Detailed descriptions of Undergraduate and Graduate courses may be found under the accordion headings below. Additional information and registration details, including days and times, and classroom locations, may be obtained from the Course Directory and Vergil.
Fall 2023 Course Listings
Projected Registration Dates for Fall 2023: Monday, April 17, 2023, for more information visit: https://www.registrar.columbia.edu/content/registration-dates-2022-2023
Refer to the online Directory of Classes http://www.columbia.edu/cu/bulletin/uwb/ for maximum course limits, restrictions, classrooms, and days and times courses will be offered.
COURSES IN SOCIOCULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY:
Anthropology UN1002x THE INTERPRETATION OF CULTURE. 3 pts. Instructor: Naor Ben-Yehoyada. The anthropological approach to the study of culture and human society. Case studies from ethnography are used in exploring the universality of cultural categories (social organization, economy, law, belief system, art, etc.) and the range of variation among human societies. Recitation section required. Days and times will be announced a few weeks before the start of term. Please refer to the Directory of Classes for detail information http://www.columbia.edu/cu/bulletin/uwb/.
Anthropology UN2004x INTRODUCTION TO SOCIAL AND CULTURAL THEORY. 3 pts. Instructor: John Pemberton.
This course presents students with crucial theories of the social, paying particular attention at the outset to classic social theory from the early 20th century. It thus traces a trajectory of thought concerning signification and exchange from Ferdinand de Saussure, Émile Durkheim, Marcel Mauss, and Karl Marx, before moving on to the historiographic reflections of Max Weber and the structuralist ethnographic elaborations of Claude Lévi-Strauss, revisiting occasionally observations from Franz Boas, founder of Anthropology at Columbia, and turning as well to the expansive critical thought of W.E.B. Du Bois. We conclude with Kathleen Stewart’s A Space on the Side of the Road—an ethnography of late 20th century Appalachia and the haunted remains of coal-mining country—with its depictions of an uncanny otherness within dominant American cultural narratives.
Anthropology UN3040x ANTHROPOLOGICAL THEORY. 3 pts. Instructor: Brian Larkin. Comprehensive and in-depth engagement with foundational and contemporary theoretical concepts and texts in Anthropology. Required of all Barnard students majoring in Anthropology (including specialized tracks). Permission of instructor required for non-majors. Not open to First Year students. Prerequisite: an introductory (1000 level) course in Anthropology.
Anthropology UN3321x INFRASTRUCTURES. 4 pts. Instructor: Brian Larkin. Infrastructures are the built networks moving goods, commodities, people, energy, waste organizing human action in modern societies. This course critically examines the work of infrastructures globally. It examines issues of urbanism, racial infrastructures, infrastructural breakdown and emergency, postcolonial infrastructures, climate change, and extraction.
Anthropology UN3808x PUNISHMENT CULTURE. 4 pts. Instructor: Kaya Williams. What is punishment, and what might attention to punitive practices teach us about the cultures in which they are used? Modern American culture is so saturated with punishment that it is difficult to know where to begin such an investigation. From childhood education to mass incarceration and from the crafting of financial futures to the training of horses and dogs, punishment is ubiquitous and often unquestioned. In many cases, punishment is the thread that connects allegedly disparate institutions and produces allegedly unforeseen forms of violence. In this course we will question both the practice and its prevalence, combining a genealogy of the concept with case studies in its modern use.
Anthropology UN3861x ANTHROPOLOGY OF THE ANTHROPOCENE. 4 pts. Instructor. Paige West. This course focuses on the political ecology of the Anthropocene. As multiple publics become increasingly aware of the extensive and accelerated rate of current global environmental change, and the presence of anthropogenesis in ever expanding circumstances, we need to critically analyze the categories of thought and action being developed in order to carefully approach this change. Our concern is thus not so much the Anthropocene as an immutable fact, inevitable event, or definitive period of time (significant though these are), but rather for the political, social, and intellectual consequences of this important idea. Thus, we seek to understand the creativity of The Anthropocene as a political, rhetorical, and social category. We also aim to examine the networks of capital and power that have given rise to the current state of planetary change, the strategies for ameliorating those changes, and how these are simultaneously implicated in the rhetorical creation of The Anthropocene.
Barnard UN3871x SENIOR THESIS SEMINAR I: 4 pts. Instructors: Paige West, Lesley Sharp, Mara Green, and Camilla Sturm. Prerequisites: Limited to Barnard Anthropology Seniors. Offered every Fall. Discussion of research methods and planning and writing of a Senior Essay in Anthropology will accompany research on problems of interest to students, culminating in the writing of individual Senior Essays. The advisory system requires periodic consultation and discussion between the student and her adviser as well as the meeting of specific deadlines set by the department each semester. Limited to Barnard Anthropology Seniors Only.
Anthropology UN3879x THE MEDICAL IMAGINARY. 4 pts. Instructor: Lesley Sharp. How might we speak of an imaginary within biomedicine? This course interrogates the ideological underpinnings of technocratic medicine in contexts that extend from the art of surgery to patient participation in experimental drug trials. Issues of scale will prove especially important in our efforts to track the medical imaginary from the whole, fleshy body to the molecular level. Key themes include everyday ethics; ways of seeing and knowing; suffering and hope; and subjectivity in a range of medical and sociomedical contexts. Non-Anthropology majors require the permission of the instructor prior to registration; no first-year students.
Anthropology UN3888x ECOCRITICISM FOR THE END TIMES. 4 pts. Instructor: Marilyn Ivy. This seminar aims to show what an anthropologically informed, ecocritical cultural studies can offer in this moment of intensifying ecological calamity. The course will not only engage significant works in anthropology, ecocriticism, philosophy, literature, politics, and aesthetics to think about the environment, it will also bring these works into engaged reflection on living in the end times (borrowing cultural critic Slavoj Zizeks phrase). The seminar will thus locate critical perspectives on the environment within the contemporary worldwide ecological crisis, emphasizing the ethnographic realities of global warming, debates on nuclear power and energy, and the place of nature. Drawing on the professor’s long experience in Japan and current research on the aftermath of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant disaster, the seminar will also take care to unpack the notion of end times, with its apocalyptic implications, through close considerations of works that take on the question of ecocatastrophe in our times. North American and European perspectives, as well as international ones (particularly ones drawn from East Asia), will give the course a global reach. The permission of the instructor is required. MUST email for permission at [email protected].
Anthropology BC3911x THE SOCIAL CONTEXTS OF U.S. IMMIGRATION LAW AND POLICY. 4 pts. Instructor: JC Salyer. Examines the historical and contemporary social, economic, and political factors that shape immigration law and policy along with the social consequences of those laws and policies. Addresses the development and function of immigration law and aspects of the immigration debate including unauthorized immigration, anti-immigration sentiments, and critiques of immigration policy. The permission of the instructor is required. Notes: Priority: Jr/Sr. & students w/related majors or thesis topics.
Anthropology BC3932x CLIMATE CHANGE, GLOBAL MIGRATION, AND HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE ANTHROPOCENE. 4 pts. Instructor: JC Salyer. Examines the historical and contemporary social, economic, and political factors that shape immigration law and policy along with the social consequences of those laws and policies. Addresses the development and function of immigration law and aspects of the immigration debate including unauthorized immigration, anti-immigration sentiments, and critiques of immigration policy. The permission of the instructor is required. Notes: Priority: Jr/Sr. & students w/related majors or thesis topics.
Anthropology UN3997x SUPERVISED INDIVIDUAL RESEARCH. 2-6 pts. STAFF. Prerequisite: the written permission of the staff member under whose supervision the research will be conducted. The permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology UN3999x SENIOR THESIS SEMINAR IN ANTHROPOLOGY. 4 pts. Instructor: Lila Abu-Lughod. Students must have declared a major in Anthropology prior to registration. Students must have a 3.6 GPA in the major and a preliminary project concept in order to be considered. Interested students must communicate/meet with thesis instructor in the previous spring about the possibility of taking the course during the upcoming academic year. Additionally, expect to discuss with the instructor at the end of the fall term whether your project has progressed far enough to be completed in the spring term. If it has not, you will exit the seminar after one semester, with a grade based on the work completed during the fall term. This two-term course is a combination of a seminar and a workshop that will help you conduct research, write, and present an original senior thesis in anthropology. Students who write theses are eligible to be considered for departmental honors. The first term of this course introduces a variety of approaches used to produce anthropological knowledge and writing; encourages students to think critically about the approaches they take to researching and writing by studying model texts with an eye to the ethics, constraints, and potentials of anthropological research and writing; and gives students practice in the seminar and workshop formats that are key to collegial exchange and refinement of ideas. During the first term, students complete a few short exercises that will culminate in a substantial draft of one discrete section of their senior project (18-20 pages) plus a detailed outline of the expected work that remains to be done (5 pages). The spring sequence of the anthropology thesis seminar is a writing intensive continuation of the fall semester, in which students will have designed the research questions, prepared a full thesis proposal that will serve as a guide for the completion of the thesis and written a draft of one chapter. Only those students who expect to have completed the fall semester portion of the course are allowed to register for the spring; final enrollment is contingent upon successful completion of first semester requirements. In spring semester, weekly meetings will be devoted to the collaborative refinement of drafts, as well as working through issues of writing (evidence, voice, authority etc.). All enrolled students are required to present their project at a symposium in the late spring, and the final grade is based primarily on successful completion of the thesis/ capstone project. Note: Columbia College & General Studies Majors by instructor’s permission only.
