| source MIT (X) |
level |
department Anthropology (X) |
21A.100 Introduction to Anthropology ( ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 You must enter the HASS-D lottery to take this subject. Lecture: TR11 ( 56-114 ) Recitation: T12 ( 66-144 ) or R12 ( 66-144 ) +final What kinds of wisdom do other ways of life offer our own? How do other perspectives on the world challenge our assumptions about life? These questions are addressed through the four fields of anthropology: biological, cultural, and linguistic anthropology, and archaeology. We examine family and kinship, religion, economics, politics, survival of indigenous groups, and Western influences from an anthropological perspective to gain appreciation for cultural and ethnic diversity. more information ... C. Walley
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.109 How Culture Works ( ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Introduces diverse meanings and uses of the concept of culture with historical and contemporary examples from scholarship and popular media around the globe. Includes first-hand observations, synthesized histories and ethnographies, quantitative representations, and visual and fictionalized accounts of human experiences. Students conduct empirical research on cultural differences through the systematic observation of human interaction, employ methods of interpretative analysis, and practice convincing others of the accuracy of their findings. more information ... M. Buyandelger, E. C. James
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.113J The Supernatural in Music, Literature and Culture ( ) (Same subject as 21L.013J , 21M.013J ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 You must enter the HASS-D lottery to take this subject. Lecture: MW11-12.30 ( 14W-111 ) Explores the relationship between music and the supernatural, focusing on the social history and context of supernatural beliefs as reflected in key literary and musical works from 1600 to the present. Provides a better understanding of the place of ambiguity and the role of interpretation in culture, science and art. Explores great works of art by Shakespeare, Verdi, Goethe (in translation), Gounod, Henry James and Benjamin Britten. Readings will also include selections from the most recent scholarship on magic and the supernatural. Writing assignments will range from web-based projects to analytic essays. No previous experience in music is necessary. Projected guest lectures, musical performances, field trips. more information ... C. Shadle, M. Fuller, J. Howe
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.114J Black Matters: Introduction to Black Studies ( ) (Same subject as 24.912J , SP.417J , 21H.106J , 21L.008J , 21M.630J , 21W.741J ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 You must enter the HASS-D lottery to take this subject. Lecture: W1-2.30 ( 4-145 ) Recitation: M1-2.30 ( 4-145 ) or M EVE (7-8.30 PM) ( 4-145 ) Interdisciplinary survey of people of African descent that draws on the overlapping approaches of history, literature, anthropology, legal studies, media studies, performance, linguistics, and creative writing. Connects the experiences of African-Americans and of other American minorities, focusing on social, political, and cultural histories, and on linguistic patterns. Includes lectures, discussions, workshops, and required field trips that involve minimal cost to students. more information ... T. DeFrantz, S. Alexandre, C. Capozzola
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.212 Myth, Ritual, and Symbolism ( ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 How people make sense of their worlds symbolically through myth, ritual, metaphor, and cosmology. The structure of symbols, the natural and social elements they draw on, their social use, and the messages they convey. Students learn to record and analyze myth and ritual. J. Howe
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.215 Disease and Health: Culture, Society, and Ethics ( ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Examines how medicine is practiced cross-culturally, with particular emphasis on Western biomedicine. Analyzes medical practice as a cultural system, focusing on the human, as opposed to the biological, side of things. Also considers how people in different cultures think of disease, health, body, and mind. Enrollment limited. J. Jackson
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.216J Dilemmas in Biomedical Ethics: Playing God or Doing Good? ( ) (Same subject as SP.622J ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Lecture: M EVE (7-10 PM) ( 56-114 ) An introduction to the cross-cultural study of biomedical ethics. Examines moral foundations of the science and practice of western biomedicine through case studies of abortion, contraception, cloning, organ transplantation and other issues. Evaluates challenges that new medical technologies pose to the practice and availability of medical services around the globe, and to cross-cultural ideas of kinship and personhood. Discusses critiques of the biomedical tradition from anthropological, feminist, legal, religious, and cross-cultural theorists. Enrollment limited. E. C. James
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.218J Identity and Difference ( ) (Same subject as SP.454J ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Examines several theoretical perspectives on human identity and focuses on processes of creating categories of acceptable and deviant identities; how identities are formed, how behaviors are labelled, and how people enter deviant roles and worlds; and responses to differences and strategies for coping with these responses. Describes how identity and difference are inescapably linked. Enrollment limited. J. Jackson
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21A.219J Law and Society ( ) (Same subject as 11.163J , 17.249J ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Studies legal reasoning, types of law and legal systems, and relationship of law to social class and social change. Emphasis on the profession and practice of law including legal education, stratification within the bar, and the politics of legal services. Investigation of emerging issues in the relationship between institutions of law and science. Enrollment limited. S. Silbey
