In the first two years, you'll concentrate on basic anthropological concepts – such as kinship, politics, economics and religion, as well as world systems and development – and on methods of studying and analysing these. You will also study ethnography and at least one region of the world in depth.
There's a substantial practical component to this degree, constituting a sixth of the course load in all three years. This includes training in:
In your final year you can specialise by choosing from a selection of option topics, and will produce a documentary film and dissertation based on individual study.
Year 1 modules |
Module title |
Credits |
|
Introduction to Social Anthropology
Introduction to Social Anthropology
30 credits
The aim of this module is to acquaint you with the main bodies of theory within social anthropology and the classical sub-fields within the discipline (political anthropology, economic anthropology, anthropology of religion and kinship) and key debates within the discipline. The module begins by locating the discipline in a historical perspective before proceeding to an exploration of key theories and central themes within the discipline. Although the lectures will draw heavily on what might be considered classical texts in anthropology, which will often mean that the literature dates from the early or mid-20th century and sometimes from the 19th century or earlier, the emphasis will be on the exploring ways in which these keys areas of work within the discipline might inform our understanding of contemporary issues and problems.
As the module progresses you will hopefully gain a growing sense of what social anthropology is and feel more confident to enter discussion concerning the kinds of questions it asks. Reflecting this gradual build-up of confidence and understanding, the essay assignment for the first term has been broken down into two distinct yet related stages.
|
30 credits |
|
Ethnography of a Selected Region 1
Ethnography of a Selected Region 1
15 credits
The module introduces the ethnography of a selected region, highlighting the anthropological theories informing this ethnography. Central themes are the creation of societies, communities, cultures and identities in response to colonialism and to contemporary opportunities and constraints, and the significance of the study of culture-building for changing ethnographic approaches and anthropology. 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.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropological Methods
Anthropological Methods
15 credits
Anthropological Methods is an introduction to practices of ethnographic research. The module examines the relationship between theory and method within anthropology. We are concerned with the specific techniques that are used by anthropologists as they conduct their fieldwork. This module also draws attention to how ethnographic knowledge produced during fieldwork is both relational and contextual. We therefore consider certain historical conjectures and power dynamics that have contributed to the way ethnography is (perhaps at times rather paradoxically) at once defined as a product and perceived as a process. To this end, the module explores the epistemological and ethical foundations of anthropological methods in order to encourage you to think about fieldwork as an encounter and ethnography as the relation between anthropological practice and theory.
|
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 |
|
Anthropological Ideas
Anthropological Ideas
15 credits
The aim of this module is to push you to think about history, theory and ethics in anthropology. This will be explored through the prism of controversy. We will be looking at a number of different controversies in anthropology, how they shaped the discipline and what we can learn from them. While doing this we will be looking at some of the key figures in the history of anthropology, the relationship between anthropology and the public and locating these people and events in an historical perspective. Anthropology is not static – it changes constantly. This module is designed to interrogate some of these changes through one particular driving force – controversies. While controversy may sound enticing or exciting, it should be kept in mind that many of these controversies massively affected the lives of researchers, research participants and others – in some cases resulting in deaths or policy shifts that detrimentally impacted on the lives of informants and those around them.
|
15 credits |
|
Introduction to Visual Practice
Introduction to Visual Practice
30 credits
Introduction to Visual Practice will introduce you to key areas in the history and practice of image use in Anthropological research and publication. You will also have hands on training a number of professional level software packages, as well as high level visual and audio production equipment (cameras, recorders, microphones). The module will be split into 4 x 5 week blocks over the year.
The first week of each block will consist of a lecture/seminar setting out the Anthropological, historical and theoretical framework relating to the practice elements which form the focus of the 5 week block.
Weeks 2-4 will consist of hands-on practical teaching in a lab-based setting, with technical supervision and weekly formative exercises completed in class. Students work towards the development of a final piece of practical work which will be presented in the final week.
The fifth week of each block will be a presentation/critique session in which students will present their work and receive feedback in the session.
The four pieces of assessed work will form a portfolio which will be the basis of the grade for the module. The blocks will run in the following order (the running order may be amended based on availability of staff and resources).
Autumn Weeks 1-5: Photography Practical teaching basic camera use, analogue to digital prints and transparencies, use of lights and tripods, digital contact sheets, PhotoShop, and Lightroom. Autumn Weeks 7-11: Film Practical teaching will cover basic camcorder skills, camera types, aspect ratios and audio-visual capture, editing, FCP and Premiere.
Spring Weeks 1-5: Sound Practical teaching will cover basic principles of sound recording, microphone types, recording formats, audio software, compression, multi-track recording and soundscapes.
Spring Weeks 7-11: Multimedia Practical teaching will cover media and logging, accessing and downloading from public resources, converting found footage, working with diverse source material and use of media platforms
|
30 credits |
You take an Individual Studies with Practice module, worth 30 credits. This module is a research project of your own choosing and design, the topic to be agreed with the member of the department who acts as supervisor.
