ANT364H – Summer 2015
Environment and Globalization
Dr. Dylan Clark
Director of Contemporary Asian Studies
University of Toronto
“What we call land is an element of nature inextricably
interwoven with man’s institutions. To isolate it and form a
market out of it was perhaps the weirdest of all
undertakings of our ancestors.”
 Karl Polanyii
Offices: 003N Munk. Office hours: TBA and by
appointment. “Virtual office hours” online at Blackboard: always
glad to answer questions on our Blackboard discussion board.
In this course we will ponder the cultural exchange between “humans” and “nature.” We ponder how different
peoples see themselves vis a vis animals, plants, foods, and resources; how they articulate themselves as subjects,
how the discern ethics, how they comprehend killing, usage, and ownership of nature. Our journey will explore
classification, gender, and economic anthropology. Along the way, we’ll strive to understand cultural classification
schema in terms of boundaries and boundedness; to think through how different peoples delineate human and nonhuman, how “nature” is objectified, how natural products are commodified, and how classification schemes bear on
economies.
Teaching Assistant: Columba Gonzalez. Office hrs: none. Ms. Gonzales only has paid hours for marking exams.
Course grading:
Midterm test: 25%
Final exam: 45%
Research paper: 30%
Course reading:
This course requires a good deal of reading. Please plan accordingly, and complete reading before class.
Attendance:
Attendance in all lectures is strongly recommended. Please arrive prepared to take extensive notes: the instructor
seldom uses PowerPoint.
Time and Place: TBA.
Course texts:

No texts to purchase. All texts provided through the University of Toronto Library system and Blackboard,
per observation of Canadian copyright laws, in accordance with U of T guidelines.
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SUMMER SESSION 2015
week 1
Jun 29 Welcome to the Anthropocene?
Kolbert, Elizabeth. 2006. “Man in the Anthropocene,” Field Notes from a Catastrophe. NY:
Bloomsbury, pp. 183-9.
Malm, Andreas. 2015. “The Anthropocene Myth.” Jacobin. March 30, 2015.
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2015/03/anthropocene-capitalism-climate-change/
Williams, Raymond. 1983. “Nature,” in Keywords, NY: Oxford University Press, pp. 219-24.
July 1 . Holiday.
week 2
Jul 6 Nature, human, culture: evolving relationships
Ingold, Tim. 2000. Selections from The Perception of the Environment: Essays in Livelihood,
Dwelling, and Skill. New York: Routledge. Pp. 13-76,
http://go.utlib.ca/cat/9953095
Anon. Undated [5th or 6th century BCE]. The Book of Genesis, 1
http://bibleencyclopedia.com/goodsalt/Genesis_1_4.htm (about a page)
Genesis 1:26, 1:27, 1:28, 1:29, and 1:30 are especially relevant.
Optional:
Wescoat J L Jr, 1995, "The 'right of thirst' for animals in Islamic law: a comparative
approach" Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, 13(6) 637 – 654
Jul 8 Situated vs. abstract: knowledges of ecology
Cronon, William. (1983) “Bounding the Land,” chapter from Cronon, Changes in the Land:
Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England. NY: Hill & Wang, pp. 54-81.
Hallowell, Irving A. 1960. “Ojibwa ontology, behavior, and world view,” IN Stanley
Diamond, Culture in History, NY: Columbia University Press.
week 3
Jul 13 What is an animal?
Sillitoe, Paul. 2002. “Contested Knowledge, Contingent Classification: Animals in the
Highlands of Papua New Guinea.” American Anthropologist, 104(4): 1162-1171.
Nadasdy, Paul. 2007. “The gift in the animal: The ontology of hunting and human–animal
sociality,” American Ethnologist. Vol. 34, No. 1, pp. 25–43.
Noske, Barbara. 1993. “The Animal Question in Anthropology: a Commentary.” Society and
Animals,1(2): 185-190.
Jul 15 Boundaries between human, animal, fungi, plant, and microbe
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Kirksey, S. Eben and Stefan Helmreich. 2010. “The Emergence of Multi-Species
Ethnography,” Cultural Anthropology, 25(4): 545-76.
Tsing, Anna. 2012. “Unruly Edges: Mushrooms as Companion Species,” Environmental
Humanities, 1: 141-54.
Langford, Jean. 2002 [2007]. “Dosic Bodies/Docile Bodies,” IN Margaret Lock and Judith
Farquhar (eds.), Beyond the Body Proper. Durham, NC: Duke, pp. 376-80.