Anthropology GU4196x MEXICO’S DISAPPEARED PRACTICUM. 4 pts. Instructor: Claudio Lomnitz. This practicum is an exercise in engaged pedagogy. The academic work we do will be conducted for the benefit of the cause of Mexico's now over 110,000 disappeared persons. Students will be engaged in a sustained research effort to development a "context analysis" of disappearances in the state of Zacatecas (Mexico)-- an exercise in social study that focuses on the economic, political, social, and criminological context in which disappearances occur. Research is done in coordination with Mexico's National Commission for the Search of the Disappeared. Alongside the practical, real-world, objective, this Practicum is designed to perfect research skills in the social sciences.
NOTE: Majors & MAs students preferred; Juniors & Seniors preferred over Freshmen & Sophomores. The permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology GU4202x ISLAMIC LAW. 3 pts. Instructor: Brinkley Messick. An introductory survey of the history and contents of the Shari'a, combined with a critical review of Orientalist and contemporary scholarship on Islamic law. In addition to models for the ritual life, we will examine a number of social, economic, and political constructs contained in Shari`a doctrine, including the concept of an Islamic state, and we also will consider the structure of litigation in courts. Seminar paper.
Anthropology GU4653x ART BEYOND AESTHETICS: DECOLONIZING APPROACHES TO REPRESENTATION. 4 pts. Instructor: Elizabeth Povinelli. This course is a combination of lectures, seminar participation, and group practicums which probes the possibility of a decolonial art research practice. This course introduces students to western approaches to politics and art through a sustained engagement with critical Indigenous and anticolonial theories of human relations to the more-than-human world. It is a mixture of lectures, class discussion, and individual practicums which lead to final projects that combine image and text. The permission of the instructor is required. ENROLLMENT PRIORITIES: Majors preferred.
COURSES IN ARCHAEOLOGY:
Anthropology UN1007x THE ORIGINS OF HUMAN SOCIETY. 3pts. Instructor: Camilla Sturm. An archaeological perspective on the evolution of human social life from the first bipedal step of our ape ancestors to the establishment of large sedentary villages. While traversing six million years and six continents, our explorations will lead us to consider such major issues as the development of human sexuality, the origin of language, the birth of “art” and religion, the domestication of plants and animals, and the foundations of social inequality. Designed for anyone who happens to be human. Recitation section required. Please refer to the Directory of Classes. Recitation section required. Day/time will be announced a few weeks before the start of term. Please refer to the Directory of Classes http://www.columbia.edu/cu/bulletin/uwb/
Anthropology UN2031x CORPSE LIFE: ANTHROPOLOGICAL HISTORIES OF THE DEAD. 3pts. Instructor: Zoe Crossland. This class fulfils the Global Core requirement. The awareness of mortality seems to be a peculiarly human affliction, and its study has been a key theme of 20th century philosophy. This class will address the question of human finitude from outside of the western philosophical tradition. Anthropologists have shown that humans deal with the challenge of death in diverse ways, which nevertheless share some common themes. During the semester we’ll look at case studies from across the world and over time and also explore the ethics and politics of disturbing the dead. The evidence of past human mortuary assemblages will provide some of our key primary texts. We’ll analyze famous burials such as those of Tutankhamun, the Lord of Sipan, and Emperor Qin’s mausoleum, containing the celebrated terracotta warriors, but we’ll also consider less well-known mortuary contexts. We will also critically examine the dead body as a privileged and sometimes contentious site for anthropological research, situating its study within the broader purview of anthropological theories of the body's production and constitution.
Anthropology UN3007x HOLY LANDS, UNHOLY HISTORIES: ARCHAEOLOGY BEFORE THE BIBLE. 3 pts. Instructor: Brian Boyd. Note that this is not a class on “biblical archaeology”. It is a course about the politics of archaeology in the context of Israel/Palestine, and the wider southwest Asia region. This course provides a critical overview of prehistoric archaeology in southwest Asia (or the Levant - the geographical area from Lebanon in the north to the Sinai in the south, and from the middle Euphrates in Syria to southern Jordan). It has been designed to appeal to anthropologists, historians, and students interested in the Ancient Mediterranean and Middle Eastern Studies. The course is divided into two parts. First, a social and political history of archaeology, emphasizing how the nature of current theoretical and practical knowledge has been shaped and defined by previous research traditions and, second, how the current political situation in the region impinges upon archaeological practice. Themes include: the dominance of "biblical archaeology" and the implications for Palestinian archaeology, Islamic archaeology, the impact of European contact from the Crusades onwards, and the development of prehistory.
Anthropology UN3151x LIVING WITH ANIMALS: ANTHROPOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES. 4 pts. Instructor: Hannah Chazin. This course examines how humans and animals shape each other’s lives. We will explore the astounding diversity of human-animal relationships in time and space, tracing the ways animals have made their impact on human societies (and vice-versa). Using contemporary ethnographic, historical, and archaeological examples from a variety of geographical regions and chronological periods, this class will consider how humans and animals live and make things, and the ways in which humans have found animals “good to think with”. In this course, we will also discuss how knowledge about human-animal relationships in the past might change contemporary and future approaches to living with animals. Instructor’s permission is required. Registration priority: Anthropology majors/concentrators, 4th year students.
Anthropology UN3663x THE ANCIENT TABLE: ARCHAEOLOGY OF COOKING. 3 pts. Instructor: Camilla Sturm. Prerequisites: None Humans don’t just eat to live. The ways we prepare, eat, and share our food is a complex reflection of our histories, environments, and ideologies. Whether we prefer coffee or tea, cornbread or challah, chicken breast or chicken feet, our tastes are expressive of social ties and social boundaries, and are linked to ideas of family and of foreignness. How did eating become such a profoundly cultural experience? This seminar takes an archaeological approach to two broad issues central to eating: First, what drives human food choices both today and in the past? Second, how have social forces shaped practices of food acquisition, preparation, and consumption (and how, in turn, has food shaped society)? We will explore these questions from various evolutionary, physiological, and cultural viewpoints, highlighted by information from the best archaeological and historic case studies. Topics that will be covered include the nature of the first cooking, beer-brewing and feasting, writing of the early recipes, gender roles and ‘domestic’ life, and how a national cuisine takes shape. Through the course of the semester we will explore food practices from Pleistocene Spain to historic Monticello, with particular emphasis on the earliest cuisines of China, Mesoamerica, and the Mediterranean. The permission of the instructor is required. Notes: Non-Anthro Majors need instructor's permission. No First-years.
ANTH UN3823x ARCHAEOLOGY ENGAGED. 4 pts. Instructor: Terence D’Altroy. This course provides a panoramic, but intensive, inquiry into the ways that archaeology and its methods for understanding the world have been marshaled for debate in issues of public interest. It is designed to examine claims to knowledge of the past through the lenses of alternative epistemologies and a series of case-based problems that range from the academic to the political, legal, cultural, romantic, and fraudulent.
ANHS GU4001x THE ANCIENT EMPIRES. 3 pts. Instructor: Terence D’Altroy. The principal goal of this course is to examine the nature and histories of a range of early empires in a comparative context. In the process, we will examine influential theories that have been proposed to account for the emergence and trajectories of those empires. Among the theories are the core-periphery, world-systems, territorial-hegemonic, tributary-capitalist, network, and IEMP approaches. Five regions of the world have been chosen, from the many that could provide candidates: Rome (the classic empire), New Kingdom Egypt, Qin China, Aztec Mesoamerica, and Inka South America. These empires have been chosen because they represent a cross-section of polities ranging from relatively simple and early expansionist societies to the grand empires of the Classical World, and the most powerful states of the indigenous Americas. There are no prerequisites for this course, although students who have no background in Anthropology, Archaeology, History, or Classics may find the course material somewhat more challenging than students with some knowledge of the study of early societies. There will be two lectures per week, given by the professor.
