GENERAL COURSE DESCRIPTIONS
(These vary each time the course is taught).
Cultural anthropology is the humanistic and scientific investigation, documentation, explanation, and celebration of the cultural diversity as well as the underlying unity of the human species. It assumes increasing importance as contemporary countries and societies are increasingly becoming multiethnic, in some cases in association with conflict, violence, and even war.
Through reading and discussing four textbooks students will be exposed to the cultural diversity of humankind as studied by cultural anthropologists in many parts of the world. Also students who are majors in anthropology will be provided with a solid foundation in the history, philosophy, theories, methods, data, problems, issues, controversies, politics, and ethics of cultural anthropology.
Furthermore, through a diversity of sources this course will plunge students deeply into one very different cultural world in particular, that of the Yanomami of the Amazon rainforest along the mountainous border between Brazil and Venezuela. The Yanomami provide a microcosm for a critical analysis of the following anthropological themes: the phenomena of culture and cultures; cultural ecology, cultural adaptation, and environmental problems and issues; violence, aggression, war, nonviolence, and peace; and missionaries, colonialism, genocide, and human rights. Moreover, the Yanomami provide a microcosm for a critical analysis of anthropology itself, including its world views, values, ethics, politics, and lingering elements of colonialism, ethnocentrism, and racism. The instructor will also discuss his own firsthand research and human experience with the Yanomami in Venezuela including his publications about them. Every student is required to thoroughly read and discuss four textbooks and in addition select one book-length case study of their choice on the Yanomami.
This semester the class follows a dual track. First, we survey contemporary as well as enduring questions, problems, issues, and cases of violence, terrorism, war, nonviolence and peace with an emphasis on anthropological approaches and special attention to the political ecology of resource competition and violent conflict from tribe to state. We will also consider the role of religion in these matters. The regional focus is on South Asia, the Middle East, and northern Africa. Second, we explore cases of the direct and indirect involvement of anthropologists and anthropology in warfare from the wars, genocide and ethnocide on the American colonial frontier into the present.
This seminar surveys ethical cases, problems, issues, and questions in anthropology from its inception to the present. Particular attention will be given to the cases of Franz Boas’ censure, Alfred Kroeber and Ishi, counterinsurgency research in Thailand during the Vietnam War, Project Camelot, Colin Turnbull and the Ik, Stephen Mosher’s exposure of forced abortion in China, and the recent controversy over the allegations of Patrick Tierney in his book Darkness in El Dorado. The development of professional ethics in anthropology will also be placed in the larger context of the Hippocratic Oath, Nuremberg Code, Declaration of Helsinki, Belmont Report, and Barbados Declaration. The code of professional ethics of the American Anthropological Association will be compared with those of other organizations in anthropology and allied disciplines and professions. Ultimately, the course critically reflects on the elemental questions of the purpose, meaning, and significance of anthropology in historical perspective from its original colonial origins to the continuing process of decolonization today.
Ecological Anthropology is a mature topical specialization that crosscuts the five subfields of anthropology and has its own separate unit within the American Anthropological Association, journal (Human Ecology), textbooks, listserv, and so on. UH undergraduate and graduate students may specialize in this subject through the Ecological Anthropology Program in which 415 is the required core course.
Ecological Anthropology explores how culture influences the dynamic interactions between human populations and the ecosystems in their habitat through time. This semester the course successively surveys the following five approaches: primate ecology, cultural ecology, historical ecology, political ecology, and spiritual ecology. Each approach will be critically analyzed through PowerPoint lectures drawing on the instructor’s textbook; slide-lectures from the instructor’s fieldwork in the Venezuelan Amazon and Thailand; specially selected videos; student panel discussions of book-length case studies; and guest speakers. Throughout the course the focus will be on relationships between biological and cultural diversity.
This course surveys anthropological approaches to the scholarly and scientific study of religion as a cultural phenomenon in its social context and through cross-cultural perspective. The course may also concentrate on a particular religion such as Buddhism to provide an in-depth case study.
423 Social and Cultural Change
This seminar offers a critical analysis of the phenomena, agents, and processes of social and cultural change throughout the world in colonial and neocolonial contexts including forces of genocide, ethnocide, and ecocide through discussion John Bodley’s book Victims of Progress. Lingering elements of colonialism, racism, and ethnocentrism within contemporary anthropology as well as problems with professional ethics and violations of human rights are also considered, and thereby the dire need for radical changes in anthropology itself is scrutinized.