You will also take 90 credits of option modules, recent examples of which include:
Year 3 module options |
Module title |
Credits |
|
Anthropological Approaches to History
Anthropological Approaches to History
15 credits
This module explores the friction and common ground between History and Anthropology. In order to understand this productive but spirited dialogue, we historicise their relationship and overlapping but divergent theoretical perspectives and methods. Modern social anthropology was formed in the early twentieth century by a rejection of evolutionism and its replacement by synchronic site-specific studies, a move that effectively eclipsed history’s theoretical significance to the discipline. Yet, dissatisfaction with the ways in which synchronic functionalist ethnographic analyses ignored history and social change brought about lasting debates about continuity and rupture; the relation between pasts, presents and futures, and the wider humanistic turn of both disciplines under the theoretical influence of Marxism, feminism, and other critical social theory since the 1960s. This module is, in many ways, an examination of the possibilities of a historicised anthropology and poses several intertwined empirical and theoretical questions about the place of structure and agency, consciousness and historicity, and memory and silences within ethnography. Through historical ethnographies and selected social historiography, we aim to understand not only how to approach the past anthropologically, but also grasp ethnographically the uses of history as a collectivist political project implicated in nationalism, racist ideology, and categories like world heritage.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology of Health and Medicine
Anthropology of Health and Medicine
15 credits
This module will explore understandings and experiences of the health and illness by engaging with classic and contemporary ethnographic work to ask:
•How are health and illness understood and experienced; how are healing practices assessed? •What is the relationship between health and inequality, both with reference to professional status and economic disparities? •What can anthropology contribute in practice?
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology and Gender Theory
Anthropology and Gender Theory
15 credits
This module is concerned with social and cultural constructions and understandings of gender, sexuality and the body as discussed in anthropology and beyond. The main aim of the module is to develop a critical understanding of some of the major theoretical approaches to gender, sex and the body, as they have been and are relevant to anthropology. In European intellectual history ideas about the body have often revolved around the biological binary categories male and female. In this module, however, using a range of ethnographic examples we look at ways in which the idea of male and female is perceived, embodied and challenged, cross-culturally, in different contexts, and at different historical moments. The topics addressed range from work, performance and narrations of the self, to queer communities and families, and from biopolitics, and new technologies of the body/reproduction, the body, gender, and nation, and gender and globalisation. By the end of the module, you will be expected to be familiar with the main theoretical perspectives in anthropology on gender, sexuality and the related politics. You should also be aware of the historical changes which have marked the analysis of these concepts and be able to use ethnographic material as evidence for theoretical points.
|
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.
The intention of the module is to give students a challenging and creative view of the potentials for using audio-visual material within anthropology. It also provides a strong theoretical background for those students going on to take the AN53040A Anthropology and the Visual: Production Module in the Spring Term.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology in Public Practice
Anthropology in Public Practice
15 credits
Work placement – 5 days per week for 2 weeks; or at least 10x8 hour days spread over a longer period to be determined by the WPM, Department, student and host organisation.
The aim is to provide experiential learning opportunities which both enhance students’ academic studies and offer the opportunity for personal development. It will therefore be an effective vehicle for delivering key aspects of Goldsmiths Learning and Teaching Strategy (Employability), including: • The teaching and assessment of skills relevant both to academic achievement and to discipline-related career opportunities • The delivery of effective personal development programmes • The enhancement of academic programmes so that career-related experiences are offered, validated and supported
General Scope of the Module Arrangements for the delivery of the module The module will be coordinated by the WPM. The academic elements will be delivered and assessed by the academic department and the personal development elements by WPM/TALIC. It will fall within the purview of the assessment framework- including exam boards and external assessors- of each department. WPM/TALIC will be invited to the Exam Board Sub Committee.
Structure The Placement is at the core. It will take place over a two-week period or may be spread over a longer period with a minimum of 10, eight-hour working days.
In the term prior to the Module, the WPM will hold discussions with students about placement options. It is anticipated that there will be a pool of placements and students will also be encouraged to find their own placements. In all cases, the WPM will meet with the host organisations, to ensure that they have the capacity to supervise the student and that they can offer the student activities and resources which will allow them to meet the learning outcomes. The respective responsibilities of the host organisation, student and Goldsmiths will be encapsulated in the Letter of Agreement.
A seminar, led by WPM/TALIC, will prepare students for placements. It will include: the purpose of the placement; information on what to expect/how to behave; health and safety issues; what to do if anything goes wrong; an introduction to self-assessment, including skills, values, personality traits; how to prepare the Personal Portfolio and presentation.
Prior to start of module: Students discuss preferred sectors with WPM and are matched to placements or find their own. Seminar (two hours) led by WPM/TALIC to prepare students for placements and to provide guidance on personal portfolio.
