Anthropology

51 Hillhouse, Rm 2A, 432.3665
M.A., M.Phil., Ph.D.

Chair
Andrew Hill

Director of Graduate Studies
Helen Siu [F] (Rm 4, 158 Whitney Avenue, 432.3680)
David Watts [Sp] (B19, 175 Whitney Avenue, 432.9597)

Professors
Arjun Appadurai, Richard Burger, Michael Dove (Forestry & Environmental Studies), Kathryn Dudley, J. Joseph Errington, Andrew Hill, Frank Hole, William Kelly, Enrique Mayer, Alison Richard (Provost), Harold Scheffler, James Scott (Political Science), Helen Siu, John Szwed, David Watts, Harvey Weiss (Near Eastern Languages & Civilizations)

Associate Professors
Nora Groce (Epidemiology & Public Health), Anastasia Karakasidou, Patricia Pessar (Adjunct, American Studies), Linda-Anne Rebhun

Assistant Professors
Bernard Bate, Richard Bribiescas, Marcello Canuto, Kamari Maxine Clarke, David Graeber, Eric Sargis, Thomas Tartaron, Eric Worby

Lecturers
Guillaume Boccara (Visiting), Carol Carpenter (Forestry & Environmental Studies), Ilana Gershon (Visiting), Christina Katsougiannopoulou Ewald, Michael Kral (Visiting), Katherine Rupp (Visiting)

Fields of Study
The department has four subfields. Archaeology focuses on ritual complexes and writing, ceramic analysis, warfare, ancient civilizations, origins of agriculture, and museum studies. Sociocultural anthropology provides a range of courses: classics in ethnography and social theory, religion, myth and ritual, kinship and descent, historical anthropology, culture and political economy, agrarian studies, ecology, environment and social change, medical anthropology, emotions, public health, sexual meanings and gender, postcolonial development, ethnicity, identity politics and diaspora, urban anthropology, global mass culture, and alternate modernity. Linguistic anthropology includes language, nationalism, and ideology, structuralism and semiotics, feminist discourse. Physical anthropology focuses on paleoanthropology, evolutionary theory, human functional anatomy, race and human biological diversity, primate ecology. There is strong geographical coverage in Africa, the Caribbean, East Asia (China and Japan), Latin America and South America, Southeast Asia (Indonesia), South Asia and the Indian Ocean, the Near East, Europe, and the United States.

Special Requirements for the Ph.D. Degree
Although there are a few required courses or seminars for each subfield, more than three-fourths of a student's program consists of electives, including course work in other departments. Admission to candidacy requires: (1) completion of two years of course work (sixteen term courses); (2) independent study and research; (3) satisfactory performance on qualifying examinations; and (4) a dissertation research proposal submitted and approved before the end of the third year. Qualifying examinations, normally taken at the end of the second year, consist of eight hours written (four hours on one of the subfields, four hours on the student's special interest), and two hours oral. Dissertations are normally based on field or laboratory research.

Combined Ph.D. Programs
The Anthropology department also offers a combined Ph.D. in Anthropology and Forestry & Environmental Studies in conjunction with the School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, and a combined Ph.D. in Anthropology and African American Studies in conjunction with the Department of African American Studies. These combined programs are ideal for students who intend to concentrate in, and to write dissertations on, thematic and theoretical issues centrally concerned with anthropology and one of these other areas of study. Students in the combined degree programs will be subject to the combined supervision of faculty members in the Anthropology department and in the respective department or school.

Admission into the combined degree program in Anthropology and African American Studies is based on mutual agreement between these two departments. Individual students will develop courses of study in consultation with their academic advisers and with the directors of graduate study for both departments. Students in the program must take core courses in Anthropology and in African American Studies, plus related courses in both departments approved by their advisory committees. In addition, they must successfully complete the African American Studies third-year Research Workshop. Oral and written qualifying examinations must include two topics in the field of African American Studies and two topics in Anthropology. The examination committee must include at least one faculty member from each department. The dissertation prospectus must be submitted to the directors of graduate study of both departments and approved by the faculty of both. The thesis readers committee must also include at least one faculty member from each department, and the faculties of both departments must approve its composition.

Master's Degrees
M.Phil. See Graduate School requirements.

M.A. This degree is intended for students not continuing in the Ph.D. program. Requirement is satisfactory completion of at least one year in that program. Special attention is given to the quality of papers submitted in course work. Applications for a terminal master's degree are not accepted.

