Anthropology 545 -- Seminar in Cultural Anthropology
Spring, 2005
TR: 6:00-8:05 DDH K110
Dr. Jane Granskog
DDH/CC206 (661) 664-3117 Dept: (661) 664-2368
jgranskog@csub.edu
Office Hours: T TH 4:00-5:30; W 2:30-4:30 and by appointment
Course Description:
This course will provide a historical overview of the major theoretical paradigms in cultural
anthropology. Theorists discussed will include those from American, British, and French schools of
anthropology from the early twentieth century to the present. We will discuss the foundations of
anthropology, Nineteenth Century Cultural Evolution, and numerous theoretical perspectives,
including those proposed by the American Historical School, proponents of culture and personality,
functionalism, structural functionalism, structuralism, cultural materialism, cultural ecology,
interpretive anthropology, symbolic anthropology, Marxist anthropology, feminist anthropology,
postmodernism, and poststructuralism. Students will also read ethnographic works that combine
various theoretical orientations to present various ways of describing culture.
Course Objectives:
Students in this course will think critically, drawing connections among the theoretical orientations
discussed, write convincingly, and read extensively to learn about the history of perspectives in
cultural anthropology.
Course Requirements:
Students are responsible for leading discussion twice. The first of these times will not be graded,
though students will receive feedback to incorporate into their second discussion. Students will write
brief (2 page) response papers to each of two videos shown in class. Students will also be responsible
for writing four papers (each one of 7-10 pages in length). Three of these papers will be based on
questions that draw comparisons among various works we have read in class. The fourth will be
about an ethnography of the student’s choice.
Required Readings:
Please see the reading listed under each date, below, for specific reading assignments. All readings
are available via electronic reserves and hard copies are also on reserve at Walter Stiern Library. To
access e-reserves, go to www.lib.csub.edu and click on “Course Reserves.” Search for reserves by my
name or by the course number (Anth 545). Click on “Electronic Reserve Readings for…” and click
on the title “***Login Required***”. Login using your CSUB RunnerCard ID barcode number and
your last name. If your computer is not already equipped with Adobe Reader, you can download it
from www.adobe.co.uk/products/acrobat/readstep2.html.
Grading and Assignments:
Lead discussion: 20
Preparation sheet for leading discussion: 10
Response paper to the Mead video (due April 19): 15
Response paper to the Malinowski video (due April 26): 15
First Paper (due April 28): 30
Second Paper (due May 12): 50
Third Paper (due May 26): 50
Fourth Paper (due June 9): 50
Total points: 240
Grading scheme:
100-93% = A
92 - 89 = A88-86 =
B+
85 - 83 = B
82 - 79 = B78-76 =
C+
75 - 73 = C
72 - 69 = C68 - 66 = D+
65 - 63 = D
62 - 59 = D58 =
F
Classroom policies:
1. I will not accept late papers unless you have a documented excuse
(proving illness, death in the family, or participation in university-sponsored events). See the
guidelines below for policies related to response papers. All papers are due at the beginning of class
on the date listed, and you must attend class that day to have your paper received.
2. There is no extra credit offered. Please focus your efforts on the regularly assigned work.
3. Do not come into class late or leave early, unless you have a compelling reason that you have
discussed with me prior to class.
4. If you miss class, it is your responsibility to find out what you missed. Any more than three
unexcused absences will negatively affect your grade.
5. Please turn off your cell phones or pagers.
6. All students must adhere to CSUB’s policy on Academic Integrity, as outlined under Rights and
Responsibilities on page 48 of the Fall 2003 Class Schedule. Students who do not do so will receive
an F in the course and will face disciplinary sanction by Student Discipline and Judicial Affairs.
Please read the following for specifics: http://www.csub.edu/ssric/Modules/Other/plagiarism.htm
7. Qualified students with disabilities who need appropriate academic adjustments should contact me
soon as possible to ensure that your needs are met in a timely manner. Any disability needs to be
verified by Services for Students with Disabilities (SSD). Upon such verification, all handouts and
assignments will be available in alternative accessible formats upon request.