During module: Three seminars (two hours) within the academic department, to help students formulate ideas for their research report and to allow them to share experiences and issues. Student presentations (two hour session) set up by WPM/TALIC. Office hours in department and with WPM/TALIC
|
15 credits |
|
Borders and Migration
Borders and Migration
30 credits
How can we develop critical knowledge about migration and borders? This module explores the multiple ways migration and borders are understood and experienced in different social, geographical, and political settings, as well as in different theoretical and discursive domains. Grounded in anthropological perspectives and methods, and branching out into film, literature, and art, the module aims to destabilise dominant understandings of migration and borders. In doing so, it critically unpacks core themes at the heart of contemporary debates on transnational movement – from race to belonging, from surveillance to gender. Throughout the module we will engage with a variety of theoretical, literary, and visual materials that focus on migrant lives and border crossings to develop a critical understanding of migration and the material, political, cultural, and linguistic borders that shape it.
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30 credits |
|
or |
|
Borders and Migration
Borders and Migration
15 credits
This module will consider the border politics involved in the making of 'transnational', diasporic', and 'local' communities. We will theorise the border as a material, political, cultural and linguistic boundary that is increasingly defining social life as well as engage with the experiences of those who cross borders. We will ask: How are borders constructed and contested? How do migrants experience borders? How is the discourse of citizenship destabilised when movement and borders become central heuristics by which to understand belonging and membership? Throughout the module we will read academic texts as well as engage with films and literature that focus on migrant lives and border crossings to develop a theoretical and practical knowledge of border politics in relationship to migratory flows.
|
15 credits |
|
Learning from Social Movements
Learning from Social Movements
15 credits
This module revolves around contemporary debates in the anthropology of social movements. It considers the contribution of ethnographic approaches to activism and protest to the theorisation of politics, collective action and social change. The anti-globalisation movement, #occupy, the anti-corruption movement in India, the anti-foreclosures movement in Spain (PAH), the Landless Workers' Movement, right-wing extremism, feminist reproductive health activists, independent-living activism, queer movements and the Indigenous Environmental Network are some of the examples that the module will explore. Rather than 'explaining away' these movements, the pedagogical orientation of the module is based on learning from them, i.e. devising ways of conceptualising their practice, methods and transformative power. The module will also consider, as a transversal issue, the question of 'engaged' or 'militant' research - and more broadly the relationship between the production of academic and activist knowledges.
The assessment is organised around student projects that will present, in a multimedia portfolio format, the result of research conducted about/with social movements.
|
15 credits |
|
Psychological Perspectives in Anthropology
Psychological Perspectives in Anthropology
15 credits
This module uses a range of data to focus on the relationship between Anthropology and Psychology. Although anthropology has often been described as a `bridge’ between the natural sciences and the humanities, the relationship between anthropology and psychology (or Psychoanalysis) has always been fraught with tension. This module explores these tensions and some attempts to overcome them.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology of Art 1
Anthropology of Art 1
15 credits
Arguably modern anthropology and modern art are close in terms of both their origins and their critical reflection on the relationships between images, objects and persons, and a concern with anthropological or ethnographic issues is often an explicit feature of contemporary artworks. But despite a long history of dealing with the so-called ‘art’ of other cultures, what does anthropology have to contribute to an understanding of the kinds of artworks you might find at Tate Modern today? Using ethnographic case studies this module will consider key anthropological approaches to art both historically and thematically, and will explore how art and anthropology are entangled with each other, including suggesting ways in which anthropology can productively learn from contemporary art.
|
15 credits |
|
The Anthropology of Rights
The Anthropology of Rights
15 credits
The aim of this module is to introduce you to rights in terms of their philosophical foundations, the history and shape of the UN system and anthropological contributions. We will be exploring human rights and humanitarian law as bodies of law, institutions, systems of practice and ideologies – with particular focus on the issue of cultural relativism (historically the key stumbling block for anthropological engagement with rights) and cross-cultural experiences of engagement with, or resistance to, rights.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology and the Visual Production Course
Anthropology and the Visual Production Course
15 Credits
The aim of this module is to allow students to explore the possibilities of communicating anthropological themes and issues through visual and aural media by producing practical work.
This is a production-based module and does not follow the usual lecture/seminar format. It is centered on the development of your own individual practical visual or sound project and seeing that through to completion. As such the contact hours are made up of some joint screening sessions and group workshops, as well as some one-to-one tutorials.
The module requires you to engage in a PROCESS of making a visual piece of work, to develop and refine a project through all the various stages and forms necessary for its successful completion. Students typically produce several versions of the practical work as they refine their project over the module of the term.
|
15 Credits |
|
Digital Anthropology
Digital Anthropology
15 credits
This module offers an introduction to theoretical debates and methods of digital anthropology. It combines an introduction to the debates that have shaped the field with practical sessions designed to familiarize learners with digital methodologies for anthropological research. As digital technologies transform contemporary experiences of subjectivity, embodiment, sociality and everyday life, the module uses anthropological tools and methods to think through digital technologies in a range of ethnographic contexts. Topics covered will reimagine the object of anthropology through digital ethnography, and explore how the purchase of digital futures and imaginaries remake anthropologists’ conceptual toolkits.
