AP/ANTH 2110 6.00 Core Concepts in Anthropology
What are the different ways that we, as anthropologists, research and analyze culture? What is ethnography and what are anthropological approaches to ethnography? This course is designed to familiarize students to key concepts in sociocultural anthropology by focusing on the craft of ethnography; specifically, how ethnography is imaginative, creative, experimental, affective, and collaborative. We will also attend to the dynamics and conundrums in knowledge production, such as whose voices are heard and which voices are obscured, notions of ‘truth’, authenticity, and identity, the problems and challenges in researching and representing trauma and crisis, and finally, the politics of research conception and reception. In doing so, we will unpack and consider the ethnographic peculiarities of weaving argument and narration to explain how diverse groups of people: seek out a better life, ensure their continuity; mark out their differences and identity; interact with others, strangers, and things, and finally, find meaning through their aspirations, (im)mobility, experiences, decisions, and understandings of their world and how they imagine what their lives could be. In the fall term, students will learn about the politics of representation, archival research, and data-driven storytelling. In the winter term, students will critically engage with contemporary concepts, theories, and paradigms of socio-cultural anthropology. By the end of the course, students will have a firmer grasp on the place of power in research creation and dissemination and will demonstrate this capacity by developing a research proposal.
Course Director: L. Davidson - lmdavids@yorku.ca