8. Students are responsible for tracking their own grade progress (see “Grading and Assignments,”
and “Grading Scheme” above).
9. When I grade your papers, I do not want to know who you are, so as to avoid any unfair bias in
grading. To this end, I request that you turn in all papers with your name typed on the right corner of
the first page only, and with that corner folded over, toward the back of the page.
Guidelines for response papers:
These papers are not to exceed two pages. In a double-spaced, typed paper, address all of the
following points:
1. What were the main points of the movie or presentation?
2. How were these exemplified?
3. What did it reaffirm or teach you about anthropological concepts? Tie the video or concepts
from it concretely to others that we have discussed or read about in class. Cite your sources.
4. Address the effectiveness of the presentation. What did it do well? How could it have been
stronger? Be specific.
Assignments are due on the day under which they are listed. For example, for class on Thursday,
March 30, please read the articles on reserve by Kuhn and by Spencer.
Tuesday, March 28
Introduction, the foundations of cultural anthropology
Thursday, March 30 – Class Cancelled but read the following
Paradigm Shifts
Nineteenth Century Cultural Evolution
Selections from
Kuhn, Thomas
1970 The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Read chapters 1 (“Introduction: A Role for History) and 2 (“The Route to Normal Science”) (pp. 122)
Spencer, Herbert
1988 “The Evolution of Society,”pp. 6-28 in Paul Bohannan and Mark Glazer, eds., High Points in
Anthropology. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Tuesday, April 5
Nineteenth Century Cultural Evolution
Morgan, Lewis Henry
1988 “Ancient Society,” pp. 32-60 in Paul Bohannan and Mark Glazer, eds., High
Points in Anthropology. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Tylor, Edward Burnett
1988 “Primitive Culture,” pp. 64-78 in Paul Bohannan and Mark Glazer, eds., High
Points in Anthropology. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Thursday, April 7
The American Historical School: Boas and his students
Stocking, George W., ed.
1974 A Franz Boas Reader: The Shaping of American Anthropology, 1883-1911.
Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press.
Read pp. 23-36, 61-71, 129-134, 148-155, 202-214, 219-242. (Note: There are additional pages in the
copy on electronic reserve that you are not required to read)
Kroeber, Alfred L.
1917 “The Superorganic,” American Anthropologist 19(2): 163-213.
Sapir, Edward
1917 “Do We Need a Superorganic?”American Anthropologist 19(3): 441-447,
Sapir, Edward
1924 “Culture, Genuine and Spurious,”The American Journal of Sociology, 29(4): 401-429.
Hurston, Zora Neale
1991 Dust Tracks on a Road. New York: Harper Perennial.
Read pp. 122-149.
Hurston, Zora Neale
1931 “Hoodoo in America,” Journal of American Folklore 44(174): 317-418.
Read pp. 356-360, 368-371, and 380-382.
Read this for today, but we will discuss Hurston on the 12th.
Tuesday, April 12
Boas’ students, continued: culture and personality
Selections from
Benedict, Ruth
1989 Patterns of Culture. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.
Read chapters 1, 2, 3, and 8 (pp. 1-56, 251-278)
Babcock, Barbara A.
1995 “‘Not in the Absolute Singular’: Rereading Ruth Benedict,” pp. 186-206 in Ruth
Behar and Deborah Gordon, eds., Women Writing Culture. Berkeley: University of
California Pres.
Thursday, April 14
Boas’ students, continued: culture and personality -- Video on Margaret Mead
Selections from
Mead, Margaret
2001 Coming of Age in Samoa. New York: Perennial Classics.
Please read the preface, chapters 1, 3, 7, and 10, (pp. xxi-xxvii, 3-11, 16-28, 61-76, and 92-109).
Lutkehaus, Nancy C.
1995 “Margaret Mead and the ‘Rustling-of-the-Wind-in-the-Palm-Trees School’
Ethnographic Writing,” pp. 186-206 in Ruth Behar and Deborah Gordon, eds.,
Women Writing Culture. Berkeley: University of California Press.
of
Freeman, Derek
2001 “Mead’s Misconstruing of Samoa,” pp. 454-465 in Paul A. Erickson and Liam D.