The module will combine an enquiry into the materialities and politics of digital infrastructures, devices and social media platforms with practical learning using digital methods to produce anthropological analysis. Practical sessions will develop independent research skills including research design and ethics, working with digital video, techniques of online data collection and digital qualitative and ethnographic analysis.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology of Violence
Anthropology of Violence
15 credits
This module looks at the ways in which anthropologists have dealt with violence, how we explain it, the specific problems of researching this topic, the involvement of anthropologists in military projects and other issues. We will be looking at the practices of researching; writing and engaging with violence and the problems these pose contemporary anthropologists. Some of the readings, lectures and other sources we might look at in this module inevitably deal with issues, descriptions and images of violence. Please be aware of this before taking the module and if it’s an issue discuss this with module convenor sooner rather than later.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology of Development
Anthropology of Development
15 credits
The module aims to provide students with a critical understanding of international development as a social, political and historical field, and of anthropology’s engagement with development and processes of planned social change. The early parts of the module provide students with an understanding of, the emergence of development as an idea, the architecture and infrastructure of aid, and introduce key theoretical approaches in the study of inequality. We also examine the tensions inherent in anthropology’s long and intimate relationship with development, through the early production of expert knowledge about tradition and culture; through its critical engagement with policy processes and planned interventions, and through the professional negotiation of the fields of development anthropology and the anthropology of development.
The module then goes on to contextualise these theoretical and critical approaches to development through a series of interlinked topics and ethnographic case studies. These take students beyond the idea of development as linear progression, or as a monolithic force acting on the world, and instead reveal a field fractured by contradictions, contestations and contingencies that is produced, reproduced and interpreted across multiple locations and cultural contexts.
|
15 credits |
|
Gender Theory in Practice
Gender Theory in Practice
15 credits
During the term you should acquire an overview of the relationship between anthropology, feminist theories and theoretical and applied issues within the field of development and politics. The emphasis will be on critical engagement and debate, and on a comparative approach to gender and gender systems of power in developed and developing countries. We will draw on the theories and debates covered in other modules to examine the implications of gender differences within specific economic and political systems.
|
15 credits |
|
Staff/Student Research Project
Staff/Student Research Project
15 credits
This is a hands-on research module aimed at providing students with grounded, meaningful research experience. This will take the form of participation in research led by staff with the aim of contributing to real, concrete outputs with public and/or academic audiences. The preparation for research will take the form of two day-long workshops in summer term, the research itself will take place over the summer, with a third writing up/dissemination workshop in the Autumn term of the following academic year. As with the Placement module, this will be a Level 6 module which takes place in the summer at the end of the 2nd year, with assessment submitted in the Autumn term of the 3rd year.
While specific research skills will vary depending upon the research project, they are envisaged to include fieldwork skills (EG - interviewing; participant observation; field notes; audio & video data gathering), research ethics training, software use (EG - NVivo; website design packages such as Wordpress; mapping software; film editing) along with dissemination related skills such as blogging or collaborative writing up of research for other forms of publication.
The aim of this course is to provide concrete skills and outputs that can be straightforwardly added to the CV's of students while also allowing them to participate in meaningful research. Depending upon the specificities of the research project - students will also be encouraged, where possible, to contribute towards the research design.
|
15 credits |
This programme is mainly taught through scheduled learning - a mixture of lectures, seminars and workshops. You’ll also be expected to undertake a significant amount of independent study. This includes carrying out required and additional reading, preparing topics for discussion, and producing essays or project work.
The following information gives an indication of the typical proportions of learning and teaching for each year of this programme*:
You’ll be assessed by a variety of methods, depending on your module choices. These include coursework, examinations, group work and projects.
The following information gives an indication of how you can typically expect to be assessed on each year of this programme*:
*Please note that these averages are based on enrolments for 2019/20. Each student’s time in teaching, learning and assessment activities will differ based on individual module choices. Find out more about how this information is calculated.
Year 3 option modules |
Module title |
Credits |
|
Anthropology of Art 2
Anthropology of Art 2
15 credits
This module offers you 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 the module Anthropology of Art 1, you will be expected to select your own topic for research. The topic may relate to areas such as:
- The social life of artistic objects and images (their production, consumption, circulation, interpretation, agency, etc.)
- The practice of an artist or art collective (especially those whose work relates to anthropological preoccupations)
- The ethnography of art institutions like galleries or museums (techniques of display, audiences, exhibitions, etc.)
