Teaching

Anthropologists study what it means to be human and how human societies have changed over time. Cultural anthropology, as a specific subdiscipline, comparatively investigates the similarities and differences of contemporary societies. Anthropologists interrogate what most people take for granted—what each time and each place would see as normal or natural. The classic shorthand for the aim of the discipline is that it seeks to “make the strange familiar and the familiar, strange.”

ANT 112 surveys the defining questions, methods, and findings of contemporary cultural anthropology. We focus on ethnography as its hallmark method and product, demonstrating what this social scientific practice can contribute to human knowledge and action in today’s world. Through this survey, we develop a deeper understanding of human diversity and come to value diversity as a strength in the address of contemporary social problems.

All human cultures study themselves and others, seeking to make sense of humanity and their own place in human history. In the western academic tradition, the comprehensive and holistic study of humanity has coalesced into the discipline of anthropology. This course is the first in the sophomore series required for the major and minor in Anthropology: this course, ANT 210, reviews the history of anthropological thought from western antiquity to the mid-twentieth century, while the spring course, ANT 211, reviews contemporary theory from the mid-twentieth century to the present.​

The peoples and cultures of Africa and its diaspora are inherently global. They are, and always have been, central to world events. This course lays the groundwork for an interdisciplinary appreciation of the place of Africa and Africans in human history and current affairs. 
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While one semester is clearly insufficient for a comprehensive study of the continent, its peoples, and its diaspora, the course selects as foci three pressing contemporary topics shaping life and cultural experience in Africa: religion, urbanization, and infrastructural development. Each focal topic also centers on an ethnography sited in one of the three major sub-Saharan regions: Western, Southern, and Eastern Africa. Alongside and through these three topical and geographical foci, other classic topics are considered, including artistic production, politics and governance, personhood and kinship, and health and medicine. In this way, the course seeks to achieve both breadth and depth in this introduction to the African continent and its peoples.

Introduction to theory and practice of anthropologist working with medical personnel or investigating health related personnel or investigating health related problem in a cross-cultural perspective.

Prerequisite: Nine hours of social or behavioral sciences including ANT 111 OR 112 OR SOC 100 OR BIO 101; or instructor permission.