Murphy, eds., Readings for a History of Anthropological Theory. Toronto:
Broadview Press.
First paper topic will be assigned
Tuesday, April 19
Discussion of Mead video and readings from the 14th
Thursday, April 21
Select the ethnography on which you plan to write your final paper.
Functionalism
Selections from
Malinowski, Bronislaw
1984 Argonauts of the Western Pacific. Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press.
Read pp. 1-25 (“Introduction”), 81-104 (“The Essentials of the Kula”), and pp. 267-289 (“In the
Amphletts – Sociology of the Kuna”)
Video on Kula
Tuesday, April 26
Structural Functionalism
Selections from
Radcliffe-Brown, A.R.
1965 Structure and Function in Primitive Society. New York: The Free Press.
Read chapters 9 (“On the Concept of Function in Social Science”) and 10 (“On Social Structure”)
(pp. 178-204).
Thursday, April 28
First paper due in class
Cultural Ecology
Selections from
Steward, Julian
1955 Theory of Culture Change: The Methodology of Multinear Evolution. Urbana:
University of Illinois Press.
Read pp. 3-8, and 11-42.
Harris, Marvin
2001 “Cultural Materialism; Cultural Ecology,” pp. 654-687 in Marvin Harris, The Rise
of Anthropological Theory. Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press.
Tuesday, May 3
Marxist Anthropology and Cultural Materialism
Marx, Karl and Friedrich Engels
2001 “Bourgeois and Proletarians,” pp. 15-25 in Erickson, Paul A. and Liam D.
Murphy, eds., Readings for a History of Anthropological Theory. Toronto:
Broadview Press.
Harris, Marvin
1988 “Theoretical Principles of Cultural Materialism,” pp. 377-403 in Paul Bohannan
and Mark Glazer, eds., High Points in Anthropology. New York; McGraw-Hill.
Harris, Marvin
1989 “Mother Cow,” pp. 11-32 in Marvin Harris, Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches.
New York: Vintage Books.
Second paper will be assigned
Thursday, May 5
Structuralism
Lévi-Strauss, Claude
1967 Structural Anthropology. New York: Doubleday & Company.
Read pp. 1-28, 116-127, 202-228. and 269-319.
Tuesday, May 10
Selections from
Douglas, Mary
2002 Purity and Danger. London and New York: Routledge.
Read pp. 8-50 (Ritual Uncleanness” and “Secular Defilement) and pp. 117-172 (“Powers and
Dangers” and “External Boundaries”)
Thursday, May 12
Second paper due at the beginning of class
Symbolic Anthropology
Van Gennep, Arnold
1960 The Rites of Passage. Trans., Monika B. Vizedom and Gabrielle L. Caffee.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Read pp. 1-13, 41-49, and 189-194.
Turner, Victor W.
1996 Schism and Continuity in an African Society: A Study of Ndembu Village Life.
Oxford and Washington, D.C.: Berg.
Read pp. 288-317 (Chapter 10: “The Politically Integrative Function of Ritual”)
Turner, Victor
2001 “Symbols in Ndembu Ritual,” pp. 357-382 in in Paul A. Erickson and Liam D.
Murphy, eds., , Readings for a History of Anthropological Theory. Toronto:
Broadview Press.
Tuesday, May 17
Interpretive Anthropology
Selections from
Geertz, Clifford
1973 The Interpretation of Cultures. New York: Basic Books
Read pp. 3-30, “Thick Description: Toward an Interpretive Theory of Culture,” pp. 142-169, “Ritual
and Social Change: A Javanese Example,” and pp. 412-453, “Deep Play: Notes on the Balinese
Cockfight.
Ortner, Sherry B.
2001 “Theory in Anthropology Since the Sixties,” pp. 642-687 in Paul A.
Erickson and Liam D. Murphy, eds., , Readings for a History of Anthropological
Theory. Toronto: Broadview Press.
