Ethnographical Texts Seminar
Code: 101240 ECTS Credits: 6| Degree | Type | Year | Semester |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2500256 Social and Cultural Anthropology | OT | 3 | 0 |
| 2500256 Social and Cultural Anthropology | OT | 4 | 0 |
Contact
- Name:
- Paula Escribano Castaño
- Email:
- Paula.Escribano@uab.cat
Use of Languages
- Principal working language:
- spanish (spa)
- Some groups entirely in English:
- No
- Some groups entirely in Catalan:
- No
- Some groups entirely in Spanish:
- Yes
Prerequisites
This course has no pre requisites.
Objectives and Contextualisation
This is an optional subject of 3rd/4th year whose general objective is to give support to the courses on thematic areas of Anthropology that students have taken during 2nd and 3rd years with readings oriented to classical and current ethnographic texts.
Students who have attended the course should be able to:
- make a critical evaluation of ethnographic materials;
- Awareness of the constraints and limitations of the ethnographic work;
- to distinguish the good ethnography of the bad;
- Understand the special features of an application-oriented ethnography;
- Calibrate the reliability of ethnographic data;
To find out to what extent this data can be used in intercultural comparison.
Competences
- Social and Cultural Anthropology
- Apprehending cultural diversity through ethnography and critically assessing ethnographic materials as knowledge of local contexts and as a proposal of theoretical models.
- Developing critical thinking and reasoning and communicating them effectively both in your own and other languages.
- Producing cultural diversity materials that could have a critical impact on the common sense conceptions.
- Students must be capable of applying their knowledge to their work or vocation in a professional way and they should have building arguments and problem resolution skills within their area of study.
- Students must be capable of collecting and interpreting relevant data (usually within their area of study) in order to make statements that reflect social, scientific or ethical relevant issues.
- Students must be capable of communicating information, ideas, problems and solutions to both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
- Using the discipline's ethnographic and theoretical corpus with analytical and synthesis skills.
Learning Outcomes
- Analysing data critically from anthropological investigations and reports.
- Analysing the complementarity and incongruities of several ethnographic reports from the same area.
- Applying the anthropological concepts to the comprehension of intercultural relationships in regional ethnographic contexts.
- Applying the knowledge of cultural variability and its genesis to avoid ethnocentric projections.
- Apprehending cultural diversity through ethnography and critically assessing ethnographic materials as local context knowledge.
- Assessing critically the explicit and implicit theoretical models in the ethnographic materials.
- Assessing the positive and negative aspects of the dialectic between specific ethnographics and comparisons of transcultural scope.
- Carrying out oral presentations using appropriate academic vocabulary and style.
- Critically assessing ethnographic materials as a proposal for theoretical models.
- Identifying main and supporting ideas and expressing them with linguistic correctness.
- Identifying the sociocultural variability in specific ethnographic contexts.
- Identifying the sociocultural variability through ethnographic texts and audiovisual resources.
- Integrating holistically the progress from the classical fields of Anthropology.
- Interpreting the cultural diversity through ethnography.
- Knowing the acculturation effects of the colonial expansion.
- Using suitable terminology when drawing up an academic text.
Content
1. Ethnography as a method, as a practice and as a product.
A proposal to read ethnographic texts: “The anthropologist as author” from Clifford Geertz. An alternative proposal: Ethnographic texts in their contexts.
2. Colonialism and World War II: colonial ethnography
Ethnography and colonialism. Scenarios, subjects and methods of ethnography in the colonial era. Ethnography and sociocultural theory: structural functionalism and culture and personality.
3. Postcolonialism and Cold War: ethnography of cultural change and community ethnography. The postmodern twist
Ethnography and postcolonialism. Scenarios, subjects and methods of ethnography in the postcolonial era. Ethnography and sociocultural theory: neo-evolutionism, cultural ecology, interpretative anthropology, critical theory, postmodernism.
Development: ethnography of explicit value and cultural change.
Civil Rights: community and participatory ethnography.
4. Globalization: multisite, transnational and virtual ethnography
Ethnography and globalization. New scenarios and new methods of ethnography. The multinational "transnational" research and ethnography. Digital ethnography Ethnographies of violence and conflicts. Autoethnography.
Methodology
The course is divided into two parts:
a) The first part will read and discuss a series of short ethnographic texts after the presentation of socio-political and theoretical contexts by the teacher.
b) The second part of the course will be devoted to the presentation and discussion of the ethnographic monographs that have been worked in groups.
Activities
| Title | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Type: Directed | |||
| Theoretical classes and practical presentation and discussion of ethnographic texts | 45 | 1.8 | 1, 2, 3, 5, 9, 6, 7, 15, 8, 16, 12, 11, 10, 13, 14 |
| Type: Supervised | |||
| Type: Supervised Individual and group tutorials | 2 | 0.08 | 1, 2, 3, 5, 9, 6, 7, 15, 8, 16, 12, 11, 10, 13, 14 |
| Type: Autonomous | |||
| Preparation of works | 30 | 1.2 | 1, 2, 4, 3, 5, 9, 6, 7, 15, 8, 16, 12, 11, 10, 13, 14 |
| Text readings | 30 | 1.2 | 1, 2, 4, 3, 5, 9, 6, 7, 15, 8, 16, 12, 11, 10, 13, 14 |
Assessment
1) Text commentaries (45% of the note). Compulsory reading of texts throughout the semester that will be evaluated through an individual exercise to deliver the day of the discussion of the text in class. Both the written exercise and the participation in class discussion activities will be assessed. It is mandatory to attend a minimum of 75% of the discussions so that the comments submitted are evaluated.
2) Presentation and discussion of the monographs in class (20% of the note). Each group will give a presentation to the class of the monograph in which they have worked and will direct the discussion about one of the chapters that they have previously selected.
3) Group work on ethnographic monograph (35% of the note). The work will consist of making a critical reading of the selected monograph, in which the aspects that have been appearing in the readings and discussions throughout the course as a condition of the ethnographic product are incorporated.
Non-evaluable: The student who has not participated in at least 80% of classes will not be evaluated
Feedback: At the time of carrying out each evaluation activity, the teacher will inform the students (via Moodle) of the procedure and date of review of the qualifications.
Recovery process: In order to participate in the recovery the student must have been previously evaluated (does not mean the student passed) in a set of activities whose weight equals to a minimum of 2/3 parts of the total grade. The presentation of class monographs is excluded from the recovery process, which can not be done at a later date than the one established.
Assessment Activities
| Title | Weighting | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Group work on ethnographic monograph | 35% | 3 | 0.12 | 1, 2, 3, 5, 9, 6, 7, 15, 8, 16, 12, 11, 10, 13, 14 |
| Presentation and discussion of the monographs in class | 20% | 25 | 1 | 1, 2, 4, 3, 5, 9, 6, 7, 15, 8, 16, 12, 11, 10, 13, 14 |
| Written activities: text commentaries | 45% | 15 | 0.6 | 1, 2, 3, 5, 9, 6, 7, 15, 8, 16, 12, 11, 10, 13, 14 |
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