Projected Registration Dates for Fall 2023: Monday, April 17, 2023, for more information visit: https://www.registrar.columbia.edu/content/registration-dates-2022-2023
Refer to the online Directory of Classes http://www.columbia.edu/cu/bulletin/uwb/ for maximum course limits, restrictions, classrooms, and days and times courses will be offered.
COURSES IN SOCIOCULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY:
Anthropology GU4196x MEXICO’S DISAPPEARED PRACTICUM. 4 pts. Instructor: Claudio Lomnitz. This practicum is an exercise in engaged pedagogy. The academic work we do will be conducted for the benefit of the cause of Mexico's now over 110,000 disappeared persons. Students will be engaged in a sustained research effort to development a "context analysis" of disappearances in the state of Zacatecas (Mexico)-- an exercise in social study that focuses on the economic, political, social, and criminological context in which disappearances occur. Research is done in coordination with Mexico's National Commission for the Search of the Disappeared. Alongside the practical, real-world, objective, this Practicum is designed to perfect research skills in the social sciences.
NOTE: Majors & MAs students preferred; Juniors & Seniors preferred over Freshmen & Sophomores. The permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology GU4202x ISLAMIC LAW. 3 pts. Instructor: Brinkley Messick. An introductory survey of the history and contents of the Shari'a, combined with a critical review of Orientalist and contemporary scholarship on Islamic law. In addition to models for the ritual life, we will examine a number of social, economic, and political constructs contained in Shari`a doctrine, including the concept of an Islamic state, and we also will consider the structure of litigation in courts. Seminar paper.
Anthropology GU4653x ART BEYOND AESTHETICS: DECOLONIZING APPROACHES TO REPRESENTATION. 4 pts. Instructor: Elizabeth Povinelli. This course is a combination of lectures, seminar participation, and group practicums which probes the possibility of a decolonial art research practice. This course introduces students to western approaches to politics and art through a sustained engagement with critical Indigenous and anticolonial theories of human relations to the more-than-human world. It is a mixture of lectures, class discussion, and individual practicums which lead to final projects that combine image and text. The permission of the instructor is required. ENROLLMENT PRIORITIES: Majors preferred.
Anthropology GR5201x PRIN/APPL OF SOCIETY & CULTURE. 3 pts. Instructor: Ellen Marakowitz. Prerequisites: graduate standing. Introductory survey of major concepts and areas of research in social and cultural anthropology. Emphasis is on both the field, as it is currently constituted and its relationship to other scholarly and professional disciplines. Required for students in Anthropology Department's master degree program and for students in the graduate programs of other departments and professional schools desiring an introduction in this field. This course is open to MA students in Social Cultural Anthropology. Other graduate students must email Professor Marakowitz at [email protected]. Undergraduate students are not allowed to enroll in this course.
Anthropology GR6038x PLACE, SPACE, NATURE. 3 pts. Instructor: Paige West. This class examines the social production of space, place, and nature. Three discursive and material fields that must be understood if we are to practice a conceptually rigorous and politically engaged contemporary anthropology. In the course, we will examine how these fields have recently been studied, described, conceptualized, and theorized. We will explore these ideas through the reading of works by anthropologists, historians, and geographers, looking at how the changing nature of places affects both the discipline of anthropology and the ways in which anthropologists conduct research in places. Prerequisites: the instructor's permission.
Anthropology GR6070x MAKING ETHNOG: METHOD & WRITING. 3 pts. Instructor: TBA. This course begins with two central and related epistemological problems in conducting ethnographic research: first, the notion that objects of scientific research are ‘made’ through adopting a particular relational stance and asking certain kinds of questions. From framing a research problem and choosing a ‘research context’ story to tell, to the kinds of methods one selects to probe such a problem, the ‘how’ and ‘what’ – or means and content – are inextricably intertwined. A second epistemological problem concerns the artifice of reality, and the nebulous distinction between truth and fiction, no less than the question of where or with whom one locates such truth. With these issues framing the course, we will work through some key themes and debates in anthropology from the perspective of methodology, ranging from subject/object liminality to incommensurability and radical alterity to the politics of representation. Students will design an ethnographic project of their choosing and conduct research throughout the term, applying different
methodological approaches popular in anthropology and the social sciences more generally, such as participant observation, semi-structured interview, diary-keeping and note-taking. Intended for MAs in ANTH & Grad students in other Depts. The instructor’s permission is required. Undergraduate students are not allowed to enroll in this course.
Anthropology GR6089x WASTE AND LEFTOVERS. 3 pts. Instructor: Catherine Fennell. Generations of anthropologists have seized upon waste as an object to think through issues as wide-ranging as labor divisions, religious devotion, and processes of social classification and value production. In recent years the discipline has renewed attention to this object by way of puzzling through how apparently intensifying global processes of industrialization, consumption, and extraction shape contemporary politics and ecological sensibilities. This seminar charts some of these moves within and beyond our discipline by inviting students to consider how and to what ends societies work through wasted things but also other kinds of durable leftovers (i.e. “ruins,” “byproducts,” “rubble,” “remainders” etc). Of particular concern for us will be the production and (re)appropriation of things that defy strict classification as “waste,” that is, as things imagined to be readily and permanently ejected from a social group or order. Students will read seminal texts on waste, excess, abjection, and reappropriation alongside ethnographic and historical monographs that take up these themes.
The instructor’s permission is required. ENROLLMENT PRIORITIES: Graduate students in discipline or demonstrate investment in topic. PREREQUISITE COURSES: If out of discipline student should be able to show instructor that they have relevant coursework or experience on the topic.
Anthropology GR6126x SEMIOTICS I. 3 pts. Instructor: Elizabeth Povinelli. This course examines the canonical texts of modern semiology and semiotics from the perspective of anthropological methods and theories. Beginning with an extensive examination of the works of Ferdinand de Saussure and Charles Sanders Peirce, the course examines the theoretical elaborations and movements of structuralism and pragmatism through the 1960s. The instructor’s permission is required. Undergraduate students are not allowed to enroll in this course.
Anthropology GR6301x ANIMAL ETHOS. 3 pts. Instructor: Lesley Sharp. This seminar interrogates and challenges assumptions regarding the human/nature divide, drawing on classic and contemporary writings within anthropology, science studies, genetics, laboratory sciences, bioethics, and moral philosophy. Of special concern are the meanings assigned to nature, species integrity, interspecies proximity, and the moral boundaries of science where animals become involved.
ANME GR6406x THE MODERN STATE AND THE COLONIAL SUBJECT. 3 pts. Instructor: Mahmood Mamdani. On the development of legal thought on the colonial subject. Focus on the American Indian in the New World, and subjugated peoples in the Ottoman Empire, in British India and in tropical and southern Africa.
ANTH GR6412x MAJOR DEBATES IN THE STUDY OF AFRICA. 3 pts. Instructor: Mahmood Mamdani.
Anthropology GR6601x QUESTIONS-ANTHROP THRY I: TEXTS. 3 pts. Instructor: Claudio Lomnitz. Presents students with critical theories of society, paying particular attention to classic continental social theory of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. We will trace a trajectory through important French and German writings essential for any understanding of the modern discipline of anthropology: from Saussure through Durkheim and Mauss, Marx, Weber, and on to the structuralist elaboration of these theoretical perspectives in Claude Lévi-Strauss, always bearing in mind the relationship of these theories to contemporary anthropology. We come last to Foucault and affiliated theorists as successors both to French structuralism and to German social theory and its concerns with modernity, rationality, and power. Throughout the readings, we will give special care to questions of signification as they inform anthropological inquiry, and we will be alert to the historical contexts that situate the discipline of anthropology today. This course is only open to 1st-yaer PhD Ant students. Others not allowed.
Anthropology GR6649x DARK ECOLOGIES: ECOCRITICAL THOUGHT NOW. 3 pts. Instructor: Marilyn Ivy. This seminar aims to disclose what an anthropologically informed, ecocritical cultural studies can offer in this moment of intensifying ecological calamity. With global warming and associated crises of pollution, habitat and species extinction, new forms of disease, and the ongoing issue of the nuclear, there is a pervasive anxiety about the fate of the earth and, with it, life itself. How can ecocritical thought grapple with this “great unraveling,” as ecotheorist Joanna Macy has put it? This seminar will engage significant works in anthropology, ecocriticism, philosophy, literature, political thought, and art to help us think about this central question. Readings will include works by Morton, Bonneuil and Fressoz, Bennett, Zizek, Kohn, Descola, Stengers, Haraway, Latour, Macy, and others. The permission of the instructor is required. Undergraduate students are not allowed to enroll in this course.