Third paper will be assigned.
Thursday, May 19
Feminist Anthropology
Rosaldo, Michelle Zimbalist and Louise Lamphere, eds.
1974 Woman, Culture, and Society. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Read the Introduction by Rosaldo and Lamphere (pp. 1-16), “Woman, Culture, and Society: A
Theoretical Overview” by Michelle Zimbalist Rosaldo (17-42), and “Is Female to Male as Nature Is
to Culture?” by Sherry B. Ortner (67-88)
Ortner, Sherry B.
1996 “So , Is Female to Male as Nature is to Culture?” pp. 173-180 in Sherry B. Ortner,
Making Gender: The Politics and Erotics of Culture. Boston: Beacon Press.
Ong, Aihwa
1997 “Spirits of Resistance,” pp. 355-370 in Louise Lamphere, Helena Ragoné, and
Patricia Zavella, eds., Situated Lives: Gender and Culture in Everyday Life. New
York: Routledge.
Martin, Emily
1997 “The Egg and the Sperm: How Science Has Constructed a Romance Based on
Stereotypical Male-Female Roles,” pp. 85-98 in Louise Lamphere, Helena Ragoné,
and Patricia Zavella, eds., Situated Lives: Gender and Culture in Everyday Life. New
York: Routledge.
Tuesday, May 24
Postmodernism
Clifford, James
2001 “Introduction: Partial Truths [Writing Culture],” pp. 598-630 in Paul A. Erickson
and Liam D. Murphy, eds. Readings for a History of Anthropological Theory.
Toronto: Broadview Press.
Wolf, Margery
1992 “Ruminations with a View(point),” pp. 1-14 in Margery Wolf, A Thrice Told Tale:
Feminism, Postmodernism, and Ethnograhic Responsibility. Stanford: Stanford
University Press.
Selections from
Clifford, James
1988 “On Ethnographic Authority, ”pp. 21-54 in James Clifford, The Predicament of
Culture: Twentieth-Century Ethnography, Literature, and Art. Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press.
Thursday, May 26
Third Paper Due at the beginning of class
Post-structuralism
Selections from
Rabinow, Paul, ed.
1984 The Foucault Reader. New York: Pantheon Books.
Read pp. 3-29 (“Introduction”), 170-177 (“The Body of the Condemned”), 178-187 (“Docile
Bodies”), 188-205 (“The Means of Correct Training”), 206-213 (“Panopticism”), 292-300 (“We
‘Other Victorians’”), and 301-329 (“The Repressive Hypothesis”)
Final paper will be assigned.
Tuesday, May 31
Post-structuralism, continued
Bourdieu, Pierre
1984 “The Habitus and the Space of Life-Styles,”pp. 169-225 in Pierre Bourdieu,
A Social critique of the Judgement of Taste. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press.
Selections from
Bourdieu, Pierre
Distinction;
1990 Outline of a Theory of Practice. Trans., Richard Nice. Cambridge; Cambridge University
Press.
Please read pp. 72-124.
Thursday, June 2
Student presentations on their ethnography of choice (presentations of works in progress)
Thursday, June 9
Final papers due to my office (DDH CC206) by 5 pm.
Related Web Sites of Interest:
http://www.as.ua.edu/ant/Faculty/murphy/anthros.htm
A website developed under the direction of Dr. Michael D. Murphy at the U. of Alabama on a
guide to anthropological theories prepared by students for students.
http://wings.buffalo.edu/anthropology/WEDA/
A worldwide e-mail directory of anthropologists
http://www.aaanet.org/
The American Anthropological Association website
http://www.anthrotech.com/
Anthro TECH website providing innovative Web resources and services to the anthropological
community and general public. Includes the virtual library in anthropology:
http://vlib.anthrotech.com/
www.publicanthropology.org
Public Anthropology website which includes the Journal Archive for the American
Anthropologist with a brief synopsis and evaluation of articles from 1888 to the present along
with a number of other commentaries on critical issues in anthropology; started by Dr. Rob
Borofsky, Director of the Center for a Public Anthropology
GUIDELINES FOR LEADING DISCUSSION
Your role, as discussion leader, is not to lecture, but to facilitate class discussion. If you choose to
begin with a brief explanation or lecture, you may do so. Fill in this paper and turn it in on the day
you lead discussion. Your questions may be about concepts from the work in question, or they may
draw connections between this work and another discussed earlier in the quarter.
