Netherlands

This course investigates contemporary globalization and its linkage with some crucial social and cultural processes. Catalysts of globalization and sociocultural complexity are critically assessed, especially the 'new' media. Furthermore, the effects of global interconnectedness are explored by dissecting phenomena like migration, the upsurge of religious movements, and the rise of transnationalism. Interrelated issues addressed in the series of lectures involve community formation, identity construction, cultural innovation versus cultural survival, and the shifting relationship between agency and structure. As such, 'Globalization and sociocultural complexity' should be regarded an introduction to current anthropology that logically follows 'Culturele Antropologie 2' in its aim to deepen students' understanding of theoretical approaches to, and the ethnography of, present-day's highly intricate social realities.

This course focuses on the language, but also on the history, geography, artistic works, traditions and current events of the Spanish-speaking countries and their communities. Language learning constitutes the 75% of the course assignments, whereas Culture assignments constitute 25% of the final grade. Tasks in various forms related to language and cultural topics are performed individually and in groups. Contact hours focus on language practice in line with the textbook chapters. Students mainly work in pairs and small groups. All participants have to complete obligatory self-study assignments before class. Students are expected to take part during the lessons as well as in group tasks.

This course discusses the functioning of both the EU and the UN as normative power intergovernmental organizations. Do they really deserve to be labelled as such? And if so, what extent have they been successful as keepers of international peace? The EU’s Commission and Council and the UN’s Security Council, General Assembly and Human Rights at the hand of both historical and actual cases are assessed. Do not expect a clear “yes” or “no”,  but come to learn what the limits and opportunities of the EU and the UN as prominent IGO’s in the field of international politics are and even more important: come to learn how to start your own research on both normative powers by using both secondary and primary sources, including the necessary theoretical toolkit on how to interpret them. 

To write effectively in an academic context is to be able to convey ideas in a manner that is clear, concise, and engaging. Writing in an Academic Context gives you the tools and techniques for this by teaching you about topics such as coherence, cohesion, conciseness, and hedging. The course is extremely hands-on and mostly focused on what comes after the first draft has been written. It helps polish writing skills by 1) teaching the underlying mechanisms of effective academic writing, and 2) providing weekly practice sessions with targeted peer (and tutor) support that serve to consolidate theory and writing skills. In doing so, the course looks beyond the content of academic articles to examine the fundamental mechanics of writing to adapt writing for different audiences across disciplines and concentrations. This course is interactive and writing intensive.

This course focuses on the relationships between language and society with special focus on those areas where Dutch is spoken. Questions about language variation are central to the course. How and why does variation emerge? What social, individual, and linguistic factors are important? Concepts addressed include standard language, accent and dialect, youth language, ethnolect, gender differences in language and gendered language as well as the differences between language variation and language change, linguistic style differences, racist and sexist language and the social meaning and function of language differences. Other topics include language planning, multilingualism, codeswitching, the status of minority languages and their role in education, language loss and language shift among migrants.

The course presents an introduction to the economic theory of the public sector. The topics covered include public goods, externalities, education, health care, pensions, redistribution, collective decision making and cost-benefit analysis.  A prerequisite for this course is a basic course in microeconomics.

This course is an overview of the principles of child development and the factors contributing to optimal human development. Theories and research of youth development within the biopsychosocial model are covered. Societal, cultural, and other environmental factors that influence development are examined, as well as the biological underpinnings of youth development.

This course examines the role of the body in human cognition, through what has come to be known as the 4E (embodied, enactive, embedded and extended) approach to cognition. 4E cognition theories are radically opposed to dualism – the binary division between mind and body, prominent over millennia of Western philosophy – and view the currently dominant computational models of cognition as problematically preserving some aspects of it. From this perspective, the brain is now understood as a part of a broader system: physical, embodied interaction with our environment is a crucial and inseparable part of how thought and meaning making take place. Embodied approaches to cognition see thought, perception, and action as interwoven. They suggest an innovative approach to cognition as a dynamic process, emerging from the interaction between human minded-bodies (or bodyminds) and their lived environments. In addition to embodied and enactive, the mind is thus treated as extended beyond the brain and embedded in relationality to the outside world. Thinking is not something purely abstract that occurs with new ‘sense data’ entering the closed system of our heads, interpreted there and expressed in our behavior: it is a constant, multi-layered process, keenly involving our bodies and the world we inhabit, that is enacted in our consciousness and perceptual experience. This perspective has paved the way for new intersections and collaborations between cognitive science and the arts and humanities. 4E approaches shed new light on questions of experience and understanding in the arts and humanities, and vice versa: newly emerging collaborations between the arts and humanities and cognitive studies contribute to further understanding of the role of the body in how we experience, make sense and think. Art has long been a field where meaning is communicated, experienced, and explored through tangible images, bodies, objects, environments and movements, where understanding and inspiration are not purely mental and abstract but take place through embodied encounters with the world. Art is, therefore, of immense potential value for furthering our understanding of embodied aspects of the mind. In this course case studies from different forms of art and media as gateways to concretize and better grasp this theoretical perspective through are discussed.