Students

ANTH702 – Core Issues in Anthropological Theory II

2015 – S2 Day

General Information

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Unit convenor and teaching staff Unit convenor and teaching staff Unit Convenor
Chris Houston
chris.houston@mq.edu.au
Contact via chris.houston@mq.edu.au
Credit points Credit points
4
Prerequisites Prerequisites
Admission to MRes
Corequisites Corequisites
Co-badged status Co-badged status
Unit description Unit description
This unit is the second of two core anthropology units that provide a grounding in theoretical, methodological and interpretive issues that are currently being debated by anthropologists. These courses form the core of the anthropology specialisation for the MRes. The issues covered will vary from year to year according to contemporary developments in anthropology and the interests of the course convenor. Others may be more enduring, such as the theoretical issues related to kinship, to politics and power and the relation between individual and society, the “writing culture” debate, “Orientalism” and the problem of the “other,” and cultural relativism.

Important Academic Dates

Information about important academic dates including deadlines for withdrawing from units are available at https://www.mq.edu.au/study/calendar-of-dates

Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of this unit, you will be able to:

  • Students who have successfully done this unit will be able to demonstrate a significantly enhanced depth and breadth of knowledge, scholarly understanding, and specific subject content knowledge in the field of urban studies.
  • Students will be able to utilize and reflect on prior knowledge and experience, of applying higher level critical thinking skills, and of integrating and synthesising learning and knowledge from a range of sources and environments.
  • Students will be able to synthesize and analyze information from a variety of sources.
  • Students will be able to articulate clearly a coherent argument in written and oral form to a variety of audiences. Students will develop a high level of oral and written skills, with specialisation for the specific needs of a discipline.
  • Students will be ethically aware and capable of confident transformative action in relation to their and the wider community. They will have a sense of connectedness with others and have a sense of mutual obligation. They will be able to appreciate the impact of their ethnographic writing for social justice and inclusion related to national and global issues.

General Assessment Information

  • Please type all essays and submit them on the due date or before. 
  • Extensions: any extensions must be requested in writing with valid documentation of their necessity (e.g. medical certificate). Any work that is submitted after the due date without an extension will be penalized at the standard rate of 1 percentage point per day.
  • Important Note: It is a requirement that all students keep a copy of their written work. In the event of work being lost, you must be able to present a second copy. If you do not do so, no consideration can be given and all marks will be forfeited for that piece of work.

Assessment Tasks

Name Weighting Due
Major Essay 75% Monday, November 10th.
Seminar Participation 25% Throughout semester

Major Essay

Due: Monday, November 10th.
Weighting: 75%

This essay counts for 75% of your grade and is required to be approximately 5,000 words in length. The essay question is self-chosen in consultation with the course convenor, and can explore a range of topics covered in the course – cities and space; cities and political economy; perception of the urban environment; social activism; urban change etc etc. This essay is due on Monday, November 10th. A typed copy must be submitted to the course convenor on this date. 
On successful completion you will be able to:
  • Students who have successfully done this unit will be able to demonstrate a significantly enhanced depth and breadth of knowledge, scholarly understanding, and specific subject content knowledge in the field of urban studies.
  • Students will be able to utilize and reflect on prior knowledge and experience, of applying higher level critical thinking skills, and of integrating and synthesising learning and knowledge from a range of sources and environments.
  • Students will be able to synthesize and analyze information from a variety of sources.
  • Students will be able to articulate clearly a coherent argument in written and oral form to a variety of audiences. Students will develop a high level of oral and written skills, with specialisation for the specific needs of a discipline.
  • Students will be ethically aware and capable of confident transformative action in relation to their and the wider community. They will have a sense of connectedness with others and have a sense of mutual obligation. They will be able to appreciate the impact of their ethnographic writing for social justice and inclusion related to national and global issues.