The course pursues a dual track: the first is devoted to general principles; and the second to a systematic, thorough, and in-depth critical analysis of a case study— change among Yanomami of the Brazilian and Venezuelan Amazon through the impacts of missionaries, miners, military, anthropologists, and other indigenous cultures among the forces endangering their population, society, culture, and ecology.
435 Human Adaptation to Forests
The topical focus of this course is the changing niches of humans and anthropology in tropical forests and in relation to the environmental and social impacts of deforestation, mineral and oil extraction, and other problems. The regional focus is Southeast Asia and the Amazon.
Spiritual ecology refers to scholarly and scientific studies of the relationships between religions and spiritualities on the one hand and on the other environments, ecologies, and environmentalisms. (The term spiritual ecology is used simply because it is more inclusive than religion, referring to individual as well as organized ideas and actions in this domain, and because spiritual ecology parallels the names of other approaches within ecological anthropology like historical ecology and political ecology).
This advanced seminar pursues a systematic, thorough, and in-depth anthropological survey and critical analysis of spiritual ecology in cross-cultural perspective. This is an exciting new interdisciplinary frontier for research, teaching, and practice that has been growing rapidly since the 1990s. The instructor will also discuss his own research and publications on various aspects of this subject, including his ongoing fieldwork on Buddhism, sacred places, ecology, and biodiversity conservation in Thailand since 1986.
Often places in the landscape are not only geophysical, biological, cultural, and/or historical in character, but also religious, spiritual, or mystical. A wide variety of “natural” phenomena are selectively considered sacred, including some individual trees, groves, forests, mountains, caves, rocks, springs, waterfalls, rivers, lakes, and so on. Billions of people throughout the world recognize and appreciate the special significance and meaning of various sacred places in their own habitat. Moreover, people from many cultural, religious, ecological, and national backgrounds may independently consider the same site to be sacred. Many of these sites attract pilgrims, some annually in the thousands or even millions. Therefore, sacred places and related phenomena in “nature” merit serious scientific and academic research, including anthropological and ecological, to further knowledge, understanding, appreciation, and protection. This course explores the fascinating and important phenomena of sacred places in “nature” with particular attention to their relevance for environmental and biodiversity conservation as well as for cultural and religious identity, tourism, cultural resource management, human rights such as religious freedom, and related matters. The instructor will discuss his own research and publications on sacred places in Thailand and elsewhere.
Applied anthropology is the use of anthropological perspectives, values, data, theories, methods, techniques, and skills for practical purposes in the real world— the arenas of government, policy, law, law enforcement, and politics; business, industry, economic development, modernization, urbanization, and globalization; communication and cyberspace; education and schools; health and disease; environmental conservation, natural resources, hazards, and disasters; media, sports, and entertainment; cultural resource management, sacred places, and religion; cultural survival and rights; and war, military, and security. Also the course explores the application of anthropology to various public social and political issues and problems such as racial and gender discrimination, environmental justice, refugees, human rights, and peace and nonviolent conflict resolution. The course will emphasize the methods of applied anthropology including focal groups, rapid rural appraisal, and participatory action research. The politics and ethics of applied anthropology will also be scrutinized. Practical information, advice, and resources on career preparation and development will be offered.
482 Environmental Anthropology
Ecological Anthropology concentrates on basic scientific and academic research on the dynamic interactions between a human population and the ecosystems in its habitat with an emphasis on the influence of culture. When such work concentrates on applied, action, and/or advocacy research dealing with practical environmental cases, questions, problems, and/or issues, then it is called environmental anthropology.
This course in environmental anthropology will be organized around a topical framework dealing with real world concerns and stress research methods to help resolve them. Among the topics covered are land and natural resource use and management systems; food production and population problems; poverty and social and economic justice; pollution, natural hazards, risks, and global warming; resource competition, conflicts, and warfare; deforestation; economic development; mineral and oil extraction industries; and protected areas and other forms of environmental and biodiversity conservation.
Human ecology is a graduate seminar that first surveys the history of the development of theories and methods in ecological anthropology. Next the course explores in depth a particular approach within ecological anthropology such as political ecology. Finally, it surveys field research methods, including the development of a literature review, research design, and grant proposal.