COURSES IN ARCHAEOLOGY:
ANHS GU4001x THE ANCIENT EMPIRES. 3 pts. Instructor: Terence D’Altroy. The principal goal of this course is to examine the nature and histories of a range of early empires in a comparative context. In the process, we will examine influential theories that have been proposed to account for the emergence and trajectories of those empires. Among the theories are the core-periphery, world-systems, territorial-hegemonic, tributary-capitalist, network, and IEMP approaches. Five regions of the world have been chosen, from the many that could provide candidates: Rome (the classic empire), New Kingdom Egypt, Qin China, Aztec Mesoamerica, and Inka South America. These empires have been chosen because they represent a cross-section of polities ranging from relatively simple and early expansionist societies to the grand empires of the Classical World, and the most powerful states of the indigenous Americas. There are no prerequisites for this course, although students who have no background in Anthropology, Archaeology, History, or Classics may find the course material somewhat more challenging than students with some knowledge of the study of early societies. There will be two lectures per week, given by the professor.
ANTH GR6051x VALUE, OBJECTS, AND MEANING. 3 pts. Instructor: Hannah Chazin. This course explores how anthropologists have engaged with the question of value as means of understanding and comparing human social engagement with the creation, circulation, and consumption of objects and ideas. In doing so, this course will read classical anthropological texts concerned with exchange, social meaning and action and consider a variety of topics of anthropological interest such as debt, commodities, fetishes, and money. In addition, we will read from a variety of other theoretical literatures that have informed anthropological discussions about the relationship between value, materiality, and semiotics. Instructor’s permission is required. The permission of the instructor is required. Undergraduate students are not allowed to enroll in this course.
COURSES IN MUSEUM ANTHROPOLOGY:
Anthropology GR5361x ETHICAL ISSUES IN MUSEUMS. 3 pts. Instructor: Sally Yerkovich. Ethical questions about museum activities are legion, yet they are usually only discussed when they become headlines in newspapers. At the same time, people working in museums make decisions with ethical and legal implications regularly and seldom give these judgments even little thought. In part, this is due to the fact that many of these decisions are based upon values that become second nature. This course will explore ethical issues that arise in all areas of a museum's operations from governance and management to collections acquisition, conservation, and deaccessioning. We will examine the issues that arise when the ownership of objects in a museum's are questioned; the ethical considerations involved in retention, restitution and repatriation; and what decolonization means for museums.
This course is required for all Museum Anthropology M.A. students. Other graduate students: The permission of the instructor is required. Undergraduate students are not allowed to enroll in this course.
Anthropology GR6352x MUSEUM ANTHROPOLOGY: HISTORY & THEORY. 3 pts. Instructor: Brian Boyd. This course will consider museums as reflectors of social priorities which store important objects and display them in ways that present significant cultural messages. Students visit several New York museums to learn how a museum functions. Required: MUSA students. Other graduate students MUST have the permission of the instructor.
Anthropology GR6652x MUSA DIGITAL MEDIA, MATERIALITY & PRACTICE. 3 pts. Instructor: Marco Castro. Class sessions will include the discussion of assigned readings, multimedia, and digital resources, as well as short lectures. Each student will co-lead one discussion section during the term. During most classes there will be presentation and discussion of student assignments. In this course we will learn how to digitally map and visualize museum systems and use this knowledge to facilitate a visitor’s journey from thinking to making. In the first part of the semester readings, class discussion and weekly “experiments” will be used to investigate how mapping, sketching, and modeling techniques can help develop sustainable frameworks for exhibition. In the second part of the semester we will begin modeling solutions and use these models to refine the way we communicate them to various stakeholders and audiences. Ultimately, the course aims to help students clearly articulate their thinking, explore ways of planning and communicating solutions and develop new models of engagement and action in an exhibition context. The class will combine lectures, seminars, field observation and prototyping.
Anthropology GR9110x MUSEUM ANTHROPOL INTERNSHIP I. 3-9 pts. An internship arranged through the Museum Anthropology program of 10 hrs/week (for 3 credits) or 20 hrs/week (for 6). Involves meaningful work, requires keeping a journal and writing a paper at the completion of the semester. Not to be taken without permission of the program directors, usually after completing the Museum Anthropology core courses.
Anthropology GR9110x MUSEUM ANTHROPOL INTERNSHIP II. 3-9 pts. An internship arranged through the Museum Anthropology program of 10 hrs/week (for 3 credits) or 20 hrs/week (for 6). Involves meaningful work, requires keeping a journal and writing a paper at the completion of the semester. Not to be taken without permission of the program directors, usually after completing the Museum Anthropology core courses.
SUPERVISED INDIVIDUAL RESEARCH COURSES IN SOCIAL CULTURAL ANTROPOLOGY & ARCHAEOLOGY
Anthropology GR9101x RESEARCH IN SOCIAL/CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY. 3-9 pts. STAFF. Individual research and tutorial in archaeology for advanced graduate students. Prerequisites: the instructor’s permission.
Anthropology GR9102x RESEARCH IN ARCHAEOLOGY. 3-9 pts. STAFF. Individual research and tutorial in archaeology for advanced graduate students. Prerequisites: the instructor’s permission.
Anthropology GR9105x RESEARCH IN SPECIAL FIELDS. 3-9 pts. STAFF. Individual research and tutorial in archaeology for advanced graduate students. Prerequisites: the instructor’s permission.
Anthropology GR9112x RSCH IN ARCHEOL METHOD/THEORY. 3-9 pts. STAFF. Individual research and tutorial in archaeological method and theory for advanced graduate students. Prerequisites: the instructor’s permission.
Anthropology GR9999x WEDNESDAY SEMINAR. 0 pts. Instructor: Catherine Fennell. Reports of ongoing research are presented by staff members, students, and special guests. All anthropology graduate students are required to attend.
Summer 2023 Course Listings
Columbia University Summer Session 2023: Applications are now open! (Learn More)
2023 Summer Courses in Anthropology
Ellen Marakowitz, Director of Summer Session, Department of Anthropology
Contact Information: [email protected]
Columbia University
School of Professional Studies
203 Lewisohn Hall
2970 Broadway, MC 4119
New York, NY 10027
https://summer.sps.columbia.edu/courses/summer-courses
[email protected]
Contact Us: 212-854-9666
For course sessions, registration dates, descriptions, meeting days and times, and other information, please visit https://summer.sps.columbia.edu/courses/summer-courses/anthropology or the directory of classes at http://www.columbia.edu/cu/bulletin/uwb/
Session A Courses
Anth 1002s (001) The Interpretation of Culture, Instructor: Neil Savishinsky
Anth 3009s The Anthropology of Islam, Instructor: Anna Reumert
Anth 3722s The Anthropology of Violence, Instructor: Juan Carlos Mazariegos
Anth 3751s Personhood, Instructor: Maria Jose De Abreu
Anth 4181s Qualitative Methods of Anthropology, Instructor: Maria Malmstrom
Session B Courses
Anth 1002s (002) The Interpretation of Culture, Instructor: Maxine Weisgrau
Anth 4004s African American Ny: Histories and Archaeologies, Instructor: Allison Mcgovern
Spring 2023 Course Listings
For information on class days and times, enrollment limits, enrollment status, course fees and classroom locations, visit the Online Directory of Classes at http://www.columbia.edu/cu/bulletin/uwb/
Registration begins for most Schools on Monday, November 14, 2022
COURSES IN SOCIOCULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY:
Anthropology UN1002y THE INTERPRETATION OF CULTURE. 3 pts. Instructor: Syantani Chatterjee. The anthropological approach to the study of culture and human society. Case studies from ethnography are used in exploring the universality of cultural categories (social organization, economy, law, belief system, art, etc.) and the range of variation among human societies. Mandatory recitation sections: TBA.
Anthropology UN1009y INTRODUCTION TO LANGUAGE AND CULTURE. 3 pts. Instructor: Mara Green. This is an introduction to the study of the production, interpretation, and reproduction of social meanings as expressed through language. In exploring language in relation to culture and society, it focuses on how communication informs and transforms the sociocultural environment.
Anthropology UN2005y THE ETHNOGRAPHIC IMAGINATION. 3 pts. Instructor: María José de Abreu. Introduction to the theory and practice of “ethnography”—the intensive study of peoples’ lives as shaped by social relations, cultural images, and historical forces. Considers through critical reading of various kinds of texts (classic ethnographies, histories, journalism, novels, films) the ways in which understanding, interpreting, and representing the lived words of people—at home or abroad, in one place or transnationally, in the past or the present—can be accomplished. Mandatory recitation sections: TBA.