Seminar Participation

Due: Throughout semester
Weighting: 25%

Over the duration of the seminar, each student will give one or two brief introductions to the week’s reading(s), drawing out its main themes and selecting a number of questions or puzzles for the seminar to discuss. These introductory remarks are intended merely to get the seminar rolling – students might wish to focus on something interesting, maddening or confusing about the reading for example.
On successful completion you will be able to:
  • Students who have successfully done this unit will be able to demonstrate a significantly enhanced depth and breadth of knowledge, scholarly understanding, and specific subject content knowledge in the field of urban studies.
  • Students will be able to utilize and reflect on prior knowledge and experience, of applying higher level critical thinking skills, and of integrating and synthesising learning and knowledge from a range of sources and environments.
  • Students will be able to synthesize and analyze information from a variety of sources.
  • Students will be able to articulate clearly a coherent argument in written and oral form to a variety of audiences. Students will develop a high level of oral and written skills, with specialisation for the specific needs of a discipline.
  • Students will be ethically aware and capable of confident transformative action in relation to their and the wider community. They will have a sense of connectedness with others and have a sense of mutual obligation. They will be able to appreciate the impact of their ethnographic writing for social justice and inclusion related to national and global issues.

Delivery and Resources

Lecture/meeting: Thursdays, 3.00pm-5.00pm, in Building W6A, Room 708

There will be a required list of reading and recommended resources that will be made available in iLearn

The ANTH 701 Convenor in 2014 is Christopher Houston, Room 605. I am available on extension 8471 and the email address is chris.houston@mq.edu.au. Please contact me about problems of any nature that affects your studies this year. 

Unit Schedule

Political Economies, Activisms, & Experiences of the City

The figures are in – most people across the globe live in cities. And accordingly, most anthropological fieldwork, from the study of music pedagogy to model-plane flying clubs, is also pursued in urban contexts. Whole cities, too, may become the locus and focus of research, raising fascinating puzzles about how to study such giant and complex places. Urban anthropology is a multi-disciplinary enterprise and its practitioners need to become famililiar with the primary concerns and thematics of other traditions of knowledge. Urban planning, architecture, political economy, phenomenology, social movements etc. etc. are all potential helpmates (and subjects) of anthropological research.

In this reading/discussion course we will cover a number of different perspectives grappling with the scales (both public and intimate) of urban life and existence. And we will visit, in ethnography and film, some fearsome places along the way.     

PART I: INTRODUCTION TO URBAN ANTHROPOLOGIES

Week One, Thursday 7th August

Perspectives on the Production of Place

Core Readings:

Lawrence, D. And Low, S. (1990) ‘The Built Environment and Spatial Form’, in Annual Review of Anthropology 19.

 

Film: The Architecture of Mud

 

 

Week Two, Thursday 14th August

Anthropology in or Anthropology of the City? Historic Guidebook[s] to the Urban.

Core Readings:

Low, S. (1996) ‘The Anthropology of Cities: Theorizing and Imagining the City’, in Annual Review of Anthropology.

Logan, K. (1979) Review Essay, ‘Urban Anthropology: Moving Toward a Synthesis’, Journal of Urban History, Vol. 5(4), pp.501-509.

Selected Readings:

Fox, R. (1977) Introduction to Urban Anthropology: Cities in their Cultural Settings.

Hannerz, U. (1980) Introduction to Exploring the City: Inquiries toward an Urban Anthropology.

Southall, A., Nas, P. & Ansari, G. (eds) (1985) Introduction and Chapter One to City and Society: Studies in Urban Ethnicity, Life-style and Class, Introduction and Chapter One.

R. Rotenberg and G. McDonogh (1993) Introduction to The Cultural Meaning of Urban Space.                                

Ash, A. & Thrift, N. (2002) Introduction to Cities: Imagining the City. Polity, Cambridge.

 

PART II: POLITICAL ECONOMIES & THE CITY

Week Three, Thursday 21st August

Colonial Cities, Modernist Urbanisms

Core Readings:

Rabinow, P. (1997) ‘On the Archaeology of Late Modernity’, Chapter 3 in Essays on the Anthropology of Reason.