Schipper, Kristofer M. “On Breath” IN Margaret Lock and Judith Farquhar (eds.), Beyond
the Body Proper. Durham, NC: Duke, pp 213-6.
week 4
Jul 20 Midterm test.
Regular class time and place. Please bring UTOR ID, pencils and eraser (in case of
Scantron.)
Jul 22 The tragedy of the commons and its critics
Hardin, Garrett. 1968. "The Tragedy of the Commons," Science, 162:1243-48. [Note: I will
search for a summary]
Rifkin, Jeremy. “A Revolution of the Rich Against the Poor,” IN All That We Share. NY: The
New Press. [1 page]
Illich. “Origins of Our Economic Powerlessness,” IN All That We Share. NY: The New
Press, pp. 67-8.
Goldman, Michael. 1998. “Inventing the commons: Theories and practices of the commons’
professional,” in Privatizing Nature: Political Struggles for the Global Commons, ed.
Michael Goldman. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, pp. 20-53.
Optional:
Bollier, and Walljasper. “A Commons Dictionary,” IN All That We Share, NY: The New
Press, pp. 243-8.
Week 5
Jul 27: Ideologies of domination, starring science, patriarchy, and capitalism
Merchant, Carolyn. 2005a. “Science and Worldviews,” IN Radical Ecology: The Search for a
Livable World. NY: Routledge, pp. 41-60.
Merchant, Carolyn. 2005b. “Environmental Ethics and Political Conflict,” IN Radical
Ecology: The Search for a Livable World. NY: Routledge, pp. 61-84.
Haraway, Donna. 1983 [1994]. “Teddy Bear Patriarchy: Taxidermy in the Garden of Eden,
New York City, 1908-1936,” IN Nicholas Dirks, Geoff Eley, and Sherry B. Ortner
(eds.) Culture/Power/History, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, pp. 49-95.
Jul 29 State and nature
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Scott, James C. 1998. “Nature and Space,” and “Taming Nature: An Agriculture of
Legibility,” IN Seeing Like a State, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, pp. 11-52;
262-305.
Ferguson, James. 2005. “Seeing like an Oil Company.” American Anthropologist, vol 107(3):
377-82.
Optional:
Agrawal, Arun. 2005. “Forests of Statistics: Colonial Environmental Knowledges,” IN
Environmentality, Durham, NC: Duke University Press, pp. 32-64.
Week 6
Aug 3 The nature of things: economy, sex, and ideology
Tsing, Anna Lowenhaupt. 1995. “Empowering Nature, or: Some Gleanings in Bee Culture,”
IN Sylvia Yanagisako and Carol Delaney (eds), Naturalizing Power. NY: Routledge,
pp. 113-43.
Luke, Timothy W. 1995. [2006] “On Environmentality: Geo-Power and Eco-Knowledge in
the Discourses of Contemporary Environmentalism,” IN Nora Haenn and Richard
R. Wilk (eds.) The Environment in Anthropology. NY: New York University Press,
257-69.
August 5 New enclosures
Peluso, Nancy Lee and Christian Lund. 2011. "New Frontiers of Land Control: Introduction."
Journal of Peasant Studies 38 (4): 667-681. doi:10.1080/03066150.2011.607692.
http://resolver.scholarsportal.info/resolve/03066150/v38i0004/667_nfolci.
Escobar, Arturo. 1995. Excerpt from “Power and Visibility: Tales of Peasants, Women, and
the Environment,” Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, pp. 192-211.
Lee Peluso, Nancy. 2012. "What's Nature Got to do with it? A Situated Historical
Perspective on Socio‐natural Commodities." Development and Change 43 (1): 79104. doi:10.1111/j.1467-7660.2012.01755.x.
http://resolver.scholarsportal.info/resolve/0012155x/v43i0001/79_wngtdwshposc.
August 7 Term papers due.
See Blackboard for topics, see Blackboard and below for formatting, instructions,
and submission information.
Week 7
Aug 10 So: What is “nature?”
Descola, Philippe. 2012. “Beyond nature and culture: The traffic of souls,” Translated by
Janet Lloyd, HAU Journal, Vol 2, No. 1.
Fioramonti, Lorenzo. 2015. “A Post-GDP World,” Foreign Policy, June 2, 2015.
http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/06/02/a-post-gdp-world/ [10 pages]
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August 7 (Friday) . Papers due to Turnin.com by 11:59PM. Hard copies (paper copies) due to main
desk at Munk Centre by. Late e-copies and late hard copies will be marked late. Early
submissions will receive marking priority.
Date TBA: Study break. Please use your time well to prepare for a very challenging final
examination.
