Fall 2006
Anthropology/Global Studies 103*
http://www.globalstudies.uiuc.edu
Anthropology in a Changing World
Tuesdays and Thursdays, 9:30-11 a.m., 112 Gregory Hall
http://compass.uiuc.edu
Professor:
Ellen Moodie emoodie@uiuc.edu, 391 Davenport Hall, 244-7849, OH T 11 a.m.-1 p.m.
Teaching Assistants:
Nicole Tami [390 DH] (tami@uiuc.edu), Teresa Ramos [309R DH] (tramos@uiuc.edu), and
William Hope [309D DH] (whope@uiuc.edu).
Your teaching assistants will grade your assignments and assist in lecture. They will be
introduced on the first day of classes. Each will hold office hours at times to be announced.
You may also arrange meetings with your professor or teaching assistants by appointment.
Course description
This course will introduce you to sociocultural anthropology through a series of stories,
situations and case studies. During the semester you will discover the enormous range of this
field of study, from long-term links across the globe to close contacts among friends and family
members. You’ll learn about diverse people and their ways of engaging with the particular
worlds around them (and helping to create the worlds around them through their ideas and
actions). The thrust of the class is globalization of those worlds, as part of the Global Studies
Initiative (GSI). In an increasingly globalized, multicultural world, anthropology is a good base
on which to build careers in law, medicine, business, journalism, public policy, politics, public
health, social work, international development, education, activism, adventure travel, novel
writing, theater, art … almost anything!
Sociocultural anthropology’s main method is ethnographic fieldwork, or long-term participantobservation. This approach contributes a crucial perspective to discussions of globalization. It
pays close attention to local, often personal, relationships within and among groups of people. In
their analyses, anthropologists consider how actions, interactions and senses of identity are
formed by and help form broader structures, whether economic, religious, political or cultural.
As part of the GSI, Anthropology 103 has an unconventional set-up. On Tuesdays and
Thursdays, we survey anthropological themes. On five Wednesdays, we attend afternoon
lectures. These talks, all about globalization from different perspectives, punctuate the course
like blue hyperlinks. They connect to class material, but in unexpected and not always
immediately apparent ways. They show us possibilities for broadening ideas about the world.
Class readings will make your own worlds a little, perhaps even a lot, bigger. They move from
Thailand to Spanish Harlem, Namibia to Mexico, Mozambique to Silicon Valley and beyond.
*
ANTH 103 meets UIUC’s General Education criteria for a UIUC Social Sciences, Non-Western
Cultures, and Western Comparative Cultures course.
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They ask how gender varies in different places and reflect on how witchcraft helps explain the
world for some people; they delve into the debate over gay marriage and ponder the role of ideas
about culture in the war on terror. The major case studies we will look at this fall include an
investigation of the controversy over how the Yanomami people of the Amazon have been
treated by scientists and other outsiders, as well as a long-term study of migration to and from
the Polynesian island-nation of Tonga and suburbs in California.
As the weeks pass, we will return again and again to think about the ways global and local
contexts—which aren’t actually so distinct—merge and move, often resisting change but also
compelling transformations. As we exchange our ideas and compare experiences, the class will
undoubtedly compel some transformations in all of our ways of thinking about the world.
Course texts
We suggest that you purchase the books listed below. All the texts contain required readings. All
the books will also be on reserve at the undergraduate library. Talking About People: Readings in
Contemporary Cultural Anthropology (referred to as Haviland in the syllabus) is a collection of
articles that will form the main archive of course readings. Yanomami: The Fierce Controversy
and What We Can Learn From It (Borofsky), which may be purchased as an e-book, discusses a
key recent debate in anthropology and is part of a larger activist web project. Voyages: From
Tongan Villages to American Suburbs (Small) offers a fascinating example of the kind of longterm work that cultural anthropologists carry out. Core Concepts in Cultural Anthropology
(Lavenda) provides valuable background to help explain class lectures and readings, offering a
kind of conceptual support system to the specific case studies in the syllabus (we will always
indicate in class what material will be included on exams and quizzes). It is important to note,
though, that this class will only give you a sample of what anthropology can be. The core course
for the people who decide to become anthropology majors is ANTH 230.
Many required readings, listed below in the schedule, are only available through the library ereserve system, http://web.library.uiuc.edu/ereserves/querycourse.asp. Some readings are
accessible through URLs listed on the syllabus. We strongly recommend that you print out these
electronic texts in order to read them carefully (if you have any problems accessing them, let us
know!). Material from all texts will be included in the midterm or final exams, as well as in
quizzes and writing assignments and exercises. You will also be required to read short selections
before each of the five guest speakers’ presentations (and take an on-line quiz related to the
readings). Those texts will be available on both the Compass and Global Studies web sites.