Be prepared to explain or outline the main concepts proposed by the theorist you are discussing if
these were unclear to the class, and if discussion is limited as a result. Do not hesitate to come to
office hours to discuss these with me, first, if that is helpful to you.
Theorist and work discussed:___________________________________
Terms that were unfamiliar or obscure and their definitions (be sure to note both where you saw the
term in your reading and your source for definitions):
1.
2.
3.
Open-ended discussion questions:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
READING LIST
(Select an ethnography from this list on which you will write a review, due June 9 by 5:00 pm)
Abu-Lughod, Lila
1993 Writing Women's Worlds: Bedouin Stories. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Abu-Lughod, Lila
1986 Veiled Sentiments: Honor and Poetry in a Bedouin Society.
Berkeley, Los Angeles, and London: University of California Press.
Basso, Keith
1996 Wisdom Sits in Places. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press.
Behar, Ruth
1993 Translated Woman: Crossing the Border With Esperanza’s Story.
Boston: Beacon Press.
Bonfil Batalla, Guillermo
1996 México Profundo: Reclaiming a Civilization. Trans., Philip A. Dennis. Austin: University of
Texas Press.
Borneman, John
1992 Belonging in Two Berlins: Kin, State, Nation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Bourgois, Philippe I.
1989 Ethnicity at Work: Divided Labor on a Central American Banana Plantation. Baltimore,
Maryland: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Bowen, Elenore Smith
1964 Return to Laughter: An Anthropological Novel. New York: Doubleday.
Brodkin, Karen
1998 How Jews Became White Folks: and What That Says About Race in
America. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press.
Burgos-DeBray, Elisabeth
1984 I, Rigoberta Menchú: An Indian Woman in Guatemala. Translated by
Ann Wright. London and New York: Verso.
Chavez, Leo
1992 Shadowed Lives: Undocumented Immigrants in American Society. Fort Worth: Harcourt
Brace Jovanovich College Publishers.
Comaroff, Jean and John Comaroff
1991 Of Revelation and Revolution: Christianity, Colonialism and Consciousness in South Africa.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press
Conklin, Beth
2001 Consuming Grief: Compassionate Cannibalism in an Amazonian Society. Austin: University
of Texas Press.
Dorian, Nancy C.
1981 Language Death: The Life Cycle of a Scottish Dialect. Philadelphia: University of
Pennsylvania Press.
English-Lueck, J. A.
1990 Health in the New Age: A Study in California Holistic Practices. Albuquerque: University of
New Mexico Press.
Evans-Pritchard, E.E.
1969 The Nuer: A Description of the Modes of Livelihood and Political Institutions of a Nilotic
People. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Feld, Steven
1982 Sound and Sentiment: Birds, Weeping Poetics, and Song in Kaluli Expression, 2nd ed.
Philadephia: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Fernández-Kelly, María Patricia
1983 For We Are Sold, I and My People: Women and Industry in Mexico’s
Frontier. Albany: State University of New York Press.
Field, Les W.
1999 The Grimace of Macho Ratón: Artisans, Identity, and Nation in Late-Twentieth-Century
Western Nicaragua. Durham and London: Duke University Press.
Fine, Michelle
1991 Framing Dropouts: Notes on the Politics of an Urban Public High School. Albany: SUNY
Press.
Foley, Douglas E.
1990 Learning Capitalist Culture: Deep in the Heart of Tejas. Philadephia: University of
Pennsylvania Press.
Foley, Douglas E.
1995 The Heartland Chronicles. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Friedlander, Judith
1975 Being Indian in Hueyapan: A Study of Forced Identity in Contemporary Mexico. New York:
St. Martin's Press.