Yeoh, B. (1996) Chapter One [Power Relations and the Built Environment in Colonial Cities] in Contesting Space: Power Relations and the Urban Built Environment in Colonial Singapore. Oxford University Press, Oxford.

Selected Readings:

King, A. (1990) ‘Incorporating the Periphery (2): Urban Planning in the Colonies’ in Urbanism, Colonialism and the World Economy (Chapter 3).

Film: Man With a Camera (Diego Vertov)

 

Week Four, Thursday 28th August

Global Cities, Global Economies

Core Readings:

Smart, A. & Smart, J. (2003) Urbanization and the Global Perspective, Annual Review of Anthropology.

Dietz, J. (1980) ‘Dependency Theory: A Review Article’ in Journal of Economic Issues No. XIV, 3.

Keyder, C. (1987) Introduction and Chapter 8 in State and Class in Turkey, Verso, London.

Selected Readings:

Friedman, J. (1986) ‘The World City Hypothesis’, in Development and Change 17 (1), pp. 69-83.

Sassen, S. (1994) ‘The Urban Complex in a World Economy’, in International Social Science Journal, No 39, pp. 43-61.

Film: Mexico City – Whose City? (Doreen Massey)

 

Week Five, Thursday 4th September

Built Environments and the Production of Memory: Identity, Heritage, Power

Core Reading:

Herzfeld, M. (2010) ‘Engagement, Gentrification and the Neo-Liberal Hijacking of History’, in Current AnthropologyVol 51, (S2).

Selected Readings:

Philo, C. & Kearns, G. (1993) ‘Culture, History, Capital: A Critical Introduction to the Selling of Places’ in Selling Places: The City as Cultural Capital, Past and Present.

Samuel, R. (1994) Theatres of Memory: Past and Present in Contemporary Culture, Verso, London.

A. Forty and S. Kuchler (2001) Introduction to The Art of Forgetting. Berg, Oxford

Film: The Gleaners and I (Agnes Varda).

 

PART III: URBAN SOCIAL MOVEMENTS & ACTIVISMS

Week 6, Thursday 11th September

Urban Conflict and Resistance

Core Readings:

Olives, J. (1976) The Struggle against Urban Renewal in the ‘Cite d’Aliarte’ (Paris)’ in C. Pickwick (ed) Urban Sociology: Critical Essays. Methuen and Co., London.

Bourgois, P. (2002) ‘Understanding Inner City Poverty: Resistance and Self-Destruction under US Apartheid’, in Exotic No More: Anthropology on the Front Lines. J. MacClancy (ed). University of Chicago Press, Chicago.

 

Week 7, Thursday 18th September

Transforming Space: Architecture and Urban Planning

Core Readings

Holston, J. (1989) ‘Blueprint Utopia’ (Chapter 2) in The Modernist City: An Anthropological Critique of Brasilia.

Scott, J. (1998) Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed. [Chapter on Le Corbusier]

Selected Readings:

Dovey, K. (1999) ‘Liberty and Complicity’ (Chapter 13) in Framing Places: Mediating Power in Built Form.

Tschumi, B (1994) ‘The Violence of Architecture’, in Architecture and Disjunction.

 

Week 8, Thursday 9th October

Civil Society and Urban Revolution

Core Readings:

Holston, J. & Appadurai, A. (1996) ‘Cities and Citizenship’ in Public Culture 8, pp. 187-204.

Holston, J. (2009) Chapter One, [Citizenship Made Strange], in Insurgent Citizenship: Disjunctions of Democracy and Modernity in Brazil. Princeton University Press, New Jersey.

Selected readings:

Harvey, D. (2000) Chapter 12 [The Insurgent Architect at Work], in Spaces of Hope. University of California Press, Berkeley.

Lefebvre, H. (2003) (1970) Chapter One and Conclusion [From the City to Urban Society], in The Urban Revolution. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis.

 

PART IV: AFFECTIVE CITIES

Week 9, Thursday 16th October

Perception of Place/ [Urban] Environment

Core Readings:

Casey, E. (1996) How to Get From Space to Place in a Fairly Short Stretch of Time: Phenomenological Prolegomena. In S. Feld, K. Basso (eds.), Senses of Place, School of American Research Press, Santa Fe.