Program materials are available upon request to the Director of Graduate Studies, Department of Anthropology, Yale University, PO Box 208277, New Haven CT 06520-8277; 203.432.3665; e-mail, anthropology@yale.edu; Web site, http://www.yale.edu/anthropology/.

Courses
ANTH 500a, Seminar in Sociocultural Anthropology. Arjun Appadurai, William Kelly. Th 9–12
The major theoretical orientations in social and cultural anthropology (especially in the United States and Europe), their historical development and importance, their relation to one another and to other disciplines.

ANTH 510b, Resistance, Rebellion, and Survival Strategies in Rural Latin America. Gilbert Joseph, Patricia Pessar. W 3.30–5.20
An interdisciplinary examination of new conceptual and methodological approaches to such phenomena as peasants in revolution, millenarianism, "banditry," refugee movements, and transnational migration. Also HIST 807b.

ANTH 513b^u, Language, Culture, and Ideology. J. Joseph Errington. T 1.30–3.20
Influential anthropological theories of culture are reviewed with critical reference to theories of language that inspired or informed them. Topics include American and European structuralism, cognitivist and interpretivist approaches to cultural description, work of Bakhtin, Bourdieu, and various "critical theorists."

ANTH 515b^u, Culture and Political Economy. Helen Siu. W 1.30–3.20
A critical introduction to anthropological formulations of the junctures of meaning, interest, and power. Readings include classical and contemporary ethnographies that are theoretically informed and historically situated. Enrollment limited to twenty-four.

ANTH 524a^u, Cultures, Histories, and Passions in Southeast Europe. Anastasia Karakasidou. Th 1.30–3.20
This course familiarizes students with the "ethnographic islands" within the "currents of history" situated in the southeast corner of Europe. The course is also dedicated to an anthropological analysis of a number of different genres (books of travel, fiction, history, etc.) that describe and represent the region.

ANTH 535a^u, Miles Davis. John Szwed. T 1.30–3.20
A survey of the life and music of Miles Davis, examining the social history and musical traditions that shaped his work and exploring his influence on music, literature, and society. Also AFAM 562a^u.

ANTH 541a, Agrarian Societies: Culture, Society, History, and Development. Robert Harms, Steven Stoll, Michael Dove, Enrique Mayer. M 1.30–5.20
An interdisciplinary examination of agrarian societies, contemporary and historical, Western and non-Western. Major analytical perspectives from anthropology, economics, history, political science, and environmental studies are used to develop a meaning-centered and historically grounded account of the transformations of rural society. Team taught. Also F&ES 753a, HIST 965a, PLSC 779a.

ANTH 550b, Anthropology and History. Guillaume Boccara. T 9.30–11.20
Introduction to the epistemological issues linked to the combination of methods and perspectives of anthropology and history. We examine the ways indigenous societies' sociohistorical processes and cultural dynamics have been analyzed. Through the exploration of indigenous narrative and ritual (mostly from the American continent), we rethink the analytical distinction between myth and history. We then tackle the issue of the relationship between "Indians' histories" and "histories of Indians," and assess to what extent it is possible to reconcile "native auto-histories" with comparative indigenous histories on the one hand, and structural history on the other.

ANTH 552a, Globalization and Violence: Interdisciplinary Perspectives. Arjun Appadurai. W 3.30–5.20
This seminar uses the close reading of eight or nine monographs as the basis for intensive discussion of ethnic violence in the era of globalization. The course is concerned with the general methodological problem of relating scales to forms in social life, and with the related problem of the historical breaks implied by the idea of "globalization." Readings and class discussions deliberately focus on problems that cut across the social sciences, such as those of state cultures, crowd dynamics, genocidal stereotyping, and the making of modern minorities. A cultural perspective—one focusing on various dimensions of contextual meaning—serves to probe the limits of various disciplinary languages and images in regard to the politics of violence. Also PLSC 768a.

ANTH 569b^u, Economic Anthropology. Enrique Mayer. W 1.30–3.20
Introduction to understanding economic systems in other cultures and societies. How work and leisure is organized, who gets what and how, and how economic concerns tie into other aspects of social life. Major debates and controversies examined, and examples from different parts of the world are presented. No prior training in economics or anthropology necessary.

ANTH 571a^u, Ethnogenesis, Resistance, and Miscegenation in America. Guillaume Boccara. T 9.30–11.20
Introduction to ethnohistoriographical issues and anthropological interpretations of the sociocultural dynamics and historical processes that developed within the American fringes between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries. The first part of the course is dedicated to the definition and critique review of key concepts such as frontier, borderland, ethnogenesis, ethnification, resistance, acculturation, and mestizaje. The second part of the seminar examines in detail some specific processes of ethnogenesis and mestizaje on the South, Central, and North American frontiers.