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.225J Violence, Human Rights, and Justice ( ) (Same subject as SP.621J ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 An examination of the problem of mass violence and oppression in the contemporary world, and of the concept of human rights as a defense against such abuse. Explores questions of cultural relativism, race, gender and ethnicity. Examines case studies from war crimes tribunals, truth commissions, anti-terrorist policies and other judicial attempts to redress state-sponsored wrongs. Considers whether the human rights framework effectively promotes the rule of law in modern societies. Students debate moral positions and address ideas of moral relativism. Enrollment limited. E. C. James
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.226 Ethnic and National Identity ( ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Lecture: MW2.30-4 ( 56-180 ) An introduction to the cross-cultural study of ethnic and national identity. Students explore the history of nationalism, focusing on ideologies about the nation-state, and look at the ways gender, religious and racial identities intersect with ethnic and national ones. Ethnic conflict is examined, along with the emergence of social movements based on identity, in particular indigenous rights movements and the ways culture can become highly politicized. Finally, students discuss the effects of globalization, migration, and transnational institutions. Enrollment limited. J. Jackson
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.232J Rethinking the Family, Sex, and Gender (New) ( ) (Same subject as SP.429J ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Cross-cultural case studies introduce students to the anthropological study of the social institutions and symbolic meanings of family, gender, and sexuality. Investigates the different forms families and households take and considers their social, emotional, and economic dynamics. Analyzes how various expectations for, and experiences of, family life are rooted in or challenged by particular conceptions of gender and sexuality. Addresses questions surrounding what it means to be a "man" or a "woman," as well as a family member, in different social contexts. H. Paxson
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.235 American Dream: Exploring Class in the US ( ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Lecture: F10-1 ( 16-220 ) Americans have historically preferred to think of the United States in classless terms, as a land of economic opportunity equally open to all. Yet, social class remains a central fault line in the US. Subject explores the experiences and understandings of class among Americans positioned at different points along the US social spectrum. Considers a variety of classic frameworks for analyzing social class and uses memoirs, novels and ethnographies to gain a sense of how class is experienced in daily life and how it intersects with other forms of social difference such as race and gender. C. Walley
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.245J Power: Interpersonal, Organizational and Global Dimensions ( ) (Same subject as 17.045J ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Using examples from anthropology and sociology alongside classical and contemporary social theory, subject explores the nature of dominant and subordinate relationships, types of legitimate authority, and practices of resistance. Examines how we are influenced in subtle ways by the people around us, who makes controlling decisions in the family, how people get ahead at work, and whether democracies, in fact, reflect the will of the people. S. Silbey
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.252 How Cultures Remember ( ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Introduces scholarly debates about the socio-cultural practices through which individuals and societies create, sustain, recall, and erase memories. Emphasis is given to the history of knowledge, construction of memory, the role of authorities in shaping memory, and how societies decide on whose versions of memory are more "truthful" and "real." Other topics include how memory works in the human brain, memory and trauma, amnesia, memory practices in the sciences, false memory, sites of memory, and the commodification of memory. M. Buyandelger
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.253 God, Violence, and Media ( ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Approaches to the socio-cultural study of religion. Provides conceptual tools for analyzing the resilience and diversity of religious experience in the face of large socio-economic and political change. Traces the connections between contemporary religious resurgence and violence, displacement, globalization, economic insecurity, and ethnic and national identity. Cases include Catholic conversion via mass media in the Philippines; a witchcraft epidemic in post-apartheid South Africa; underground Protestantism in the atheist Soviet Union; spiritual shopping in the United States. M. Buyandelger
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21A.265 Food and Culture ( ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Explores connections between what we eat and who we are through cross-cultural study of how personal identities and social groups are formed via food production, preparation, and consumption. Organized around critical discussion of what makes "good" food good (healthy, authentic, ethical, etc.). Uses anthropological and literary classics as well as recent writing and films on the politics of food and agriculture. H. Paxson