Books to purchase
W. Haviland, R. Gordon, and L. Vivanco, Talking About People: Readings in Contemporary
Cultural Anthropology, 4th Ed. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 2006) [Haviland]
Robert Borofsky, Yanomami: The Fierce Controversy and What We Can Learn From It
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005). You may purchase an abridged version
available for a reduced price. Details in class. [Borofsky]
Cathy A. Small, Voyages: From Tongan Villages to American Suburbs (Ithaca: Cornell
University Press, 1997) [Small]
Robert H. Lavenda and Emily A. Schultz, Core Concepts in Cultural Anthropology, 3rd Edition
(New York: McGraw-Hill, 2006) [Lavenda]
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Course issues and policies
Academic honesty: All students should know and abide by academic ethics. Plagiarism, whether
intentional or not, whether it involves forgetting to cite all your sources of information or turning
in someone else’s work as your own, has serious consequences. The URL
http://library.ups.edu/research/guides/acadhon.htm offers a helpful statement on academic
honesty. Extended information is available at the following web site:
http://www.research.uiuc.edu/ethics/plagiarism.asp#students. A student’s first instance of
plagiarism will be turned back with the opportunity for resubmission valued at half-grade; a
second instance will result in failure for the course. We shall electronically screen suspect outof-class essays for plagiarism.
Special Needs: Any students with special needs should discuss them with the professor as early
in the semester as possible. We shall arrange for alternative test sites if needed and if specified
seating arrangements are needed, we are happy to accommodate students.
Attendance at all lectures, in ANTH 103 class (T-Th, 9:30-11 a.m., 112 Gregory Hall) in the GSI
lectures (selected Ws, 4-5 p.m., Foellinger Auditorium), as well as the LAS 101 classes (W 45:30 p.m.), is crucial to getting the full benefit of the course, especially because there isn’t one
central textbook to follow in this syllabus. It should be clear that it’s very important to read the
assigned texts at least once before the date for which they are listed in the schedule. You would
do well to keep notes on key terms and ideas that trouble you from the readings. You may ask
about these issues in class, in office hours, through e-mail (though don’t expect an instantaneous
answer), if you happen to run into the professor in the gym or the street, or via the web page
discussion options. Your understanding of reading assignments, lectures and films will be
occasionally checked with the in-class quizzes, on-line exercises, and “short writes.” Grades
from unannounced in-class quizzes or missed exercises cannot be made up.
Grades
Your grade will be based upon a combination of measures.
 Mid-term exam (20 percent)
 Final exam (20 percent)
 Two out-of-class writing assignments (10 percent + 15 percent = 25 percent)
 Periodic assignments (28 percent)
o in-class quizzes on assigned readings, films, and class lectures
o on-line exercises on assigned readings
 Five on-line quizzes in connection with the special speakers (5 percent)
 Two surveys at the start and end of the semester (2 percent)
No late work will be accepted except under exceptional circumstances. These
circumstances must be discussed with the professor.
Exams (40 percent): The mid-term and final exams are worth 20 percent each. Fifty percent of
the grade for each exam will consist of multiple-choice questions, identifications, and short
answers. The other 50 percent will comprise essay questions. The dates of these exams are
October 12 (in 112 Gregory Hall during class time) and December 12 (in a room TBA). There
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will be review sessions before each exam. The final exam will focus on material in the second
half of the course but you will be responsible for knowing material from the entire semester.
Out-of-class writing assignments (25 percent): There will be one on-line letter-writing exercise,
due at a date in late September to be announced, and one three-page essay written as a kind of
consultant’s report to a non-governmental organization, due just before Thanksgiving break
(November 16). Details will be announced closer to the due dates.
Periodic assignments and quizzes (28 percent):
o Quizzes: there will be eight unannounced quizzes during the semester. Some will
be in the form of short (two-paragraph) writing essays such as film reviews,
lecture reviews, or summaries of controversial issues posed in lectures. Others
will be multiple-choice exercises. The six best scores will count towards your
grade (18 percent).
o On-line exercises: These will be available on-line to help comprehension on
assigned readings (10 percent).
Special speaker quizzes (5 percent): Prior to each of the five special speakers’ presentations you
will be asked to go on-line to the Compass course web site to take a quiz based on the assigned
readings for the scheduled speaker. Your score will be based on the best of two attempts. This
activity should be completed by 1 p.m. the Wednesday of the Foellinger Auditorium lecture.