Anthropology UN2017y MAFIAS AND OTHER DANGEROUS AFFILIATIONS. 3 pts. Instructor: Naor Ben-Yehoyada. Regimes of various shapes and sizes tend to criminalize associations, organizations, and social relations that these ruling powers see as anathema to the social order on which their power depends: witches, officers of toppled political orders, alleged conspirators (rebels, traitors, terrorists, and dissidents), gangsters and mafiosi, or corrupt officers and magnates. Our main goal will be to understand how and under what conditions do those with the power to do so define, investigate, criminalize and prosecute those kinds of social relations that are cast as enemies of public order. We will also pay close attention to questions of knowledge – legal, investigative, political, journalistic, and public – how doubt, certainty, suspicion and surprise shape the struggle over the relationship between the state and society. The main part of the course is organized around six criminal investigations on mafia-related affairs that took place from the 1950s to the present (two are undergoing appeal these days) in western Sicily. After the introductory section, we will spend two weeks (four meetings) on every one of these cases. We will follow attempts to understand the Mafia and similarly criminalized organizations, and procure evidence about it. We will then expand our inquiry from Sicily to cases from all over the world, to examine questions about social relations, law, the uses of culture, and political imagination.
*Although this is a social anthropology course, no previous knowledge of anthropology is required or presumed. Classroom lectures will provide necessary disciplinary background. Mandatory recitation sections: TBA.
Anthropology UN3356y EARTH WORKS: ANTHROPOLOGY, ART, EXTRACTION. 3 pts. Instructor: Rosalind Morris. This undergraduate seminar is offered to students interested in the anthropological analysis of extractive economies and the social and political forms associated with them, as well as the arts through which they have been made the object of both investment and resistance. The course this semester will be focused on mining, and is organized along three axes: 1) mineral object; 2) socioeconomic form; and 3) aesthetics, with the latter including the arts of artisanal extraction, and literary, visual and media artistic practice. Permission of the instructor is required. Enrollment Priorities: Majors Preferred.
Anthropology UN3665y THE POLITICS OF CARE. 4 pts. Instructor: Lesley Sharp. What are the consequences of entrenched inequalities in the context of care? How might we (re)imagine associated practices as political projects? Wherein lie the origins of utopic and dystopic visions of daily survival? How might we track associated promises and failures as they travel across social hierarchies, nationalities, and geographies of care? And what do we mean when we speak of “care”? These questions define the scaffolding for this course. Our primary goals throughout this semester are threefold. First, we begin by interrogating the meaning of “care” and its potential relevance as a political project in medical and other domains. Second, we will track care’s associated meanings and consequences across a range of contents, including urban and rural America, an Amazonia borderland, South Africa, France, and Mexico. Third, we will address temporal dimensions of care, as envisioned and experienced in the here-and-now, historically, and in a futuristic world of science fiction. Finally, and most importantly, we will remain alert to the relevance of domains of difference relevant to care, most notably race, gender, class, and species. Note: instructor Permission is required for Non-Majors.
Anthropology UN3703y CLIMATE CHANGE AND COLONIALISM. 4 pts. Instructor: Dilshanie Perera. In 2022, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) recognized colonialism’s contributions to the climate crisis, citing its “historical and ongoing patterns of inequity.” This was the first time that this group of climate experts had ever formally acknowledged colonialism, despite activists, writers, artists, and scholars from around the world emphasizing the devastations of colonial extractions. A sole focus on the present and future of the climate crisis obscures a deeper understanding of how the crisis came to be. This course asks: How has colonialism, namely, colonial processes of domination, extraction, control, dispossession, knowledge-making, and violence, created the climate crisis as well as enduring inequalities? How does the past intimately structure the possibilities of the present? How can an understanding of colonialism’s “historical and ongoing” effects deepen calls for climate justice? This interdisciplinary seminar features an anthropological and historical exploration of the specificities of colonial regimes’ extractive violence against people, land, and resources. We will see how climate change is intensified through unequal social, political, and economic distributions of harm and advantage, and how climate vulnerability is created and maintained. The goal of the course is to provide students with conceptual tools for historicizing climate change, and for critically engaging the consequences of colonial relations of power.
Anthropology BC3808y PUNISHMENT CULTURE. 4 pts. Instructor: Kaya Williams. What is punishment, and what might attention to punitive practices teach us about the cultures in which they are used? Modern American culture is so saturated with punishment that it is difficult to know where to begin such an investigation. From childhood education to mass incarceration and from the crafting of financial futures to the training of horses and dogs, punishment is ubiquitous and often unquestioned. In many cases, punishment is the thread that connects allegedly disparate institutions and produces allegedly unforeseen forms of violence. In this course we will question both the practice and its prevalence, combining a genealogy of the concept with case studies in its modern use. Notes: Open to Anthro majors; others require instructor Permission.
Anthropology UN3828y THE ANTHROPOLOGY OF WAR. 4 pts. Instructor: Nadia Abu El-Haj. In this class, we will think about the various ways in which philosophers, social theorists, historians and anthropologists have thought about war, violence, and responsibility. The course focuses on a set of themes and questions: for example, the nature of violence and the question of responsibility or accountability, shifting technologies of warfare, and the phenomenology and aftermath of warfare, for civilians and for combatants. The reading list incorporates different approaches to such questions—from historical to philosophical to ethnographic accounts. Permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology BC3868y ETHNOGRAPHIC FIELD RESEARCH IN NYC. 4 pts. Instructor: Kaya Williams. This course provides the aspiring anthropologist with an array of primarily qualitative methodological tools essential to successful urban fieldwork. As such, it is a practicum of sorts, where regular field assignments help build one’s ability to record and analyze social behavior by drawing on several key data collection techniques. Because we have the luxury of inhabiting a large, densely populated, international city, this class requires that you take a head-first plunge into urban anthropology. The NYC area will define the laboratory for individually- designed research projects. Be forewarned, however! Ethnographic engagement involves efforts to detect social patterns, but it is often a self-reflexive exercise, too. Readings provide methodological, analytical, and personal insights into the skills, joys, and trials that define successful field research. Enrollment limit is 15. Open to Barnard Anthropology majors; others need Instructor permission.
Anthropology BC3872y SENIOR THESIS SEMINAR II. 4 pts. Instructors: Paige West, J.C. Salyer, and Camilla Sturm. Prerequisites: Must complete ANTH BC3871x. Limited to Barnard Senior Anthropology Majors. Offered every Spring. Discussion of research methods and planning and writing of a Senior Essay in Anthropology will accompany research on problems of interest to students, culminating in the writing of individual Senior Essays. The advisory system requires periodic consultation and discussion between the student and her adviser as well as the meeting of specific deadlines set by the department each semester. Notes: Open to Barnard Anthropology majors. Others need the permission of the instructors.
Anthropology UN3880y LISTENING: AN ETHNOGRAPHY OF SOUND SEMINAR. 4 pts. Instructor: John Pemberton. We explore the possibilities of an ethnography of sound through a range of listening encounters: in resonant urban soundscapes of the city and in natural soundscapes of acoustic ecology; from audible pasts and echoes of the present; through repetitive listening in the age of electronic reproduction, and mindful listening that retraces an uncanniness inherent in sound. Silence, noise, voice, chambers, reverberation, sound in its myriad manifestations and transmissions. From the captured souls of Edison’s phonography, to everyday acoustical adventures, the course turns away from the screen and dominant epistemologies of the visual for an extended moment, and does so in pursuit of sonorous objects. How is it that sound so moves us as we move within its world, and who or what then might the listening subject be? Permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology UN3939y THE ANIME EFFECT: MEDIA AND TECHNOCULTURE IN CONTEMPORARY JAPAN. 4 pts. Instructor: Marilyn Ivy. Culture, technology, and media in contemporary Japan. Theoretical and ethnographic engagements with forms of mass mediation, including anime, manga, video, and cell-phone novels. Considers larger global economic and political contexts, including post-Fukushima transformations. Permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology UN3947y TEXT, MAGIC, PERFORMANCE. 4 pts. Instructor: John Pemberton. This course pursues interconnections linking text and performance in light of magic, ritual, possession, narration, and related articulations of power. Readings are drawn from classic theoretical writings, colonial fiction, and ethnographic accounts. Domains of inquiry include: spirit possession, trance states, séance, ritual performance, and related realms of cinematic projection, musical form, shadow theater, performative objects, and (other) things that move on their own, compellingly. Key theoretical concerns are subjectivity - particularly, the conjuring up and displacement of self in the form of the first-person singular I - and the haunting power of repetition. Retraced throughout the course are the uncanny shadows of a fully possessed subject --within ritual contexts and within everyday life. Permission of the instructor is required. This course counts toward the Global Core requirement.
