particular
area and period. For this, you should discuss the place, time, and people
involved. You should mention the key archaeological evidence that is
available for the period, and discuss in greater detail the kinds of
historical documents and other material that that available are to work
with. These presentations of particular situations and kinds of documentary
data will allow us to discuss various strategies for approaching anthropological
questions using ethnohistorical and archaeological data. The report
should be a 3-4 page statement that summarizes the material covered
in the presentation.
- 50% A final paper (due May 4) and presentation dealing with a situation
that requires the use of archaeological and other material (archival
documents, oral history, ethnography, indigenous texts, etc.). This
will most likely be on the same topic as your preliminary presentation/paper.
The second presentation will describe your final project in a somewhat
longer -- 20 minutes or so -- format. For this you should describe the
questions you addressed and they methods you employed, the data you
used and what you found out.
Readings
A complete reading packet will
be available for copying in the Departmental office, or you can find most
of the assigned readings in the library. Some of the readings come from
the following books, which would be good sources for further reading:
Barnard, Alan J. 2000. History
and theory in anthropology. Cambridge, U.K. New York : Cambridge University
Press
Borofsky, Robert (ed). 1994
Assessing Cultural Anthropology. New York: McGraw-Hill
Cohn, Bernard S. 1987 An
Anthropologist Among Historians and Other Essays. Bernard S. Cohn.
Oxford: Oxford University Press
Nicholas
B. Dirks, Geoffrey Eley, and Sherry B. Ortner (eds.) Culture, Power,
History: A Reader in Contemporary Social Theory. Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1994.
Hodder, Ian, (1987) Archaeology
as Long Term History, edited by Ian Hodder. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ.
Press.
Karsten, Peter, and John Modell,
editors. Theory, Method, and Practice in Social and Cultural History.
New York: New York Univ. Press, 1992.
Menchaca,
Martha 1996. History and anthropology : conducting research. Michigan
State University.
Pels, Peter and Oscar Salemink
(eds.)1999 Colonial subjects : essays on the practical history of anthropology.
Ann Arbor : University of Michigan Press.
R.W. Preucel and I. Hodder,
1996, Contemporary Archaeology in Theory.
Sahlins, Marshall (1981) Historical
Metaphors and Mythical Realities. Ann Arbor: U. of Michigan Press.
Trouillot, Michel-Rolph (1995)
Silencing the Past. Boston: Beacon Press.
Trigger, Bruce (1989) A
History of Archaeological Thought.
Wolf, Eric (1982) Europe
and the People without History. Berkeley: Univ. of California Press.
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