Frye, David
1996 Indians Into Mexicans: History and Identity in a Mexican Town. Austin: University of Texas
Press.
Geertz, Clifford
1983 Local Knowledge: Further Essays in Interpretive Anthropology. New York: Basic Books.
1995 After the Fact. Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press.
Glass-Coffin, Bonnie
1998 The Gift of Life: Female Spirituality and Healing in Northern Peru. Albuquerque: University
of New Mexico Press
Handler, Richard
1988 Nationalism and the Politics of Culture in Quebec. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.
Harvey, David
1989 The Condition of Postmodernity: An Enquiry into the Origins of Cultural Change. Oxford:
Blackwell.
Haviland, John Beard
1977 Gossip, Reputation, and Knowledge in Zinacantan. Chicago and
London: University of Chicago Press.
Holland, Dorothy C. and Margaret A. Eisenhart
1990 Educated in Romance. Chicago and London: University of Chicago
Press.
Hurston, Zora Neale
1990 Tell My Horse: Voodoo and Life in Haiti and Jamaica. New York: Harper & Row.
Jackson, John L.
2001 Harlemworld. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Kondo, Dorrine
1990 Crafting Selves: Power, Gender, and Discourses of Identity in a Japanese Workplace.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Levinson, Bradley A.U.
2001 Equal: Student Culture and Identity at a Mexican Secondary School, 1988-1998. Durham,
NC: Duke University Press.
Luhrmann, Tanya M.
1989 Persuasions of the Witch’s Craft: Ritual Magic in Contemporary England. Cambridge:
Harvard University Press.
MacLeod, Jay
1987 Ain’t No Makin’ It: Leveled Aspirations in a Low-Income Neighborhood.
Boulder: Westview Press.
McLaren, Peter
1986 Schooling as a Ritual Performance: Towards a Political Economy of
Educational Symbols and Gestures. London and New York: Routledge.
Minh-ha, Trinh T.
1989 Woman, Native, Other. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.
Myerhoff, Barbara
1995 Remembered Lives: The Work of Ritual, Storytelling, and Growing Older. Ann
Arbor: The University of Michigan Press.
Nash, June C.
1993 We Eat the Mines and the Mines Eat Us: Dependency and Exploitation
in Bolivian Tin Mines. New York: Columbia University Press.
Nash, June
2001 Mayan Visions: The Quest for Autonomy in an Age of Globalization.
New York: Routledge.
Oboler, Suzanne
1995 Ethnic Labels, Ethnic Lives: Identity and the Politics of Re(Presentation)
in the United States. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Olsen, Laurie
1997 Made In America: Immigrant Students in Our Public Schools. New
York: The New Press.
Ong, Aihwa
1987 Spirits of Resistance and Capitalist Discipline: Factory Women in Malaysia. Albany: SUNY
Press.
Ortiz, Alfonso
1969 The Tewa World: Space, Time, Being and Becoming in a Pueblo Society. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
Philips, Susan Urmston
1983 The Invisible Culture: Communication in Classroom and Community
on the Warm Springs Indian Reservation. New York and London:
Longman.
Stephen, Lynn
1991 Zapotec Women. Austin: University of Texas Press.
Taggart, James M.
1990 Enchanted Maidens: Gender Relations In Spanish Folktales of
Courtship and Marriage. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Tsing, Anna Lowenhaupt
1993 In the Realm of the Diamond Queen: Marginality in an Out-of-the-Way Place. Princeton:
Princeton University Press.
Valdés, Guadalupe
1996 Con Respeto: Bridging the Distances Between Culturally Diverse Families and
Schools.: An Ethnographic Portrait. New York and London: Teachers College
Press.
Willis, Paul E.
1977 Learning to Labour: How Working Class Kids Get Working Class Jobs.
Westmead: Saxon House.
Wilmsen, Edwin N.
1989 Land Filled with Flies: A Political Economy of the Kalahari. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
Woolard, Kathryn A.
1989 Double Talk: Bilingualism and the Politics of Ethnicity in Catalonia.
Stanford: Stanford University Press.