- Cases of iconoclasm (in public monuments, for example)
Your research may make use of fieldwork methods (such as participant observation, interviews and photographic documentation) and/or the analysis of documents including visual (pictures, films, material artefacts) and written materials (museum archives, newspapers, essays, books, internet sites). The appropriate methods for your research will be determined by the topic, the time-frame, issues of access, etc. Once you have selected your topic, you should confirm its suitability with your module tutor before embarking on fieldwork.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology of Art 1
Anthropology of Art 1
30 credits
Arguably modern anthropology and modern art are close in terms of both their origins and their critical reflection on the relationships between images, objects and persons, and a concern with anthropological or ethnographic issues is often an explicit feature of contemporary artworks. But despite a long history of dealing with the so-called ‘art’ of other cultures, what does anthropology have to contribute to an understanding of the kinds of artworks you might find at Tate Modern today? Using ethnographic case studies this module will consider key anthropological approaches to art both historically and thematically, and will explore how art and anthropology are entangled with each other, including suggesting ways in which anthropology can productively learn from contemporary art.
|
30 credits |
|
Anthropology of Development
Anthropology of Development
15 credits
The module aims to provide students with a critical understanding of international development as a social, political and historical field, and of anthropology’s engagement with development and processes of planned social change. The early parts of the module provide students with an understanding of, the emergence of development as an idea, the architecture and infrastructure of aid, and introduce key theoretical approaches in the study of inequality. We also examine the tensions inherent in anthropology’s long and intimate relationship with development, through the early production of expert knowledge about tradition and culture; through its critical engagement with policy processes and planned interventions, and through the professional negotiation of the fields of development anthropology and the anthropology of development.
The module then goes on to contextualise these theoretical and critical approaches to development through a series of interlinked topics and ethnographic case studies. These take students beyond the idea of development as linear progression, or as a monolithic force acting on the world, and instead reveal a field fractured by contradictions, contestations and contingencies that is produced, reproduced and interpreted across multiple locations and cultural contexts.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology of Development
Anthropology of Development
15 credits
The module aims to provide students with a critical understanding of international development as a social, political and historical field, and of anthropology’s engagement with development and processes of planned social change. The early parts of the module provide students with an understanding of, the emergence of development as an idea, the architecture and infrastructure of aid, and introduce key theoretical approaches in the study of inequality. We also examine the tensions inherent in anthropology’s long and intimate relationship with development, through the early production of expert knowledge about tradition and culture; through its critical engagement with policy processes and planned interventions, and through the professional negotiation of the fields of development anthropology and the anthropology of development.
The module then goes on to contextualise these theoretical and critical approaches to development through a series of interlinked topics and ethnographic case studies. These take students beyond the idea of development as linear progression, or as a monolithic force acting on the world, and instead reveal a field fractured by contradictions, contestations and contingencies that is produced, reproduced and interpreted across multiple locations and cultural contexts.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology and the Environment
Anthropology and the Environment
15 credits
This module examines three areas of anthropological enquiry into human-environment relations: different societies’ experience of and thoughts about their biophysical surroundings (beliefs, practices, dwelling); human shaping of landscapes (living in balance with nature, enhancing or destroying it); and environmental politics, or political ecology (small and large scale resource conflict, science and policy processes, environmental movements). Each topic is examined through one or two key studies, drawn from different regions of the world (e.g. Amazonia, West Africa, Indonesia) and relating to different resources (e.g. forests, soil, water, oil). Throughout the module, we will also discuss the bearings of the anthropological ideas examined on public dismodules of environmentalism and on conservation policy.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology and Gender Theory
Anthropology and Gender Theory
15 credits
This module is concerned with social and cultural constructions and understandings of gender, sexuality and the body as discussed in anthropology and beyond. The main aim of the module is to develop a critical understanding of some of the major theoretical approaches to gender, sex and the body, as they have been and are relevant to anthropology. In European intellectual history ideas about the body have often revolved around the biological binary categories male and female. In this module, however, using a range of ethnographic examples we look at ways in which the idea of male and female is perceived, embodied and challenged, cross-culturally, in different contexts, and at different historical moments. The topics addressed range from work, performance and narrations of the self, to queer communities and families, and from biopolitics, and new technologies of the body/reproduction, the body, gender, and nation, and gender and globalisation. By the end of the module, you will be expected to be familiar with the main theoretical perspectives in anthropology on gender, sexuality and the related politics. You should also be aware of the historical changes which have marked the analysis of these concepts and be able to use ethnographic material as evidence for theoretical points.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology of Violence
Anthropology of Violence
15 credits
This module looks at the ways in which anthropologists have dealt with violence, how we explain it, the specific problems of researching this topic, the involvement of anthropologists in military projects and other issues. We will be looking at the practices of researching; writing and engaging with violence and the problems these pose contemporary anthropologists. Some of the readings, lectures and other sources we might look at in this module inevitably deal with issues, descriptions and images of violence. Please be aware of this before taking the module and if it’s an issue discuss this with module convenor sooner rather than later.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology and the Visual 1
Anthropology and the Visual 1
30 credits
Although ‘visual anthropology’ is usually taken as synonymous with a certain kind of ethnographic/ documentary filmmaking, this module will look at issues concerned with a broader sense of the visual and its use within anthropology through a focus on two media – photography and sound – both of which present a set of productive possibilities for anthropologists. In doing so it takes up Eliot Weinberger’s criticism of contemporary visual anthropology for adopting a narrow definition of its field and available tools, when the conjunction of ‘visual’ with ‘anthropology’ should open up a whole range of creative possibilities for conducting and presenting research.