Anthropology UN3998y SUPERVISED INDIVIDUAL RESEARCH. 2-6 pts. Anthropology Instructors. Prerequisite: the written permission of the staff member under whose supervision the research will be conducted.
Anthropology UN3999y SENIOR THESIS SEMINAR IN ANTHROPOLOGY. 4 pts. Instructor: Brinkley Messick. Students must have declared a major in Anthropology prior to registration. Students must have a 3.6 GPA in the major and a preliminary project concept in order to be considered. Interested students must communicate/meet with thesis instructor in the previous spring about the possibility of taking the course during the upcoming academic year. Additionally, expect to discuss with the instructor at the end of the fall term whether your project has progressed far enough to be completed in the spring term. If it has not, you will exit the seminar after one semester, with a grade based on the work completed during the fall term. This two-term course is a combination of a seminar and a workshop that will help you conduct research, write, and present an original senior thesis in anthropology. Students who write theses are eligible to be considered for departmental honors. The first term of this course introduces a variety of approaches used to produce anthropological knowledge and writing; encourages students to think critically about the approaches they take to researching and writing by studying model texts with an eye to the ethics, constraints, and potentials of anthropological research and writing; and gives students practice in the seminar and workshop formats that are key to collegial exchange and refinement of ideas. During the first term, students complete a few short exercises that will culminate in a substantial draft of one discrete section of their senior project (18-20 pages) plus a detailed outline of the expected work that remains to be done (5 pages). The spring sequence of the anthropology thesis seminar is a writing intensive continuation of the fall semester, in which students will have designed the research questions, prepared a full thesis proposal that will serve as a guide for the completion of the thesis and written a draft of one chapter. Only those students who expect to have completed the fall semester portion of the course are allowed to register for the spring; final enrollment is contingent upon successful completion of first semester requirements. In spring semester, weekly meetings will be devoted to the collaborative refinement of drafts, as well as working through issues of writing (evidence, voice, authority etc.). All enrolled students are required to present their project at a symposium in the late spring, and the final grade is based primarily on successful completion of the thesis/ capstone project. Note: The senior thesis seminar is open to CC and GS majors in Anthropology only. It requires the instructor’s permission for registration. Students must have a 3.6 GPA in the major and a preliminary project concept in order to be considered. Interested students should communicate with the thesis instructor and the director of undergraduate study in the previous spring about the possibility of taking the course during the upcoming academic year. Additionally, expect to discuss with the instructor at the end of the fall term whether your project has progressed far enough to be completed in the spring term. If it has not, you will exit the seminar after one semester, with a grade based on the work completed during the fall term. Requirements: Students must have completed the requirements of the first semester of the sequence and seek instructor approval to enroll in the second. Prerequisites: Permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology GU4108y FILM AT LOW TEMPERATURES: CINEMAS OF THE ARCTIC. 3 pts. Instructor: Tyler Adkins. This seminar explores the screen cultures of the Indigenous peoples of the Polar and Circumpolar regions of Canada, The United States, Russia, Scandinavia, and Greenland as they exist at the unstable boundary between cinematic object and creative subject. Viewing work by Indigenous filmmakers, we will draw on from Indigenous Studies, Cultural Anthropology, and Film Studies to examine the complicated role of film in the Arctic.
Anthropology GU4143y ACCUSATION. 3 pts. Instructor: Rosalind Morris. This course examines the politics and practices of collective accusation in comparative perspective. It treats these phenomena in their relation to processes of political and economic transition, to discourses of crisis, and to the practices of rule by which the idea of exception is made the grounds for extreme claims on and for the social body-usually, but not exclusively, enacted through forms of expulsion. We will consider the various theoretical perspectives through which forms of collective accusation have been addressed, focusing on psychoanalytic, structural functional, and poststructuralist readings. In doing so, we will also investigate the difference and possible continuities between the forms and logics of accusation that operate in totalitarian as well as liberal regimes. Course readings will include both literary and critical texts. Permission of the instructor is required.
COURSES IN ARCHAEOLOGY:
Anthropology UN1008y THE RISE OF CIVILIZATION. 3 pts. Instructor: Terence D’Altroy. The rise of major civilization in prehistory and protohistory throughout the world, from the initial appearance of sedentism, agriculture, and social stratification through the emergence of the archaic empires. Description and analysis of a range of regions that were centers of significant cultural development: Mesopotamia, Egypt, the Indus River Valley, China, North America, and Mesoamerica. $25.00 Anthropology Lab Fee. DO NOT REGISTER FOR A RECITATION SECTION IF YOU ARE NOT OFFICIALLY REGISTERED FOR THE COURSE. This course counts toward the Global Core requirement. Refer to the Directory of Classes http://www.columbia.edu/cu/bulletin/uwb/ for a list of recitation sections.
Anthropology BC2012 LABORATORY METHODS IN ARCHAEOLOGY. 4 pts. Instructor: Severin Fowles. Only the most recent chapters of the past are able to be studied using traditional historiographical methods focused on archives of textual documents. How, then, are we to analyze the deep history of human experiences prior to the written word? And even when textual archives do survive from a given historical period, these archives are typically biased toward the perspectives of those in power. How, then, are we to undertake analyses of the past that take into account the lives and experiences of all of society’s members, including the poor, the working class, the colonized, and others whose voices appear far less frequently in historical documents? From its disciplinary origins in nineteenth century antiquarianism, archaeology has grown to become a rigorous science of the past, dedicated to the exploration of long-term and inclusive social histories. “Laboratory Methods in Archaeology” is an intensive introduction to the analysis of archaeological artifacts and samples in which we explore how the organic and inorganic remains from archaeological sites can be used to build rigorous claims about the human past. The 2022 iteration of the course centers on assemblages from two sites, both excavated by Barnard’s archaeological field program in the Taos region of northern New Mexico: (1) the Spanish colonial site of San Antonio del Embudo founded in 1725 and (2) the hippie commune known as New Buffalo, founded in 1967. Participants in ANTH BC2012 will be introduced to the history, geology, and ecology of the Taos region, as well as to the excavation histories of the two sites. Specialized laboratory modules focus on the analysis of chipped stone artifacts ceramics, animal bone, glass, and industrial artifacts. The course only demands participation in the seminars and laboratory modules and successful completion of the written assignments, but all students are encouraged to develop specialized research projects to be subsequently expanded into either (1) a senior thesis project or (2) a conference presentation at the Society for American Archaeology, Society for Historical Archaeology, or Theoretical Archaeology Group meeting. Prerequisites: the instructor permission.
Anthropology UN2028y THINK LIKE AN ARCHAEOLOGIST. 3 pts. Instructor. Allison McGovern. This course provides a comprehensive introduction to methods and theory in archaeology – by exploring how archaeologists work to create narratives about the past (and the present) on the basis on the material remains of the past. The course begins with a consideration of how archaeologists deal with the remains of the past in the present: What are archaeological sites and how do we ‘discover’ them? How do archaeologists ‘read’ or analyze sites and artifacts? From there, we will turn to the question of how archaeologists interpret these materials traces, in order to create narratives about life in the past. After a review of the historical development of theoretical approaches in archaeological interpretation, the course will consider contemporary approaches to interpreting the past. $25.00 Anthropology Lab Fee. Mandatory recitation sections: TBA.
Anthropology BC3222y GENDER ARCHAEOLXGY. 3 pts. Instructor: Camilla Sturm. This seminar critically reexamines the ancient world from the perspective of gender archaeology. Though the seedlings of gender archaeology were first sown by of feminist archaeologists during the 70’s and 80’s, this approach involves far more than simply ‘womanizing’ androcentric narratives of past. Rather, gender archaeology criticizes interpretations of the past that transplant contemporary social roles onto the archaeological past, casting the divisions and inequalities of today as both timeless and natural. This class challenges the idea of a singular past, instead championing a turn towards multiple, rich, messy, intersectional pasts. The ‘x’ in ‘archaeolxgy’ is an explicit signal of our focus on this diversity of pasts and a call for a more inclusive field of practice today. Notes: Non-Majors need instructor permission.
Anthropology GU4346y LAB TECHNIQUES IN ARCHAEOLOGY. 4 pts. Instructor: Allison McGovern. Laboratory Methods in Archaeology” is an intensive introduction to the analysis of archaeological artifacts and samples in which we explore how the organic and inorganic remains from archaeological sites can be used to build rigorous claims about the human past. In 2023, this course will focus on pre-contact and post-contact assemblages from the New York-metro area, including materials from the legacy collections of Ralph Solecki. Participants will be introduced to the history, geology, and ecology of the New York area and specialized laboratory modules focus on the analysis of chipped stone artifacts, ceramics, animal bone, glass, and a range of post-contact artifacts. The course only demands participation in the seminars and laboratory modules and successful completion of the written assignments, but all students are encouraged to develop specialized research projects to be subsequently expanded into either (1) a thesis project or (2) a conference presentation at the Society for American Archaeology, Society for Historical Archaeology, or Theoretical Archaeology Group meeting. Permission of the instructor is required. $25.00 Anthropology Lab Fee.