ANTH 575a^u, Urban Anthropology and Global History. Helen Siu. T 1.30–3.20
The seminar explores urbanization processes in different historical times and places. Using a combination of literary works, historical narratives, and ethnographies, it analyzes how migrants and urbanites with their unique cultural histories confront changes in the macro political economies that encapsulate them. The seminar focuses on the nature of migration, adaptive strategies, ethnicity, and political symbolism, the myth of marginality, the language of class, and culture conflict.

ANTH 576a^u, Anthropology of the Object. Eric Worby. TTh 1.30–3.20
An exploration of the culturally variable means through which value and significance are attributed to objects. Topics for discussion include gift-giving and commodity exchange; the classification collection, and display of art and artifacts; the gendered and racialized body as object for self and other; advertising, consumption, and commodity fetishism; concepts of property; the politics of value.

ANTH 578b^u, Gender and Social Change in Southeast Asia. J. Joseph Errington. Th 1.30–3.20
A survey of problems and approaches to modernization in Southeast Asian locales, mostly Indonesian and Malaysian, centering on pivotal issues of gender. Emphasis in reading is on book-length ethnographies.

ANTH 58oa^u, Language and Political Practice. Bernard Bate. Th 2.30–4.20
An exploration of the relationship between language and politics in a number of societies. The course examines how language use, as both mode of social practice and object of ideology and political organization, is constitutive of political relations and social organization generally. Topics include the relationship of ideologies and aesthetics of language to broader political economies; speech genre and the performance of self and social organization; and oratory and its relationship to the constitution of the social field as an integral element of political praxis.

ANTH 581a, Society and Environment: Introduction to Theory and Method. Michael Dove. Th 2.30–5.20
Critical issues in the analysis of relations between society and environment. Topics include: (1) the identification of environmental "problems," focusing on the rationale of development intervention and failure, and the study of environmental discourse; (2) conceptual boundaries in resource-use systems and in conceptions of nature and culture; (3) conceptual boundaries in environmental relations between center and periphery and between the local and the global; (4) the sociology of science of environmental relations, encompassing views of indigenous knowledge, objective distance, scientific "forgetfulness," and relations between the natural and social sciences; and (5) the implications of the foregoing for current critiques of science. Also F&ES 747a.

ANTH 587b^u, The Anthropology of Sound. John Szwed. Th 1.30–3.20
The socially mediated nature of sound, and the cultural consequences of technologies of sound transmission, modification, and recording. Topics include the pre- and postindustrial soundscapes; audio ethnography; the art of noise; synesthesia; problems of originality and plagiarism (covers, sampling, mixing, machine music, etc.); world music; audio imperialism and terrorism; musical utopias; imaginary soundscapes. Also AMST 763b^u.

ANTH 592a, Anthropology and Classical Social Theory. David Graeber. W 1.30–3.20
The course is meant not only to introduce anthropology students to the founding works of Western social theory—the big names like Marx, Weber, and Durkheim—but also to place these authors in the context of the Western intellectual and cultural tradition from which they emerged and to discuss their ongoing relevance to anthropological thought. A central goal of the seminar is to identify ways of disarticulating the production of gender by examining how these roles are both naturalized and disrupted in local and global spheres.

ANTH 594b, Theories of Value in Anthropology. David Graeber. W 3.30–5.20
There is a broad feeling in anthropology that there is some level at which "values" in the sociological sense, "value" in the economic sense, and linguistic "value" in the Saussurean sense all come down to the same thing—and that a theory of value based on this insight holds out the promise of resolving many of the stickiest outstanding problems in social theory: most notably, the relation of individual desire and action with cultural meaning and social form. But it's not at all clear whether such a theory actually exists. In this course, students examine some contenders and work on developing such a theory.

ANTH 644a^u, Globalization, Bilingualism, and Endangered Languages. J. Joseph Errington. T 9.30–11.20
A review of sociolinguistic concomitants of modernization. Emphasis is on transitional bilingualism in marginal communities, politics of language, and problems of language loss.

ANTH 681a^u, Introduction to Jazz Studies. John Szwed. Th 1.30–3.20
An overview of the music and its cultural history, with consideration of the influence of jazz on the visual arts, dance, literature, and film; an introduction to the scholarship and methods of jazz studies. Also AFAM 557a^u, AMST 703a^u.