|
30 credits |
|
Anthropology and the Visual Production Course
Anthropology and the Visual Production Course
30 credits
To understand some of the implications and practical concerns of communicating anthropological themes and issues through visual and aural, as well as written media. This is a production-based module and does not follow the usual lecture/seminar format. It is centered on the development of your own individual practical visual or sound project and seeing that through to completion, hopefully by the end of the term. As such the contact hours are mostly made up of one-to-one tutorials, although there will be some sessions when we meet as a whole group. We will have a group viewing session in the last week of the Spring Term. Above all else, the module requires you to engage in a process of practical production, not to take a few photographs, or record a bit of sound at the end of the term, but to develop and refine a project through all the various stages and forms necessary for its successful completion. Students typically produce several versions of the practical work as they refine their project over the module of the term.
In planning their project students should - if necessary - look at a practical ‘how to do it’ books, although technical advice will also be given in tutorial sessions. Even if you have had a good deal of photographic experience, this is likely to draw attention to issues you have not so far considered.
|
30 credits |
|
The Anthropology of Rights
The Anthropology of Rights
15 credits
The aim of this module is to introduce you to rights in terms of their philosophical foundations, the history and shape of the UN system and anthropological contributions. We will be exploring human rights and humanitarian law as bodies of law, institutions, systems of practice and ideologies – with particular focus on the issue of cultural relativism (historically the key stumbling block for anthropological engagement with rights) and cross-cultural experiences of engagement with, or resistance to, rights.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropology of Human Animal Relations
Anthropology of Human Animal Relations
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.
Animals are famously good to think with and feature in some of the most controversial thought experiments in anthropology. This course introduces a pantheon of anthropological animals, from Bororo parrots and Lele pangolin to Derrida’s cat and Haraway’s dogs. What does it mean if people can become animals and vice versa? How do we turn animal into edible? Can dogs be heroes?
We also look at the political economy of animal production, the largest industry in the world. The consumption of animals has recently entered an unprecedented phase of extreme exploitation epitomised by the factory farms of Euroamerica. At the same time, ‘wild’ animals have been commodified in zoos and rare species preserved in parks that exclude human inhabitants. How are we to understand these apparently contradictory impulses? Why are cows food and pandas poster children for the Worldwide Fund for Nature? As we adapt to new forms of biotechnology what is at stake in our exchanges with animals, of genes, organs, diseases and labour? The module uses a wide range of resources including film, ethnography and fiction to explore these and other questions.
|
15 or 30 credits |
|
Health, Medicine and Social Power
Health, Medicine and Social Power
15 credits
An introduction to key areas of medical anthropology, ranging from ideas about healing to social inequality and the ‘new biology’. The module addresses issues of biomedicine in the UK alongside alternative therapies and explanations of health/illness in different parts of the world, and approaches to the political economy. Specific sessions include the application of medical anthropology, ‘new’ diseases and technologies.
|
15 credits |
|
Anthropological Approaches to History
Anthropological Approaches to History
15 credits
This module explores the friction and common ground between History and Anthropology. In order to understand this productive but spirited dialogue, we historicise their relationship and overlapping but divergent theoretical perspectives and methods. Modern social anthropology was formed in the early twentieth century by a rejection of evolutionism and its replacement by synchronic site-specific studies, a move that effectively eclipsed history’s theoretical significance to the discipline. Yet, dissatisfaction with the ways in which synchronic functionalist ethnographic analyses ignored history and social change brought about lasting debates about continuity and rupture; the relation between pasts, presents and futures, and the wider humanistic turn of both disciplines under the theoretical influence of Marxism, feminism, and other critical social theory since the 1960s. This module is, in many ways, an examination of the possibilities of a historicised anthropology and poses several intertwined empirical and theoretical questions about the place of structure and agency, consciousness and historicity, and memory and silences within ethnography. Through historical ethnographies and selected social historiography, we aim to understand not only how to approach the past anthropologically, but also grasp ethnographically the uses of history as a collectivist political project implicated in nationalism, racist ideology, and categories like world heritage.
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15 credits |
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Ideology and the Secular
Ideology and the Secular
15 credits
Is Friedrich Nietzsche’s clarion call, ‘God is Dead’, still relevant in an increasingly reflexive cosmopolitan and pluralistic world? Starting with a critique of secularism as a self-evident category, this module seeks out ethnography that enriches our critical understandings of the misplaced distinction made between religious and secular domains.