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.270 Anthropology through Speculative Fiction (New) ( ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Lecture: T1-4 ( 56-114 ) Examines how anthropology and speculative fiction (SF) each explore ideas about culture and society, technology, morality, and life in "other" worlds. Investigates this convergence of interest through analysis of SF in print, film, and other media. Covers traditional and contemporary anthropological themes, including first contact; gift exchange; gender, marriage, and kinship; law, morality, and cultural relativism; religion; race and embodiment; politics, violence, and war; medicine, healing, and consciousness; technology and environment. E. C. James, S. Helmreich
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.337 Documenting Culture ( ) (Subject meets with CMS.917 ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Surveys how and why people seek to capture life on film. Examines the motives of documentary and ethnographic filmmakers, including curiosity about exotic peoples, concern with documentary as a form of science, and an interest in capturing the truth about cultural life. Students view documentaries about people in the US and abroad, studying the relationship between film images and "reality," tensions between art and observation, and the ethical relationship between filmmakers and those they film. Students taking the graduate version complete additional assignments. C. Walley
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.339J DV Lab: Documenting Science through Video and New Media (New) ( ) (Same subject as STS.064J ) Prereq: None Units: 3-3-6 Introductory exploration of documentary film theory and production, focusing on documentaries about science, engineering, and related fields. Students engage in digital video production as well as social and media analysis of science documentaries. Readings drawn from social studies of science as well as from documentary film theory. Uses documentary video making as a tool to explore the worlds of science and engineering, as well as a tool for thinking analytically about media itself and the social worlds in which science is embedded. Class includes a lab component devoted to digital video production in addition to class time. Enrollment limited. C. Walley, C. Boebel
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page
21A.340J Technology and Culture ( ) (Same subject as STS.075J ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 URL: http://web.mit.edu/anthropology/course_desc/index.html#340 Lecture: W EVE (7-10 PM) ( 16-220 ) Examines the intersections of technology, culture, and politics in a variety of social and historical settings ranging from nineteenth century factories to twenty-first century techno dance floors, from Victorian London to anything-goes Las Vegas. Discussions and readings organized around three questions: what cultural effects and risks follow from treating biology as technology; how computers have changed the way we think about ourselves and others; and how politics are built into our infrastructures. Explores the forces behind technological and cultural change; how technological and cultural artifacts are understood and used by different communities; and whether, in what ways, and for whom technology has produced a better world. K. Downes
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21A.341J Energy Decisions, Markets, and Policies (New) ( ) (Same subject as 14.43J , 15.031J ) Prereq: 14.01 or permission of instructor Units: 4-0-8 Structured around choices and constraints regarding sources and uses of energy by households, firms, and governments. Introduces managerial, economic, political, social and cultural frameworks for describing and explaining behavior at various levels of aggregation; includes examples of cost-benefit, organizational and institutional analyses of energy generation, distribution, and consumption. Topics include the role of markets and prices; financial analysis of energy-related investments; institutional path dependence; economic and political determinants of government regulation and the impact of regulation on decisions; other forms of government action and social norms regarding desired behavior and opportunities for businesses and consumers, including feedback into the political/regulatory system. Examples drawn from a wide range of countries and settings. D. Lessard, R. Schmalensee, S. Silbey
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21A.342 Environmental Struggles ( ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Offers an international perspective on the environment. Using environmental conflict to consider the stakes that groups in various parts of the world have in nature, while also exploring how ecological and social dynamics interact and change over time, subject considers such controversial environmental issues as: nuclear contamination in Eastern Europe; genetic bioprospecting in Mexico; toxic run-off in the rural US; the Bhopal accident in India; and the impact of population growth in the Third World. C. Walley
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21A.344J Drugs, Politics, and Culture ( ) (Same subject as STS.062J ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Examines the relationship between drugs, politics, and society in cross-cultural perspective; use of mind-altering and habit-forming substances by "traditional societies"; the development of a global trade in sugar, opium, and cocaine with the rise of capitalism; and the use and abuse of alcohol, LSD, and Prozac in the US. Finishes by looking at the war on drugs, shifting attitudes to tobacco, and by evaluating America's drug laws. Staff
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21A.345 The Politics of International Development ( ) Prereq: None Units: 3-0-9 Offers an anthropological perspective on international development. Students consider development, not in policy or technical terms, but through its social and political dynamics and its impacts on daily life. Examines the various histories of, and meanings given to, international development as well as the social organization of aid agencies and projects. Follows examples of specific projects in various parts of the world. Examples: water projects for pastorialists in Africa, factory development in Southeast Asia, and international nature parks in Indonesia. C. Walley
Score: 8.684269 Details | Listing | Web page