ANTH 700a^u, Archaeological Method and Theory I. Frank Hole. T 9.30–11.20
Theoretical approaches and methods used in the design and implementation of archaeological field research and laboratory analysis. Also ARCG 700a^u.

ANTH 702b^u, Archaeological Method and Theory II. Marcello Canuto. T 9.30–11.20
The principles archaeologists use to explain human cultural development from the material record of the past. Questions considered include: What is archaeology and what are its aims? Is there or is there not a coherent body of archaeological theory to which most archaeologists subscribe? What appear to be the most productive theoretical approaches for understanding and interpreting the past? Also ARCG 702b^u.

ANTH 705Lb^u, Archaeology Laboratory II. Thomas Tartaron. W 1–4
Practical experience in preparation, analysis, and interpretation of artifacts and nonartifactual archaeological data. Students undertake term projects. Also ARCG 705Lb^u.

ANTH 709b^u, Climate, Society, and Causality. Harvey Weiss. Th 1.30–3.20
Analysis of (1) palaeoclimate proxy and instrumental data for abruptness, magnitude, and duration of Holocene climate changes, and (2) archaeological and historical records for adaptive social responses in Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Americas. The webs of causality are disentangled when the resolution of the palaeoclimate and archaeohistorical records are re-examined. Also ARCG 709b^u.

ANTH 712b^u, Ancient Civilizations of Mesoamerica. Marcello Canuto. TTh 11.30–12.45
The Indian civilizations of Mexico and Central America from earliest times through the Spanish conquest. Also ARCG 712b^u.

ANTH 713b^u, Birth, Baptism, Marriage, Death: Aspects of Byzantine and Modern Greek Private Life. Christina Ewald. Th 3.30–5.20
A general introduction to rituals and ceremonies of private life in Byzantine and early modern Greek culture (fourth to nineteenth century). Also ARCG 713b^u.

ANTH 728a^u, Archaeology of the Incas. Staff. Th 9.30–11.20
Examination of Inca society and culture, with an emphasis on the contribution made by archaeological research. Consideration of the relationship between the historical sources and archaeological evidence, along with the more general methodological problem of the study of prehistoric conquest states. Also ARCG 728a^u.

ANTH 733a^u and 733La^u, Archaeological Field Techniques and Archaeology Lab I. Thomas Tartaron. TTh 9–10.15, Lab Sa 9–5
An introduction to the practice and techniques of modern archaeology, including methods of excavation, recording, mapping, dating, and ecological analysis. The lab offers instruction in the field at an archaeological site in Connecticut in stratigraphy, mapping, artifact recovery, and excavation strategy. The courses must be taken concurrently and are counted together as 1 credit. Also ARCG 733a^u and 733La^u.

ANTH 737b^u, Archaeological Research Design. Frank Hole. MW 1–2.15
Various approaches to designing archaeological research are presented and discussed through the use of case studies. As final projects students design and present their own research proposals. Also ARCG 737b^u.

ANTH 738b^u, Ethnoarchaeology. Frank Hole. TTh 9–10.15
A survey and critical examination of the uses of ethnographic, experimental, and replication studies for the archaeological interpretation of material culture and patterns of behavior. Also ARCG 738b^u.

ANTH 740a^u, Topics in Maya Archaeology. Marcello Canuto. W 1.30–3.20
Examination of current problems in Maya archaeology, epigraphy, iconography, and ethnohistory. Topics include the preclassic, classic, and postclassic periods. the development and collapse of classic Maya civilization, economic and political organization, warfare, and external relations. Also ARCG 740a^u.

ANTH 746a^u, Topics in Greek Prehistory. Thomas Tartaron. W 3.30–5.20
A detailed examination of current topics in the archaeology of Neolithic and Bronze Age Greece, including the transition to agriculture, the rise of complex society, seafaring and trade, and the emergence and collapse of Mycenaean "palatial" systems. Also ARCG 746a^u.

ANTH 747a^u, The Archaeology of Households and Daily Life. Marcello Canuto. W 1.30–3.20
Undeniably, households and everyday life are at the core of human existence. Despite the inescapable pervasiveness of these arenas of daily life in the study of human societies, social scientists have assigned everyday life a passive position in human societies. This course examines households in past and present societies throughout the world in order to discuss how people in their households and throughout their everyday lives experience and construct the world around them. Also ARCG 747a^u.