COURSE IN PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY:
Anthropology GU4148y HUMAN SKELETAL BIOLOGY II. 3 pts. Recommended for archaeology and physical anthropology students, pre-meds, and biology majors interested in the human skeletal system. Intensive study of human skeletal materials using anatomical and anthropological landmarks to assess sex, age, and ethnicity of bones. Other primate skeletal materials and fossil casts used for comparative study. The permission of the instructor is required.
For information on class days and times, enrollment limits, enrollment status, course fees and classroom locations, visit the Online Directory of Classes at http://www.columbia.edu/cu/bulletin/uwb/
Registration begins for most schools on Monday, November 14, 2022.
COURSES IN SOCIOCULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY:
Anthropology GU4108y FILM AT LOW TEMPERATURES: CINEMAS OF THE ARCTIC. 3 pts. Instructor: Tyler Adkins. This seminar explores the screen cultures of the Indigenous peoples of the Polar and Circumpolar regions of Canada, The United States, Russia, Scandinavia, and Greenland as they exist at the unstable boundary between cinematic object and creative subject. Viewing work by Indigenous filmmakers, we will draw on from Indigenous Studies, Cultural Anthropology, and Film Studies to examine the complicated role of film in the Arctic.
Anthropology GU4143y ACCUSATION. 3 pts. Instructor: Rosalind Morris. This course examines the politics and practices of collective accusation in comparative perspective. It treats these phenomena in their relation to processes of political and economic transition, to discourses of crisis, and to the practices of rule by which the idea of exception is made the grounds for extreme claims on and for the social body-usually, but not exclusively, enacted through forms of expulsion. We will consider the various theoretical perspectives through which forms of collective accusation have been addressed, focusing on psychoanalytic, structural functional, and poststructuralist readings. In doing so, we will also investigate the difference and possible continuities between the forms and logics of accusation that operate in totalitarian as well as liberal regimes. Course readings will include both literary and critical texts. Permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology GR6067y LANGUAGE AND ITS LIMITS. 3 pts. Instructor: Mara Green. This course examines language and its limits from the perspective of practice and theory, drawing on linguistic and sociocultural anthropology, semiotics, and deaf and disability studies. The first weeks focus on foundational texts and frameworks for language, semiotics, and communication, paying attention to the placement, and theorization, of boundaries that separate language from not-language and to the work such boundaries (are intended to) do. The second part of the course explores materials where the subjects and objects of study approach or even cross those boundaries, asking what kinds of ethical, intellectual, and relational demands these materials make in both social and analytic contexts. Focal topics may include linguistic relativity; semiotics; modality (signed, spoken, written languages); disability; trauma and colonialism; human-nonhuman communication; and gender. Please email for instructor permission. Permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology GR6069y TECHNO/BODIES. 3 pts. Instructor: Lesley Sharp. This course examines technological body interventions as framed by sociality and subjectivity. Of special interest are pre- and post-human contexts that generate technological nostalgia, desire, anxiety, or fear. Topics include transformative surgeries; cyborgs and other hybrids; the militarized body and the nation; and body economies. Permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology GR6157y IDEA OF A BL RADICAL TRADITION. 3 pts. Instructor: David Scott. This course will seek to raise and think through the following questions: What does it mean to talk today about a black radical tradition? What has it meant in the past to speak in these (or cognate) terms? And if we take the debate in part at least to inhabit a normative discursive space, an argumentative space in which to make claims on the moral-political present, what ought it to mean to talk about a black radical tradition? Course is open to graduate students only & the permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology GR617y HOUSE, HOME, PROJECT. 3 pts. Instructor: Catherine Fennell. In the past two decades, anthropologists have heeded calls for a "spatial" turn in the social sciences by asking how spatiality relates to social, cultural and political life. This turn is a remarkable given how much the field had treated space as a secondary effect of temporally-based processes of social and cultural change. Yet even if anthropology had neglected an adequate theorization of space, the increasing tractions of disciplinary conversations concerning place, ecology, and infrastructure suggest that human spatiality has long been a significant component of anthropologists’ concerns. In this seminar we explore how various scholars, including anthropological thinkers, have approached human spatiality through discussions of houses, homes and housing-related projects. Our exploration will shed light on several classic and contemporary concerns. For instance: What do built forms reveal about the shape and mechanics of social orders? How do they mediate and/or configure relatedness and what does that relatedness consist of? How can discussions centered on inhabiting place contribute to investigations of quotidian experience? How have interventions into domestic architecture supported political governance? How does one “write” the house? By following accounts of houses, homes and housing-related projects, we will consider varied interrogations of practice and embodiment, memory, materiality and collective well-being. Permission of the instructor is required. Enrollment Priorities: GRADUATE STUDENTS IN DISCIPLINE OR INVESTED IN TOPIC. Prerequisite Courses: IF OUT OF DISCIPLINE YOU SHOULD BE ABLE TO SHOW INSTRUCTOR THAT YOU HAVE RELEVANT COURSEWORK ON THE TOPIC.
Anthropology GR6212y PRIN/APPL-SOC & CULTRL ANTHROPOLOGY. 3 pts. Instructor: Ellen Marakowitz. Focus on research and writing for the Masters level thesis, including research design, bibliography and background literature development, and writing. Prerequisites: ANTH G4201 Principles and Applications of Social and Cultural Anthropology. Prerequisites: ANTH G4201 Principles and Applications of Social and Cultural Anthropology and the permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology GR6216Y NOT YOUR GRANDPARENT’S KINSHIP. 4 pts. Instructor: Naor Ben-Yehoyada. While kinship as an institutional category of training has had a rocky route over the past several decades, the roles that received and transformed terms of relatedness shape the way people make and brake social relations and political projects enjoy periodical waves of interest. After introductory critical engagement with foundational texts, we will examine current theoretical and methodological issues in the analysis of kinship, relations, and relatedness. We will focus the social processes through which (and projects in which) people define, create, extend, limit, sever or transform their relatedness with others within and over generations. We will ask what is the relationship between the reach of relatedness and the bounds communities and associations; how people distinguish who is or is not their kin, kith, friend, relative, family member, and so forth; when and how they propose to replace one term of relatedness for another, to act “as if” those unrelated are related, or vice versa; what roles substances (blood, water, milk, &c.) play in conveying, expressing, and forging relations. We will focus on the vicissitudes of relatedness through settlement and migration, as well as on the intersections of kinship and political economy.
Anthropology GR6227y ETHNOGRAPHIES AT THE END OF THE WORLD. 3 pts. Juan Carlos Mazariegos. What can we learn from anthropological and ethnographic research in and about a damaged world, a world confronted by the violence and effects of war, climate change, transnational migration, post-industrial abandonment, and the lives and afterlives of colonialism and slavery? What are the ethnographic debates that address the catastrophes produced by capitalism and the lifeforms that emerge out of its ruins? What types of anthropological critique emerge in times enunciated as ‘the end of the world’? And what comes after this end? Ethnographies at the End of the World addresses these questions by paying close attention to some of the most relevant debates in contemporary anthropological theory and anthropological critique. These debates include, among others, discussions on violence and trauma, the politics of life and death, the work of memory and oblivion, and the material entanglements between human and non-human forms of existence. The aim of this seminar is to generate a discussion around the multiple implications of these theoretical arrangements and how anthropologists deploy them in their ethnographic understandings of the world we live in. In doing so, this course provides students with a fundamental understanding and conceptual knowledge about how anthropologists use and produce theory, and how this theoretical production is mobilized as a social critique. This course is reading intensive and operates in the form of a seminar. It is intended, primarily, for MA students in the department of anthropology and graduate students in other departments. Priority given to ANTH MAs. Other graduate students require the permission of the instructor.