Ingold, T. (2000) [Culture, Perception and Cognition – Chapter Nine] in The Perception of the Environment. Routledge, London.

 

Week 10, Thursday 23rd October

Experiencing the Violence of Things and Men

Core Readings:

Houston, C. (forthcoming) Introduction and Chapter One in City of the Fearless: Urban Activism in Istanbul 1975-1983.

Navaro-Yashin, Y. (2009) ‘Affective Spaces, Melancholic Objects: Ruination and the Production of Anthropological Knowledge’, in JRAI 15 (1)

De Cauter, L. (2011) ‘Towards a Phenomenology of Civil War: Hobbes Meets Benjamin in Beirut’, in International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 35 (2).

 

Week 11, Thursday 30th October  

Department of Anthropology Research Week. No Class

 

Week 12, Thursday November 13th

The Religious City

Core Reading:

Vryonis, S. (1991) ‘Byzantine Constantinople and Ottoman Istanbul: Evolution in a Millennial Imperial Iconography’, in The Ottoman City and its Parts. Ad Caratzas, New York.

Selected Readings:

Fox, R. (1977) [Chapter on the Regal-Ritual City] in Urban Anthropology: Cities in their Cultural Settings.

Bachetta, P. (2010) ‘The (Failed) Production of Hindu Nationalized Space in Ahmedabad, Gujurat’, in Gender, Place and Culture Vol 17 (5).

Haneda, M. & Miura, T. (1994) Introduction to Islamic Urban Studies: Historical Review and Perspectives. Kegan Paul International, New York.

Bergmann, S. (2007) ‘Theology in its Spatial Turn: Space, Place and Built Environments Challenging and Changing the Images of God’, in Religion Compass 1 (3).

Cavanaugh, W. (1999) ‘The City: Beyond Secular Parodies’, in J. Millbank, C. Pickstock, G. Ward (eds.) Radical Orthodoxy. Routledge, London.

Film: Forest of Bliss (Robert Gardner)

 

Week 13, Thursday 13th November

Reviewing the Discipline: What are the Subjects of Urban Anthropology?

Core Reading:

Herzfeld, M. (2001) ‘Borders, Nodes and Groupings’, Anthropology: Theoretical Practice in Culture and Society. Blackwell, Oxford.

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Assessment Policy  http://mq.edu.au/policy/docs/assessment/policy.html

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Disruption to Studies Policy http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/disruption_studies/policy.html The Disruption to Studies Policy is effective from March 3 2014 and replaces the Special Consideration Policy.

In addition, a number of other policies can be found in the Learning and Teaching Category of Policy Central.

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Macquarie University students have a responsibility to be familiar with the Student Code of Conduct: https://students.mq.edu.au/support/student_conduct/

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Graduate Capabilities

PG - Capable of Professional and Personal Judgment and Initiative

Our postgraduates will demonstrate a high standard of discernment and common sense in their professional and personal judgment. They will have the ability to make informed choices and decisions that reflect both the nature of their professional work and their personal perspectives.

This graduate capability is supported by:

Learning outcome

  • Students will be ethically aware and capable of confident transformative action in relation to their and the wider community. They will have a sense of connectedness with others and have a sense of mutual obligation. They will be able to appreciate the impact of their ethnographic writing for social justice and inclusion related to national and global issues.

PG - Discipline Knowledge and Skills

Our postgraduates will be able to demonstrate a significantly enhanced depth and breadth of knowledge, scholarly understanding, and specific subject content knowledge in their chosen fields.