ANTH 753a^u, Early Prehistory. Frank Hole. TTh 1–2.15
The formation of modern society began with the beginning of food production and the establishment of permanent settlements. Triggered by climatic and environmental factors, the Neolithic Revolution led to innovations in architecture, art, metallurgy, religion, diet, technology, trade, and social organization that provided the foundations for the earliest civilizations. This course focuses on the Neolithic period in the region including the Eastern Mediterranean, Turkey, Iraq, and western Iran. Also ARCG 753a^u.

ANTH 763b^u, Archaeologies of Empire. Harvey Weiss. T 2.30–4.20
Comparative study of origins, structures, efficiencies, and limitations of imperialism, ancient and modern, in the Old and New Worlds, from Akkad to "Indochine," and from Wari to Aztec. The contrast between ancient and modern imperialisms examined from the perspectives of nineteenth- and twentieth-century archaeology and political economy. Also ARCG 763b^u.

ANTH 773a^u, Civilizations and Collapse. Harvey Weiss. Th 3.30–5.20
Collapse documented in the archaeological and early historical records of the Old and New Worlds, including Mesopotamia, Mesoamerica, the Andes, and Europe. Analysis of politicoeconomic vulnerabilities, resiliencies, and adaptations in the face of abrupt climate change, anthropogenic environmental degradation, resource depletion, "barbarian" incursions, or class conflict. Also ARCG 773a^u, NELC 588a^u.

ANTH 777b^u, The Origins of Agriculture. Frank Hole. TTh 1–2.15
The concepts and processes of domestication are examined in the context of archaeological examples from several regions of the world. Also ARCG 777b^u.

ANTH 803b, Reproductive Ecology of Humans and Nonhuman Primates. Richard Bribiescas. T or W 1.30–3.20
Survey of the current understanding of the physiology of reproductive function within the control of evolutionary and life history theory. Emphasis on population variation in female and male reproductive endocrinology as well as the sources of that variation.

ANTH 815b, Primate Functional Morphology. Eric Sargis.
Examination of the form and function of primate cranial, dental, and postcranial morphology. Includes the relationship between diet and body size, as well as locomotion and body size; craniodental adaptations in relation to dietary differences; postcranial adaptations in relation to differential substrate use; and postcranial adaptations for various locomotor modes. Paleobiological implications for fossil primates are also considered.

ANTH 822b, Topics and Issues in Human Evolution. Andrew Hill. W 2.30–4.20
Topics from the span of primate evolution are covered: the early primates, origin of modern type primates, anthropoid origins, monkey and hominoid evolution. Readings and discussions focus on issues of taxonomy—judging morphological similarities and differences among fossils. Specific attention paid to traits paleontologists use to assign fossils to species and functional/behavioral significance of those traits. Lectures and lab use of fossils provide background on fossil evidence.

ANTH 829a^u, Primate Evolution. Eric Sargis. MW 1–2.15
Exploration of the evolutionary history of the order Primates from its origins through the Miocene epoch. Focus is on controversies in taxonomy, systematics, and functional morphology in the primate fossil record.

ANTH 849b, Primate Models in Human Evolution. David Watts. T 1.30–3.20

ANTH 851a, Topics and Issues in Evolutionary Theory. Eric Sargis, Richard Bribiescas.
Focus on current literature in theoretical evolutionary biology, intended to give new graduate students intensive training in critical analysis of theoretical models and in scientific writing.

ANTH 856a^u, Reconstructing Human Evolution: An Ecological Approach. Andrew Hill. Th 1.30–3.20
If human evolutionary change has been determined or affected by ecological factors, like changes in climate, competition with other animals, availability and kinds of food supply, then it is important to determine ecological and environmental information about the regions and time period in which human evolution has occurred. An examination of methods of obtaining data relevant to this, by evaluating the techniques and results of such other fields as geology, paleobotany, and paleozoology. It also surveys ethnographic, primatological, and other biological models of early human behavior.

ANTH 864b, Human Osteology. Eric Sargis. TTh 11.30–12.45
A lecture and lab course on the characteristics of the human skeleton and its use in studies of function morphology, paleodemography, and paleopathology. Laboratories familiarize students with skeletal parts; lectures focus on the nature of bone tissue, its biomechanical modification, sexing, ageing, and interpretation of lesions.

ANTH 951a or b, Directed Research in Ethnology and Social Anthropology.
By arrangement with faculty.

ANTH 952a or b, Directed Research in Linguistics.
By arrangement with faculty.

ANTH 953a or b, Directed Research in Archaeology and Prehistory.
By arrangement with faculty.

ANTH 965a or b, Directed Research in Physical Anthropology.
By arrangement with faculty.

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