Date. XX : Final exam. Date/time/place to be determined by Office of the Registrar. Please bring
UTOR ID card and pencils. Please bring no aids.
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Expectations, Policies, and Common Courtesy
Attendance: Students are expected to attend all classes, though this is not required.
Punctuality: You are expected to arrive and be settled in your seat by the beginning of class and to remain until the end of class.
Unless you become ill, do not begin packing up books or stand to leave before the end of class, because this is distracting to all. If
you know you cannot stay for the entire period, please notify the instructor before class, then sit near the door and leave very
quietly.
Courtesy in Class: Every student is expected to pay close attention in the lecture or film. Refrain from talking during lectures and
films, except to ask or respond to a question from the instructor. Even quiet talking is distracting and disrespectful for your fellow
students and your instructor. Turn off mobile phones. Use computers ONLY for course readings and/or taking notes: surfing, email,
social media, etc. are distracting to your peers and instructor.
Email Communication: Emailing with your professor is a form of professional communication. Please write courteously and clearly;
do not use text-messaging abbreviations or slang.
Accommodations:
The University of Toronto is committed to accessibility. If you require accommodations for a disability, or have any accessibility
concerns about the course, the classroom or course materials, please contact Accessibility Services as soon as possible:
disability.services@utoronto.ca or http://studentlife.utoronto.ca/accessibility
If you have religious scheduling concerns, please report these in the first or second week of class. I will do my utmost to respect
disabilities and religious issues if they should arise.
Missed Tests or Deadlines:
If you do become ill (or otherwise incapacitated) you must provide me with appropriate documentation. For missed work, contact
me as soon as possible - and no later than one-week after the original due date. For medical exemptions, only an official U of T form
signed by your physician will be accepted. A blank copy of the U of T medical certificate should be available on-line from the Arts and
Science website (try this http://www.healthservice.utoronto.ca/pdfs/medcert.htm). For non-medical emergencies, please contact
your college registrar, which may be able to provide a letter documenting your situation. Be aware that submitting a note which has
been altered or obtained under false pretenses is considered a very serious offence by the University.
MISSED TESTS AND EXAMS
* Students should strenuously avoid missing a test or exam-- the procedure for taking a make-up test is strictly regulated by the
university, and these policies will be followed in all cases. Notify the instructor by email within 24 hours of missing the exam. A
make-up test will take place as soon as possible, usually within 5 days of the original test, and often sooner than that. The make-up
test will not be scheduled during regular classtime, and may conflict with employment, childcare, and so forth. A student who
misses a test must accommodate another day and time at her inconvenience. A missed make-up exam results in a zero on the
exam.
* For valid excuses, see the section above, “Missed Tests or Deadlines.”
* A make-up test will include different content, different questions, and a different format.
* For the Final Exam, see Section 7.14 Examinations in the UT Calendar. You will have to submit a petition to Registrar Services,
among other requirements, and re-take the exam during the Deferred Examinations Period, as scheduled by the university.
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PLAGIARISM. While you may get lecture notes from other students for days when you are absent, the answers you submit must be your own
independent work. Exercises in which duplication is detected will be severely penalized. For more details, see Academic Honesty;
and the Code of Behaviour on Academic Matters in the UT Calendar for under the Code of Behaviour on Academic Matters. It is your
responsibility to be familiar with this code, and adhere to it. By now you should be aware that the university expects your work to
be done independently. Any attempt to gain undue advantage over your classmates by plagiarizing or other forms of cheating will
be dealt with according to the Code of Behaviour on Academic Matters. IF you have any questions about what is or is not plagiarism,
please see www. Plagiarism.org.
Normally, students will be required to submit their course essays to Turnitin.com for a review of textual similarity and detection of
possible plagiarism. In doing so, students will allow their essays to be included as source documents in the Turnitin.com reference
database, where they will be used solely for the purpose of detecting plagiarism. The terms that apply to the University's use of the
Turnitin.com service are described on the Turnitin.com web site.
LATE EXERCISES: (1) Late exercises will be penalized per calendar day, including weekends (Turnitin.com will
register the time/date of your submission). The penalty is 5% on the first day late, plus 2% per day
thereafter including weekends and holidays. Late work may result in severe delays in marking.
SYLLABUS date: June 26, 2015.
Image credits:
Top: Chipko movement, Garhwal, India., ca. 1983.
Bottom: Kids for Tigers, with 350.org banner, West Bengal, India, ca. 2009.
i
Polanyi, 1944, “Market and Nature,” IN The Great Transformation, Boston: Beacon. p. 178.
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