Anthropology GR6305y ART, AESTHETICS, AND THE POLITICAL. 3 pts. Instructor: Marilyn Ivy. Cross-disciplinary in inspiration, this seminar engages work in anthropology, art criticism, literary studies, aesthetics, and philosophy to think about the political possibilities of art and the aesthetic dimensions of the political. Focusing most sharply (but not exclusively) on what is variously called socially engaged art, relational art, or participatory art, the seminar will consider recent art practices, performances, texts, and objects across a diverse range of genres and national-cultural locations. Art thinkers studied will include Kant, Benjamin, Adorno, Lyotard, Ranciere, Kitagawa, García-Canclini, Groys, Bishop, Bourriard, and beyond. Permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology GR6602y QUESTIONS IN ANTHROPOLOGICAL THEORY II: 3 pts. Instructor: Nadia Abu El-Haj. This course surveys the historical relationships between anthropological thought and its generic inscription in the form of ethnography. Readings of key ethnographic texts will be used to chart the evolving paradigms and problematics through which the disciplines practitioners have conceptualized their objects and the discipline itself. The course focuses on several key questions, including: the modernity of anthropology and the value of primitivism; the relationship between history and eventfulness in the representation of social order, and related to this, the question of anti-sociality (in crime, witchcraft, warfare, and other kinds of violence); the idea of a cultural world view; voice, language, and translation; and the relationship between the form and content of a text. Assignments include weekly readings and reviews of texts, and a substantial piece of ethnographic writing. The course is exclusively limited to doctoral students in Anthropology.
COURSES IN ARCHAEOLOGY:
Anthropology GR5115y POLITICAL HUMAN-ANIMAL STUDIES. 3 pts. Instructor: Brian Boyd. In a number of academic disciplines the concern with relationships between humans and non-humans has recently resulted in a radical revision of the ways in which we think people and animals construct their social worlds. This course addresses how humans and animals enter into, and interact within, each other's worlds. It draws upon perspectives from anthropology, geography, (political) philosophy, ethics, literary theory, and the sciences, placing current debates within the context of the deep history of human-animal relations. Topics to be discussed include "wildness", domestication, classification, animal rights, biotechnology, "nature/culture", food/cooking, fabulous/mythical animals, the portrayal of animals in popular culture, and human-animal sexualities. Permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology GR6031y CONTESTING THE PAST. 3 pts. Instructor: Terence D’Altroy. Permission of the instructor is required.
Anthropology GR6162y CONTEMPORARY ARCHAEOLOGICAL THEORY. 3 pts. Instructor: Severin Fowles. Archaeology is a sprawling, messy discipline and the role that theory does, should, and might play in the process of archaeological data collection, analysis, and interpretation has been highly contested. Archaeologists argue over whether there is such a thing as a stand-alone ‘archaeological theory’ and what kinds of theory from other disciplines should (or should not!) be imported. This course explores a range of recent theoretical conversations, orientations, and interventions within archaeology, with an eye to understanding what is currently at stake – and what is contested – in how archaeologists think about making archaeological knowledge in the contemporary moment. In doing so, this course encourages students to think about theory in archaeology as an important form of “practical knowledge” or “know how” for archaeologists (cf. Lucas 2018). Notes: Priority given to the first-year archaeology students in the NYC Consortium. Permission of the instructor is required.
COURSE IN PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY:
Anthropology GU4148y HUMAN SKELETAL BIOLOGY II. 3 pts. Recommended for archaeology and physical anthropology students, pre-meds, and biology majors interested in the human skeletal system. Intensive study of human skeletal materials using anatomical and anthropological landmarks to assess sex, age, and ethnicity of bones. Other primate skeletal materials and fossil casts used for comparative study. The permission of the instructor is required.
COURSES IN MUSEUM ANTHROPOLOGY:
Anthropology GU4346y LAB TECHNIQUES IN ARCHAEOLOGY. 4 pts. Instructor: Allison McGovern. Laboratory Methods in Archaeology” is an intensive introduction to the analysis of archaeological artifacts and samples in which we explore how the organic and inorganic remains from archaeological sites can be used to build rigorous claims about the human past. In 2023, this course will focus on pre-contact and post-contact assemblages from the New York-metro area, including materials from the legacy collections of Ralph Solecki. Participants will be introduced to the history, geology, and ecology of the New York area and specialized laboratory modules focus on the analysis of chipped stone artifacts, ceramics, animal bone, glass, and a range of post-contact artifacts. The course only demands participation in the seminars and laboratory modules and successful completion of the written assignments, but all students are encouraged to develop specialized research projects to be subsequently expanded into either (1) a thesis project or (2) a conference presentation at the Society for American Archaeology, Society for Historical Archaeology, or Theoretical Archaeology Group meeting. Permission of the instructor is required. $25.00 Anthropology Lab Fee.
Anthropology GR6192y EXHIBITION PRAC-GLOBAL CONTEXT. 3 pts. Instructor: Ciné Ostrow. Prerequisites: ANTH G6352 Museum Anthropology: history and theory / ANTH G6353 Politics and Practice of Museum Exhibitions; G9110, G9111 and the instructors permission. Corequisites: ANTH G6353. This course addresses the practical challenges entailed in the process of creating a successful exhibition. Developing an actual curatorial project, students will get an opportunity to apply the museum anthropology theory they are exposed to throughout the program. They will be given a hands-on approach to the different stages involved in the curation of a show, from the in-depth researching of a topic to the writing, editing and design of an exhibition that will be effective for specific audiences. Permission of the instructor is required. NOTE: Class will meet off campus at AMNH.
Anthropology GR6365y EXHIBITION CULTURES. 3 pts. Instructor: Laurel Kendall. This course is a continuation of Museum Anthropology G6352 (not a prerequisite). Through the study of museum exhibitions, this course explores a series of debates about the representation of culture in museums, the politics of identity, and the significance of objects. We will consider the museum as a contemporary and variable form, as a site for the expression of national, group, and individual identity and as a site of performance and consumption. We will consider how exhibits are developed, what they aim to convey, what makes them effective (or not), and how they sometimes become flashpoints of controversy. Because the work of museums is visual, enacted through the display of material forms, we will also consider the transformation of objects into artifacts and as part of exhibitions, addressing questions of meaning, ownership, value, and magic. We will look at this range of issues from the point of view of practitioners, critics, and audiences. G6365 works in tandem with the exhibition project that will be developed in “Exhibition Practice in Global Culture” to produce a small exhibit. This year we will use a Tibetan Thangka painting (AMNH #70.3/8090) as the focal point for an exhibit that explores contemporary Thangkas and those who paint them. Permission of the instructor is required. NOTE: Class will meet off campus at AMNH.
Anthropology GR9110y MUSEUM ANTHROPOLOGY INTERNSHIP I. 3-9 pts. Instructor: Brian Boyd. An internship arranged through the Museum Anthropology program of 10 hrs. /week (for 3 credits) or 20 hrs. /week (for 6). Involves meaningful work, requires keeping a journal and writing a paper at the completion of the semester. Not to be taken without permission of the program directors, usually after completing the Museum Anthropology core courses.
Anthropology GR9111y MUSEUM ANTHROPOLOGY INTERNSHIP II. 3-9 pts. Instructor: Brian Boyd. An internship arranged through the Museum Anthropology program of 10 hrs. /week (for 3 credits) or 20 hrs. /week (for 6). Involves meaningful work, requires keeping a journal and writing a paper at the completion of the semester. Not to be taken without permission of the program directors, usually after completing the Museum Anthropology core courses.
SUPERVISED INDIVIDUAL RESEARCH COURSES:
Anthropology GR9101y RESEARCH IN SOCIAL/CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY. 3-9 Pts. STAFF. Individual research and tutorial in archaeology for advanced graduate students. Prerequisites: the instructor’s permission. Enrollment is limited to 10.
Anthropology GR9102y RESEARCH IN ARCHAEOLOGY. 3-9 pts. STAFF. Individual research and tutorial in archaeology for advanced graduate students. Prerequisites: the instructor’s permission. Enrollment is limited to 10.
Anthropology GR9103y RESEARCH IN PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY. 3-9 Pts. Instructor: Ralph Holloway. Prerequisites: the instructor’s permission. Individual research and tutorial in physical anthropology for advanced graduate students. Enrollment is limited to 8.
Anthropology GR9105y RESEARCH IN SPECIAL FIELDS. 3-9 Pts. STAFF. Individual research and tutorial in archaeology for advanced graduate students. Prerequisites: the instructor’s permission. Enrollment is limited to 10.
Anthropology GR9112y RSCH IN ARCHEOL METHOD/THEORY. 3-9 Pts. STAFF. Individual research and tutorial in archaeological method and theory for advanced graduate students. Prerequisites: the instructor’s permission. Enrollment is limited to 10.
Anthropology GR9999y WEDNESDAY SEMINAR. 0 Pts. Instructor: Catherine Fennell. Reports of ongoing research are presented by staff members, students, and special guests. All anthropology graduate students are required to attend. Enrollment is limited to 40.