Not available in 2018/19
AN269 Half Unit
The Anthropology of Amazonia
This information is for the 2018/19 session.
Teacher responsible
Dr Agustin Diz OLD 6.06
Availability
This course is available on the BA in Anthropology and Law, BA in Social Anthropology and BSc in Social Anthropology. This course is available as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit and to General Course students.
Pre-requisites
Unless granted an exemption by the course teacher, students taking this course should have completed an introductory course in anthropology.
Course content
The course will introduce students to selected themes in the anthropology of Amazonia. It will provide a grounding in the ethnographic literature of the region while seeking to engage with current theoretical debates, highlighting their potential importance to the discipline of anthropology. Topics to be covered include history, indigenous social movements; sexuality and gender; trade and inter-ethnic relations; politics and power; illness, well-being and death. Students will be encouraged to reflect on the broader relationship between ethnography and theory, to challenge common stereotypes of Amazonia and its inhabitants, and to explore ways in which the region has inscribed itself on the imagination of anthropologists and laypersons alike.
Teaching
10 hours of lectures and 10 hours of classes in the LT.
This course has a reading week in Week 6 of LT.
Formative coursework
Students registered for Anthropology degrees will prepare tutorial essays on the subject matter of the course and receive feedback from their academic advisors. Students who are not registered for Anthropology degrees will be given the option of submitting essays to the course teacher and receiving feedback on them.
Indicative reading
Clastres, Pierre. 1987. Society Against the State: Essays in Political
Anthropology.
Overing, Joanna. & Alan Passes (eds). 2000. The Anthropology of Love and
Anger: The Aesthetics of Conviviality in Native Amazonia.
Walker, Harry. 2012. Under a Watchful Eye: Self, Power and Intimacy in
Amazonia.
Descola, Philippe. 1994. In the Society of Nature: A Native Ecology in
Amazonia.
Gow, Peter. 2002. An Amazonian Myth and its History.
Fisher, William H. 2000. Rainforest Exchanges: Industry and Community on an
Amazonian Frontier.
Seeger, Anthony. 2004. Why Suyá Sing: A Musical Anthropology of an Amazonian
People.
Gregor, Thomas. 1985. Anxious Pleasures: The Sexual Lives of an Amazonian
People.
Lévi-Strauss, Claude. 1984. Tristes Tropiques.
Conklin, Beth. 2001. Consuming Grief: Compassionate Cannibalism in an
Amazonian Society.
Assessment
Take home exam (100%) in the LT.
Key facts
Department: Anthropology
Total students 2017/18: 22
Average class size 2017/18: 11
Capped 2017/18: No
Lecture capture used 2017/18: Yes (LT)
Value: Half Unit