GSI surveys (2 percent): These measures of knowledge must be completed at the start and end of
the semester.
Class themes
There are five parts to this schedule, each loosely organizing units of knowledge in which
you should become conversant by the end of the term.

It begins with an introduction to the field of anthropology itself, outlining major concepts
and providing historical background to the development of the discipline.

It continues with “Other Knowledge,” a title drawn from anthropology’s perhaps sordid
origins: the discipline emerged as Westerners encountered many people who looked
different and had unfamiliar customs in the context of long-distance trade, conquest and
colonialism. Anthropology started as a way to create Knowledge about Others.

The third theme is “Capital and Creed”—referring to the spread of the dominant
economic system in the world today, capitalism, and religion, which inevitably
intertwines with economic ideologies. The section should challenge us to think about
how any economic system (any form of exchange) is cultural, rather than “natural” or
“scientific.” The core of this section is a book on transnational migration, which has
everything to do with economics (but also links to religion here). The section also
addresses post-9/11 political/cultural changes.
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
The fourth section, “Control and Change,” builds on the ideas from the third part of the
syllabus, exploring forms of control within different social systems (focusing on the
dominant social arrangement in the world today, the state). It wonders about how change
occurs in states, considering development programs and international organizations that
promote them, as well as activism that does not come only from powerful agencies or
universities but emerges within groups of people who unite to solve their problems.

Finally, “Identity and Belonging” returns to the ideas first explored in the section “Other
Knowledge,” now placed within the scaffolding built over the past weeks of the course. It
considers how categories of identity and difference, of belonging and exclusion, are
structured. It explores the always-interconnected issues of race, ethnicity, gender,
sexuality and class, and investigates classic anthropological interests in kinship and
marriage.
Reading schedule**
You should have completed the assigned readings by the day listed on this schedule. Often there
will be a reading review exercise available on Compass to help you think through the main ideas
in the reading. You may notice that some weeks have more reading than others; it is up to you to
manage your workloads in order to keep up (reading ahead on the lighter weeks). The readings
from the books are denoted by the surname of the first author (i.e., Haviland stands for Talking
about People). Readings with a URL are available in open links. Readings marked with an
asterisk (*) can be found on e-reserve, http://web.library.uiuc.edu/ereserves/querycourse.asp. As
we have already suggested, electronic readings should be printed out and read with a pen in hand
to write down questions, and underline important ideas. Interacting physically with a text aids in
remembering material.
August
PART I: INTRODUCTION
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Theme: Anthropology and global issues
29
Theme: What is anthropology?
Reading: *Luke Eric Lassiter, “Evolution and the Critique of Race: A Short Story.” In
Invitation to Anthropology, 3-32 (Oxford, U.K.: AltaMira Press, 2006)
CORE CONCEPTS: Lavenda, 1-12
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Theme: What is culture?
Reading: Haviland, 27-29, 42-44, 45-49
“Basic Concepts: What is the Meaning of Culture?”
Sally Engle Merry, “Human-Rights Law and the Demonization of
Culture”
Jane Mulcock, “Ethnography in Awkward Spaces: An Anthropology of
Cultural Borrowing”
**
Subject to change, pending unforeseen events.
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Renato Rosaldo, “Of Headhunters and Soldiers: Separating Cultural and
Ethical Relativism.” In Issues in Ethics 11 (1) (Winter 2000).
http://www.scu.edu/ethics/publications/iie/v11n1/relativism.html
CORE CONCEPTS: Lavenda, 15-30
September
PART II: OTHER KNOWLEDGE
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Theme: Culture, self and experience
Reading: Haviland, 72-76, 84-86
“Socialization: How Do People Learn and Experience Their Culture?”
Amparo B. Ojeda, “Growing Up American: Doing the Right Thing”
Emily Martin, “Flexible Survivors”
*Susan Bordo, “Never Just Pictures.” In One World, Many Cultures, 5th edition,
edited by Stuart and Terry Hirschberg, 168-173 (New York: Pearson
Longman, 2004)
*Erica Goode, “Study Finds TV Trims Fiji Girls’ Body Image and Eating Habits.”
In Beyond Borders: Thinking Critically About Global Issues, edited by
Paula S. Rothenberg, 558-560 (New York: Worth Publishers, 2006)
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Theme: How do we know others/the Other?