In tracing the historical formation of the ‘secular’ - as a broad ideology with deep impact on the effects of the state on its subjects’ bodily dispositions, consciousness and desires - we approach anthropological questions of individual and social transformation through examining ethics, morality and the law in a variety of ‘secular’ contexts.
These contexts include, but are not limited to:
- Anthropological considerations of the ideological premises of mass political movements such as Nazism and Bolshevism;
- The everyday Kemalist state in Turkey
- The infrastructural power of fiscal authoritarianism
- The family resemblances between multiculturalism, Indirect Rule, and apartheid
- The very idea of the human/Humanism in prescriptive social engineering organised through the state apparatus and executed in the name of freedom and equality
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15 credits |
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Indian and Peasant Politics in Amazonia
Indian and Peasant Politics in Amazonia
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 looks at Amazonian societies from pre-history to the present – indigenous, peasant, colonial, developmentalist – and includes discussion of modern social movements (Landless Peoples Movement) as well as classic themes of Levi-Strauss's 'world on the wane', human ecology and extractivist economies.
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15 or 30 credits |
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Myth and Ritual
Myth and Ritual
15 credits
There was a time when myth and ritual were seen as products of the childhood of humankind, before Science came along and disenchanted everything, a time when people languished (or gloried, depending on one’s point of view) in a kind of poetic consciousness. Nowadays, anthropologists tend to assume myth and ritual are aspects of all human societies, our own included; what they can’t agree on however is why. What is it that myth and ritual actually do? Are they ways of resolving existential dilemmas? Or reflecting on the fact they can’t be resolved? Are they ways of establishing unquestionable authority? Forms of artistic self-expression? Media for political action? Or some combination of these?
This module will explore some of these questions, by way of (hopefully colourful and interesting) concrete case studies.
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15 credits |
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Urban Anthropology
Urban Anthropology
15 credits
As we enter the third millennium, the percentage of urban dwellers exceeds 50% of the world’s population. The sub-field of urban anthropology was born as ethnographers followed rural migrants to cities; but at the beginning of the 20th century, the emergence of anthropology as a professional discipline was intertwined with a fascination with the urban locus across a wide range of arts and social sciences.
Through historical and ethnographic perspectives this module considers the changing use and valorisation of different urban spaces at different times; how cities are represented; ideas of order and disorder, of public and domestic places, of control and resistance through carnival, informal economies and kinship networks. The module covers both third-world and Euro-American cities, and supplements theoretical discourses and ethnographies with films and novels.
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15 credits |
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Anthropology and the Visual Production Course
Anthropology and the Visual Production Course
30 credits
To understand some of the implications and practical concerns of communicating anthropological themes and issues through visual and aural, as well as written media. This is a production-based module and does not follow the usual lecture/seminar format. It is centered on the development of your own individual practical visual or sound project and seeing that through to completion, hopefully by the end of the term. As such the contact hours are mostly made up of one-to-one tutorials, although there will be some sessions when we meet as a whole group. We will have a group viewing session in the last week of the Spring Term. Above all else, the module requires you to engage in a process of practical production, not to take a few photographs, or record a bit of sound at the end of the term, but to develop and refine a project through all the various stages and forms necessary for its successful completion. Students typically produce several versions of the practical work as they refine their project over the module of the term.
In planning their project students should - if necessary - look at a practical ‘how to do it’ books, although technical advice will also be given in tutorial sessions. Even if you have had a good deal of photographic experience, this is likely to draw attention to issues you have not so far considered.
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30 credits |
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Environmental Anthropology
Environmental Anthropology
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 examines three areas of anthropological enquiry into human-environment relations:
- different societies’ experience of and thoughts about their biophysical surroundings (beliefs, practices, dwelling)
- human shaping of landscapes (living in balance with nature, enhancing or destroying it)
- environmental politics, or political ecology (small and large scale resource conflict, science and policy processes, environmental movements)
Each topic is examined through one or two key studies, drawn from different regions of the world (eg Amazonia, West Africa, Indonesia) and relating to different resources (eg forests, soil, water, oil).
Throughout the module, we will also discuss the bearings of the anthropological ideas examined on public discourses of environmentalism and on conservation policy.
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15 or 30 credits |
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Psychological Perspectives in Anthropology
Psychological Perspectives in Anthropology
15 credits
This module uses a range of data to focus on the relationship between Anthropology and Psychology. Although anthropology has often been described as a `bridge’ between the natural sciences and the humanities, the relationship between anthropology and psychology (or Psychoanalysis) has always been fraught with tension. This module explores these tensions and some attempts to overcome them.
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15 credits |
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Borders and Migration
Borders and Migration
30 credits
How can we develop critical knowledge about migration and borders? This module explores the multiple ways migration and borders are understood and experienced in different social, geographical, and political settings, as well as in different theoretical and discursive domains. Grounded in anthropological perspectives and methods, and branching out into film, literature, and art, the module aims to destabilise dominant understandings of migration and borders. In doing so, it critically unpacks core themes at the heart of contemporary debates on transnational movement – from race to belonging, from surveillance to gender. Throughout the module we will engage with a variety of theoretical, literary, and visual materials that focus on migrant lives and border crossings to develop a critical understanding of migration and the material, political, cultural, and linguistic borders that shape it.
