Corsi di Studio del Dipartimento di Culture, Politica e Società

According to the learning objective of the Master in Cultural Anthropology and Ethnology, aimed at providing a basic preparation in the anthropological discipline and its main thematic fields, the course Theories and Fields of Anthropology offers, in the first part, a general overview of more relevant issues of Anthropology, Ethnology and Ethnography by illustrating its theoretical foundations, its main authors, and its historical development. The second and third parts will explore ethnographic cases and specific issues (ethnography; ethnicity and ethnic belonging debate; migration issues; refugees, asylum-seekers and politics of citizenship; Postcolonial Studies; etc.). The aim is to develop the students’ critical awareness and autonomy of judgment.

The course aims at providing higher and specific knowledge about the main concepts and debates within Anthropology and Ethnology, as well as the authors who contributed to its development (Griaule, Malinowski, Bateson, Evans-Pritchard, Balandier, Lévi-Strauss, Turner, De Martino, Geertz, Clifford, Rosaldo, Scheper-Hughes, Riesmann, Crapanzano, Viveiros de Castro, amomg others). It intends to increase the students’ ability to learn about this specific research field and its specific conceptual lexicon (culture, ethnicity, initiation, kinship, ethnographic self-reflexivity and narrative turn, and so on), by explicitly encouraging students’ autonomy and their critical abilities, analyzing ethnographic cases presented in class and implementing meaningful comparison with history and gender/racial/cultural/postcolonial studies (Fanon, Said, Spivak, Mbembe, and so on). The research on migration, given its central role in current anthropological debate, will receive particular emphasis. One of the main purposes of the course is to enhance the auto-reflexivity of students.

Lectures. The course is divided in three parts. The first part is a historic and theoretical presentation of the discipline; the second and third thematic and ethnographic part will alternate lectures with seminar lessons involving students in the presentation of short reports based on selected articles. 

Students will sit an oral exam aiming to assess the acquired basic notions in anthropology and ethnology, their ability to apply such notions to specific cases, and to critically discuss one-three selected topics. Questions will address both notions acquired while attending the course, and the texts each student selects upon previous agreement with the teacher. The answers will be evaluated according to the following criteria: a) Appropriateness and richness of the contents; b) Clearness of language, speech consistency and sector-based vocabulary; c) Critical-analytical capacity and ability to give examples.

Students who do not or cannot attend class will present an oral exposition of the texts specifically listed for “non – attending students”. Non-native speakers can give their answers in English, Spanish or French.

The course will provide students with an overview of the main issues, concepts (belief, rite, myth, filiation, alliance, sacrifice, fetish, person, gift, power and so on), and authors (Griaule, Malinowski, Bateson, Evans-Pritchard, Balandier, Lévi-Strauss, Turner, De Martino Geertz, Clifford, Rosaldo, Scheper-Hughes, Riesmann, Crapanzano, Viveiros de Castro ecc.). The colonial genealogy of anthropological knowledge, its controversial transformations, its main schools (structuralism, hermeneutic anthropology, symbolic anthropology and so on) will receive particular emphasis. Ethnographic examples taken from the teacher’s field experiences (Mali, Camerun, Mozambico, DRC, Uganda; Colombia, Peru, Cuba) will offer examples to discuss the different theoretical and historical trajectories of anthropology. Beyond the strong emphasis on interdisciplinary and comparative perspectives, the postcolonial debate and the migration issues (refuges, asylum, citizenship and so on) will receive particular attention, given their important role in current anthropological debate.

 

Texts for students attending the course (three among the following, the first of the following books is mandatory , the other three can be choosen among the titles mentioned below):

 

1. R. Beneduce, Corpi e saperi indocili. Guarigione, stregoneria e potere in Camerun, Bollati Boringhieri. TESTO OBBLIGATORIO PER TUTTI GLI STUDENTI

2. G. Bateson, Naven, Einaudi

3. E. De Martino, La fine del mondo, Einaudi

4. C. Lévi-Strauss, Antropologia strutturale, Il Saggiatore

5. J. e J. Comaroff, Modernity and its malcontents, University of Chicago Press

6. P. Geschiere, Witchcraft, intimacy, and trust: Africa in comparison, University of Chicago Press.

7. J.-F. Bayart, S. Ellis, B. Hibou, The criminalization of the State in Africa, James Currey

8. G. Calame-Griaule, Il mondo della parola. Etnologia e linguaggio dei Dogon, Bollati Boringhieri

9. P. Riesmann, Società e libertà n ei Peul Djelgobé dell'Alto Volta, Jaca Book.

10. V. Turner, La foresta dei simboli. Aspetti del rituale Ndembu, Morcelliana

11. F. Fanon, I dannati della terra, Einaudi.

12. F. Fanon, Pelle nera, maschere bianche, Marco Tropea editore.

13. A. Mbembe, Postcolonialismo, Meltemi

14. J. Clifford, I frutti puri impazziscono, Bollati Boringhieri

15. A. Sayad, La doppia assenza, Cortina

 

Moreover: 3 articles among those made available and discussed by the teacher (see teacher’s site).

Texts for students not attending the course (four books among the following: the first of the following books is mandatory , the other three can be choosen among the titles mentioned below):

 

1. R. Beneduce, Corpi e saperi indocili. Guarigione, stregoneria e potere in Camerun, Bollati Boringhieri (or, alternatively, R. Beneduce, Un lugar en el mundo. Senderos de la migración entre violencia, memoria y deseo, 2015) (FOR ALL STUDENTS)

2. G. Bateson, Naven, Stanford University Press, 2nd ed.

3. E. De Martino, La fine del mondo, Einaudi (the French translation is forthcoming: May 2015; alternatively, The Land of Remorse: a Study of Southern Italian Tarantism, 2005)

4. C. Lévi-Strauss, Anthropologie structurelle, Plon

5. J. e J. Comaroff, Modernity and its malcontents, University of Chicago Press

6. P. Geschiere, Witchcraft, intimacy, and trust: Africa in comparison, University of Chicago Press.

7. J.-F. Bayart, S. Ellis, B. Hibou, The criminalization of the State in Africa, James Currey

8. G. Calame-Griaule, Ethnologie et langage, La parole chez les Dogon, Institu d’Ethnologie

9. P. Riesmann, Freedom in Fulani Social Life: An Introspective Ethnography, Mouton & Co.

10. V. Turner, The forest of symbols. Aspects of Ndembu ritual, Cornell University Press.

11. F. Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth, Grove Press.

12. F. Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks, Pluto Press.

13. A. Mbembe, On the postcolony, University of California Press.

14. J. Galinier, La moitié du monde. Le corps et le cosmos dans le rituel des Indiens Otomí, PUF.

15. S. Mahmood, Politics of Piety. The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject, Princeton University Press.

16. A. L. Stoler, Race and the education of Desire. Foucault’s History of sexuality ant the colonial order of things, Duke University Press.

17. J. Clifford, I frutti puri impazziscono, Bollati Boringhieri

18. A. Sayad, La doppia assenza, Cortina

 

Moreover: 4 articles among those made available and discussed by the teacher (see teacher’s site).

Texts for Erasmus students:

International and Erasmus students may prepare for examinations and take them in English, Spanish or French.

Students are strongly encouraged to discuss materials and issues during
the classes. Some documentary films will be used in order to promote
debates and analysis about the issues taken in consideration during the course