Reading: *Rebekah Nathan, “As Others See Us.” In My Freshman Year: What a
Professor Learned by Becoming a Student, 67-89 (Ithaca: Cornell
University Press, 2005)
Haviland, 24-26
Gregory Starrett, “Culture Never Dies: Anthropology at Abu Ghraib”
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Theme: The long quest for the primitive
Reading: Borofsky, xiii-xv, 3-21
*Napoleon A. Chagnon, “Doing Fieldwork among the Yanomamö.” In One
World, Many Cultures, 446-460.
See web site http://www.publicanthropology.org/yanomami/
14
Theme: Power relations (in and out of the field)
Reading: Borofsky, 22-60
19
Theme: Ethics and fieldwork practices
Reading: Borofsky, 61-106
See web site http://www.research.uiuc.edu/ethics/anthropology.asp12
20
GSI Cross-Course Lecture Series:
Globalization, inequality, and democracy
Palagummi Sainath, Indian journalist
On-line quiz must be submitted by 3 p.m., September 19, for full credit.
Each time we have a speaker, please see the UIUC Global Studies web site for the guest’s
biography and for the reading assignments.
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ASSIGNMENT: Letter exercise on http://www.publicanthropology.org/yanomami/ : “Giving
Back to Communities That Facilitated Anthropological Research” (for description see
http://www.publicanthropology.org/Yanomami/06Fall-Topics.php) (Sept. 18-Oct. 4)
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Theme: Language and culture: Translation and social order
Reading: Haviland, 56-68
Salikoko S. Mufwene, “Forms of Address: How Their Social Functions
May Vary”
Jane H. Hill, “Language, Race and White Public Space”
CORE CONCEPTS: Lavenda 33-51
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Theme: Language and culture: Can global be local?
Reading: *David Crystal, “Why a global language?” In English as a Global
Language, 2nd edition, 1-28 (New York: Cambridge University Press,
2003)
PART III CAPITAL AND CREED
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Theme: Economic anthropology: Primitive quests
Reading: *Marshall Sahlins, “The Original Affluent Society.”
http://www.eco-action.org/dt/affluent.html
CORE CONCEPTS: Lavenda, 131-152
October
3
Theme: Colonialism and capitalism
Reading: *Jamaica Kincaid, “On Seeing England for the First Time.” In
Anthropology/Annual Editions 00/01, 222-224 (Guilford:
Dushkin/McGraw-Hill, 2000)
*Slavenka Drakulic, “On Bad Teeth.” In One World, Many Cultures, 523-530.
*George Carlin, “A Place for Your Stuff.” In One World, Many Cultures, 441445.
CORE CONCEPTS: Lavenda, 187-207
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GSI Cross-Course Lecture Series:
US-Arab relations
Hafez Al Mirazi, host of Al-Jazeera television talk show, “From
Washington”
On-line quiz must be submitted by 1 p.m., October 4, for full credit.
5
Theme: Global culture change in a post-9/11 world
Reading: Haviland, 242-244, 278-283
“Understanding 9/11: What Motivated the 9/11 Hijackers?”
“Anthropology and the War on Terror: What Is Anthropology’s Role in
the ‘War on Terror?’”
Moutot, Michael. “Washington is Losing ‘War on Terror’: Experts.” July 5, 2006,
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines06/070503.htm
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10
Theme: Review
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MIDTERM EXAM
17
Theme: Religion: Global history and individual experience
Reading: Haviland, 223-230, 234-241
“Religion: How Do We Make Sense of Peoples’ Beliefs and Ritual
Practices?”
Isak Niehaus, “Witchcraft in Anthropological Perspective”
Sian Sullivan, “On Dance and Difference: Bodies, Movement and
Experience in Khoesaan Trance-Dancing—Perceptions of ‘a
Raver’”
CORE CONCEPTS: Lavenda, 71-89
18
GSI Cross-Course Lecture Series:
Migration and Human Trafficking
Susan Forbes Martin, executive director, Institute for the Study of International
Migration, Georgetown University
On-line quiz must be submitted by 1 p.m., October 18, for full credit.
19
Theme: Migration today: Global forces, island village
Reading: Small, 1-49
24
Theme: Coming to America
Reading: Small, 50-100
26
Theme: Home and family, time and distance
Reading: Small, 101-158
31
Theme: Traditions and transnationalism
Reading: Small, 158-216
PART IV CONTROL AND CHANGE
November
2
Theme: Controlling others
Reading: Haviland, 201-206
“Politics: How Do People Exercise Power Over Each Other?”
