Anthropology

This course examines the meaning and role of critique in the social sciences. It focuses on various theoretical conceptions of critique and the application of critique in different fields of research across the social sciences. Through a combination of lectures and discussions, the course develops the skill of criticizing social problems or pathologies and uses this skill in research across disciplines in investigations of the social world. 

This course explores how British food has evolved across the centuries. It studies a few of the current food-related issues that are relevant today in the United Kingdom through various analyses of texts, film extracts, menus, maps, and statistics. The course provides the opportunity to reconsider stereotypes to gain a better understanding of British food.

This course examines how South Korea has been enmeshed in transnational flows of peoples and cultures since the 1980s. It turns an ethnographic lens on global processes to analyze some of their meanings and implications for people's everyday lives and, in particular, explore Korea's specific experience of globalization. Topics include promises and pitfalls of in- and out-migration; national and transnational consumption; intersections of love and profit in marriage migration and in entertainment work; migrant labor; nationalism and transnationalism of Korean sports; politics of race, identity and multiculturalism in Korea itself and toward Koreans internationally; transnational adoption; and “Korean wave.” 

After an introduction to the anthropological approach, this course focuses on three themes: deviance, madness, and risk. It discusses the norms of a moral society, the distinction between normal and pathological, and the representations of suicide and "risky" conduct. The course studies the logic behind reproduction and anomie, and questions forms of domination and games of dissent.

This course introduces students to the theory and practice of ethnographic fieldwork. At the heart of this course is collaborative project in which students learn about qualitative methods by putting them to the test in practical group work. Their collective ethnographies require them to write extensive field notes, which are assessed, and which function as an extended period of learning to write effectively in an academic manner. 

This course studies how art and culture exist in France. It examines the various aspects, institutions, and movements that make up art and culture from an anthropological and sociological point of view.

This course examines the psychology of experiencing cultural difference and investigates the cultural differences between Japan and other countries. Culture affects us at the level of the unconscious mind and understanding cultural difference requires the process of deep culture learning. The class has two parts, 1) the psychology of deep culture, and 2) analyzing cultural difference. The goal of this course is to gain a deeper understanding of how culture shapes our minds as well as a deeper understanding of Japan and other cultural communities.

This course studies and analyzes anthropological aspects of the modern world, including sports, video games, movies, and social media, among others. From an ethnographic point of view, it examines how these aspects manifest themselves in the world both culturally and socially.

This course explores the literary and artistic foundations that contribute to the construction of the cultural space and the politics we inhabit. It examines how sources are managed, interpreted, and renewed over time; the architecture and art they inspired; and how they have been adapted to the religious and political installation of Christianity; all of which have informed our unique identity today. The French model is at the center of these lineaments of cultural anthropology. The artistic representations (literary, pictorial, architectural) that endure over time reveal how people in the Middle Ages viewed the world and will influence the identity of future European nations over time.

This course is part of the Laurea Magistrale program. The course is intended for advanced level students only. Enrollment is by consent of the instructor. The course starts with introductions into the concept of monumentality and memory in archaeology. The topics are addressed and discussed into detail mainly using examples from Pharaonic Egypt (3000 B.C.E – 300 B.C.E.), a culture which is due to its long duration and the long-lasting traditions on the one hand, and the presence of a large monumental record, especially well suited as a case study. While the major focus is laid upon the emic perspective, presenting and interpreting processes within the Egyptian culture, the course also includes the etic perspective from antiquity until today. The course shows how ancient monumentality and the cultural memory are still being used and how they affected and still affect archaeology. Topics covered include: monumentality – What does it mean and why does it matter; an introduction to the concept of memory within archaeology; monuments of Pharaonic Egypt; what makes a monument a monument in Pharaonic Egypt, the concept of the monumental discourse; cities and residences as expressions of monumentality; the heydays of monumentalism: the pyramids of the Old Kingdom and the time of Ramesses II; Damnatio Memoriae: the Amarna Period and its reception; the structure of the Ancient Egyptian history: how monumental records shaped the later idea of Ancient Egypt; reuse and usurpation; Archaism in Ancient Egypt; monumentality and memory in the Mayan Culture; the construction of memory and identities in the European prehistory: monuments and megalithism; the memory and monuments of Ancient Egypt from Roman times until the decipherment of the hieroglyphs in 1822: what remained without the knowledge of the Ancient Egyptian language; and the memory and monuments of Ancient Egypt today.