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30 credits |
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Borders and Migration
Borders and Migration
15 credits
This module will consider the border politics involved in the making of 'transnational', diasporic', and 'local' communities. We will theorise the border as a material, political, cultural and linguistic boundary that is increasingly defining social life as well as engage with the experiences of those who cross borders. We will ask: How are borders constructed and contested? How do migrants experience borders? How is the discourse of citizenship destabilised when movement and borders become central heuristics by which to understand belonging and membership? Throughout the module we will read academic texts as well as engage with films and literature that focus on migrant lives and border crossings to develop a theoretical and practical knowledge of border politics in relationship to migratory flows.
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15 credits |
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Learning from Social Movements
Learning from Social Movements
15 credits
This module revolves around contemporary debates in the anthropology of social movements. It considers the contribution of ethnographic approaches to activism and protest to the theorisation of politics, collective action and social change. The anti-globalisation movement, #occupy, the anti-corruption movement in India, the anti-foreclosures movement in Spain (PAH), the Landless Workers' Movement, right-wing extremism, feminist reproductive health activists, independent-living activism, queer movements and the Indigenous Environmental Network are some of the examples that the module will explore. Rather than 'explaining away' these movements, the pedagogical orientation of the module is based on learning from them, i.e. devising ways of conceptualising their practice, methods and transformative power. The module will also consider, as a transversal issue, the question of 'engaged' or 'militant' research - and more broadly the relationship between the production of academic and activist knowledges.
The assessment is organised around student projects that will present, in a multimedia portfolio format, the result of research conducted about/with social movements.
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15 credits |
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Digital Anthropology
Digital Anthropology
15 credits
This module offers an introduction to theoretical debates and methods of digital anthropology. It combines an introduction to the debates that have shaped the field with practical sessions designed to familiarize learners with digital methodologies for anthropological research. As digital technologies transform contemporary experiences of subjectivity, embodiment, sociality and everyday life, the module uses anthropological tools and methods to think through digital technologies in a range of ethnographic contexts. Topics covered will reimagine the object of anthropology through digital ethnography, and explore how the purchase of digital futures and imaginaries remake anthropologists’ conceptual toolkits.
The module will combine an enquiry into the materialities and politics of digital infrastructures, devices and social media platforms with practical learning using digital methods to produce anthropological analysis. Practical sessions will develop independent research skills including research design and ethics, working with digital video, techniques of online data collection and digital qualitative and ethnographic analysis.
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15 credits |
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Staff/Student Research Project
Staff/Student Research Project
15 credits
This is a hands-on research module aimed at providing students with grounded, meaningful research experience. This will take the form of participation in research led by staff with the aim of contributing to real, concrete outputs with public and/or academic audiences. The preparation for research will take the form of two day-long workshops in summer term, the research itself will take place over the summer, with a third writing up/dissemination workshop in the Autumn term of the following academic year. As with the Placement module, this will be a Level 6 module which takes place in the summer at the end of the 2nd year, with assessment submitted in the Autumn term of the 3rd year.
While specific research skills will vary depending upon the research project, they are envisaged to include fieldwork skills (EG - interviewing; participant observation; field notes; audio & video data gathering), research ethics training, software use (EG - NVivo; website design packages such as Wordpress; mapping software; film editing) along with dissemination related skills such as blogging or collaborative writing up of research for other forms of publication.
The aim of this course is to provide concrete skills and outputs that can be straightforwardly added to the CV's of students while also allowing them to participate in meaningful research. Depending upon the specificities of the research project - students will also be encouraged, where possible, to contribute towards the research design.
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15 credits |
This programme is mainly taught through scheduled learning - a mixture of lectures, seminars and workshops. You’ll also be expected to undertake a significant amount of independent study. This includes carrying out required and additional reading, preparing topics for discussion, and producing essays or project work.
The following information gives an indication of the typical proportions of learning and teaching for each year of this programme*:
You’ll be assessed by a variety of methods, depending on your module choices. These include coursework, examinations, group work and projects.
The following information gives an indication of how you can typically expect to be assessed on each year of this programme*:
*Please note that these are averages are based on enrolments for 2018/19. Each student’s time in teaching, learning and assessment activities will differ based on individual module choices. Find out more about how this information is calculated.
An undergraduate honours degree is made up of 360 credits – 120 at Level 4, 120 at Level 5 and 120 at Level 6. If you are a full-time student, you will usually take Level 4 modules in the first year, Level 5 in the second, and Level 6 modules in your final year. A standard module is worth 30 credits. Some programmes also contain 15-credit half modules or can be made up of higher-value parts, such as a dissertation or a Major Project.
Please note that due to staff research commitments not all of these modules may be available every year.