Clifford D. Shearing and Philip C. Stenning, “Say ‘Cheese!’: The Disney
Order That Is Not So Mickey Mouse”
CORE CONCEPTS: Lavenda, 91-109
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Theme: States and order
Reading: Haviland, 209-217, 191-196
Pierre L. Van den Berghe, “The Modern State: Nation-Builder or Nation
Killer?”
8
Alex de Waal, “The Genocidal State: Hutu Extremism and the Origins of
the ‘Final Solution’ in Rwanda”
CORE CONCEPTS: Lavenda, 111-129
8
GSI Cross-Course Lecture Series:
Children and war
Mattito Watson, Deputy field office director for Save the Children/U.S. in Darfur,
Sudan.
On-line quiz must be submitted by 1 p.m., November 8, for full credit.
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Theme: Intervention and development
Reading: Haviland, 245-257
“Change: What Does It Mean to Modernize?”
James L. Brain, “The Ugly American Revisited”
James Ferguson with Larry Lohmann, “The Anti-Politics Machine:
‘Development’ and Bureaucratic Power in Lesotho”
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Activism and social movements
Reading: *Guillermo Delgado-P., “The Makings of a Transnational Movement.” In
NACLA: Report on the Americas 35 (6) May/June 2002, 36-38.
Haviland 258-262
Frédérique Apffel-Marglin, “Counter-Development in the Andes”
*Vandana Shiva, “Building Water Democracy: People’s Victory Against Coca
Cola in Plachimada.” In Beyond Borders:Thinking Critically About Global
Issues, 580-583.
*Liza Featherstone, “The New Student Movement.” In Beyond Borders:
Thinking Critically About Global Issues, 585-590.
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GSI Cross-Course Lecture Series:
Globalization from below
Luis Macas, Ecuadorian indigenous leader and human rights activist
On-line quiz must be submitted by 1 p.m., November 15, for full credit.
PART V: IDENTITY AND BELONGING
16
Theme: Race/ethnicity/class
Reading: *Marisol de la Cadena, “Reconstructing Race: Racism, Culture and Mestizaje
in Latin America.” NACLA Report on the Americas (May/June 2001), 1623.
*Stuart Hall, “Old and New Identities.” In Beyond Borders: Thinking Critically
About Global Issues, 220-224.
Erin Texeira, “Black Men Combat Negative Stereotypes.” July 9, 2006.
www.progressiveu.org/101704-black-men-combat-negatives-stereotypes .
ASSIGNMENT: Three-page consultant’s report for non-government organization on
development issues
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THANKSGIVING BREAK
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Theme: Class/ethnicity/race
Reading: Haviland, 181-190
Brett Williams, “Owning Places and Buying Time: Class, Culture, and
Stalled Gentrification”
Betsy Leondar-Wright, “Widening the Racial Wealth Gap.” May 31, 2006.
www.commondreams.org/views06/0531-20.htm
*Karen J. Hossfeld, “Gender, Race, and Class in Silicon Valley.” In Beyond
Borders: Thinking Critically About Global Issues, 264-270.
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Theme: Gender and sexuality
Reading: *Cheryl A. Rubenberg, “The Foundation of Gender Identity: Garaba,
Relational Conductivity, and Patriarchy.” In Beyond Borders:
Thinking Critically About Global Issues, 256-263.
Haviland, 125-140
“Gender and Sexuality: How Do Women and Men Relate to Each Other?”
Roger N. Lancaster, “The Place of Anthropology in a Public Culture
Reshaped by Bioreductivism”
David Bennett, “Hanky-Panky and Spanky Wanky: Sex and the Single
Boy”
“Gay and Lesbian Marriage: Should Gays and Lesbians Have the Right to
Marry?”
CORE CONCEPTS: Lavenda, 153-171
December
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Theme: Marriage and kinship
Reading: Haviland, 143-160
“Marriage and Kinship: What Does It Mean to Be in a Family?”
Serena Nanda, “Arranging a Marriage in India”
Brett Williams, “Why Migrant Women Feed Their Husbands Tamales:
Foodways as a Basis for a Revisionist View of Tejano Family
Life”
Lu Yuan and Sam Mitchell, “Land of the Walking Marriage”
CORE CONCEPTS: Lavenda, 175-186
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Theme: Wrap-up and review
Reading: Michael Schwalbe, “Afterword: The Costs of American Privilege.” In Beyond
Borders: Thinking Critically About Global Issues, 603-605.
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FINAL EXAMINATION, 1:30-4:30 p.m.
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