This graduate capability is supported by:

Learning outcomes

  • Students who have successfully done this unit will be able to demonstrate a significantly enhanced depth and breadth of knowledge, scholarly understanding, and specific subject content knowledge in the field of urban studies.
  • Students will be able to utilize and reflect on prior knowledge and experience, of applying higher level critical thinking skills, and of integrating and synthesising learning and knowledge from a range of sources and environments.
  • Students will be able to synthesize and analyze information from a variety of sources.
  • Students will be able to articulate clearly a coherent argument in written and oral form to a variety of audiences. Students will develop a high level of oral and written skills, with specialisation for the specific needs of a discipline.
  • Students will be ethically aware and capable of confident transformative action in relation to their and the wider community. They will have a sense of connectedness with others and have a sense of mutual obligation. They will be able to appreciate the impact of their ethnographic writing for social justice and inclusion related to national and global issues.

Assessment task

  • Major Essay

PG - Critical, Analytical and Integrative Thinking

Our postgraduates will be capable of utilising and reflecting on prior knowledge and experience, of applying higher level critical thinking skills, and of integrating and synthesising learning and knowledge from a range of sources and environments. A characteristic of this form of thinking is the generation of new, professionally oriented knowledge through personal or group-based critique of practice and theory.

This graduate capability is supported by:

Learning outcomes

  • Students who have successfully done this unit will be able to demonstrate a significantly enhanced depth and breadth of knowledge, scholarly understanding, and specific subject content knowledge in the field of urban studies.
  • Students will be able to utilize and reflect on prior knowledge and experience, of applying higher level critical thinking skills, and of integrating and synthesising learning and knowledge from a range of sources and environments.
  • Students will be able to synthesize and analyze information from a variety of sources.
  • Students will be able to articulate clearly a coherent argument in written and oral form to a variety of audiences. Students will develop a high level of oral and written skills, with specialisation for the specific needs of a discipline.

Assessment task

  • Major Essay

PG - Research and Problem Solving Capability

Our postgraduates will be capable of systematic enquiry; able to use research skills to create new knowledge that can be applied to real world issues, or contribute to a field of study or practice to enhance society. They will be capable of creative questioning, problem finding and problem solving.

This graduate capability is supported by:

Learning outcomes

  • Students will be able to synthesize and analyze information from a variety of sources.
  • Students will be able to articulate clearly a coherent argument in written and oral form to a variety of audiences. Students will develop a high level of oral and written skills, with specialisation for the specific needs of a discipline.

Assessment tasks

  • Major Essay
  • Seminar Participation

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Our postgraduates will be able to communicate effectively and convey their views to different social, cultural, and professional audiences. They will be able to use a variety of technologically supported media to communicate with empathy using a range of written, spoken or visual formats.

This graduate capability is supported by:

Learning outcomes

  • Students who have successfully done this unit will be able to demonstrate a significantly enhanced depth and breadth of knowledge, scholarly understanding, and specific subject content knowledge in the field of urban studies.
  • Students will be able to articulate clearly a coherent argument in written and oral form to a variety of audiences. Students will develop a high level of oral and written skills, with specialisation for the specific needs of a discipline.

Assessment tasks

  • Major Essay
  • Seminar Participation

PG - Engaged and Responsible, Active and Ethical Citizens

Our postgraduates will be ethically aware and capable of confident transformative action in relation to their professional responsibilities and the wider community. They will have a sense of connectedness with others and country and have a sense of mutual obligation. They will be able to appreciate the impact of their professional roles for social justice and inclusion related to national and global issues

This graduate capability is supported by:

Learning outcomes

  • Students who have successfully done this unit will be able to demonstrate a significantly enhanced depth and breadth of knowledge, scholarly understanding, and specific subject content knowledge in the field of urban studies.
  • Students will be able to utilize and reflect on prior knowledge and experience, of applying higher level critical thinking skills, and of integrating and synthesising learning and knowledge from a range of sources and environments.
  • Students will be able to synthesize and analyze information from a variety of sources.
  • Students will be ethically aware and capable of confident transformative action in relation to their and the wider community. They will have a sense of connectedness with others and have a sense of mutual obligation. They will be able to appreciate the impact of their ethnographic writing for social justice and inclusion related to national and global issues.

Assessment tasks

  • Major Essay
  • Seminar Participation