Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Term: 1
Course Title: Voice and Place
Course Code: 15 180 2040
Course Unit Value: 1
Contact Hours: 1 hour lecture; 1 hour tutorial
Course Teachers: Convenor: Dr Stephen Hughes
Lecturers: Members of the Department of Anthropology and
Sociology
Tutorials: Giulia Battaglia
Timetable:
See www.soas.ac.uk/timetable for the lecture room. Tutorials will
be assigned and lists posted on the Anthropology notice board in
the Faculty offices.
Assessment:
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Academic -> Arts & Humanities Faculty -> Information for
Students -> Online Coursework Submission
http://www.soas.ac.uk/artshumanities/information-for-
students/ocs/
Attendance Regulations:
You should attend all lectures and tutorials for the course, and
attendance is required for at least 50% of tutorials and lectures.
Attendance registers will be maintained for these. You should
notify your tutor or the Faculty Office in advance if you are unable
to attend a tutorial for good reason. Should two absences occur
without explanation within any four week period, your tutor will
inform the Faculty Office and a letter will be sent to you with
copies to the department’s undergraduate tutor and to the
Registry. All absences are noted on your records, and if absences
persist you may be prevented from taking the written
examination for the course.
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WEEK 1: Environmental movements in contemporary China
Jakob Klein
Our focus in this unit is on the social, cultural and political dimensions of
everyday and organized responses to environmental degradation in the PRC,
including the relationship between such responses and transnational debates
and organizations (Litzinger 2004). Illuminating comparisons with Taiwan and
other Asian settings are provided by Weller and Hsiao (1998), Weller (2006),
Kalland and Persoon (1998) and Greenhough and Tsing (2003), while some
of the global dimensions of contemporary environmental movements are
discussed by Tsing (2005), Lien (2004) and Carrier (2004).
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Essay question:
Key readings:
Jing, Jun (2003) ‘Environmental protests in rural China’ in E.J. Perry and M.
Selden (eds), Chinese Society: Change, Conflict, Resistance. New York and
London: RoutledgeCurzon. (available as electronic book via SOAS library)
Recommended readings:
Lora Wainwright, Anna (2009) ‘Of farming chemicals and cancer deaths: the
politics of health in contemporary rural China’, Social
Anthropology/Anthropologie Sociale, 17 (1): 56-73.
Weller, Robert P. and Hsin-Huang Michael Hsiao (1998) ‘Culture, gender and
community in Taiwan’s environmental movement’, in Arne Kalland and Gerard
Persoon (eds), Environmental Movements in Asia. Richmond, Surrey: Curzon
Press, pp. 83-109.
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Further readings:
Greenhough, Paul and Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing (eds) (2003) Nature in the
Global South: Environmental Projects in South and Southeast Asia. Durham,
NC: Duke University Press. (Especially chapters by Dove and Baviskar)
Shapiro, Judith (2001) Mao’s War Against Nature: Politics and the
Environment in Revolutionary China. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Coggins, Chris (2003) The Tiger and the Pangolin: Nature, Culture, and
Conservation in China. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press. Chapter 8:
‘White tigers and azure dragons: fengshui forests, sacred space, and the
preservation of biodiversity in village landscapes’, pp. 195-215.
Marks, Robert B. (1998) Tigers, Rice, Silk, and Silt: Environment and
Economy in Late Imperial China. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Tucker, Mary Evelyn and John Berthrong (eds). 1998. Confucianism and
Ecology: The Interrelation of Heaven, Earth, and Humans. Cambridge, Mass.:
Harvard University, Center for the Study of World Religions.
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WEEK 2: Using film to theorise about the other and the
politics of fear
Lola Martinez
Freud, Sigmund 1956 The uncanny in his Collected Papers, vol.IV London:
Hogarth Press. In main library, xerox in DL.
Otis, Laura Arthur Conan Doyle: an imperial immune system and Conclusion:
Identity in the Age of Aids in her Membranes, metaphors of invasion in
nineteenth-century literature, science and politics. Baltimore and
London: The John Hopkins University Press. DL
Simmel, Georg 1950 The Stranger in The sociology of Georg Simmel edited
by Kurt H. Wolff. New York.
Stephen Hughes
This week starts with a basic introduction and overview of the relatively new
and still emergent specialist sub-field, anthropology of media. Considering
that the contemporary worlds we live in are inescapably and continuously
transformed through a proliferation of mass media, it may seem somewhat
surprising that anthropology as an academic discipline has only recently
begun to seriously address how and why media matters to the people with
whom they study. This week we will consider why anthropologists have been
slow to take on the topic of the media. Why might we want to propose an
anthropology of media? What would such an anthropology consist of? And
what would it might contribute to the understanding of media?
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focuses on recent studies on film exhibition. Exhibition has emerged as one
of the key sites where anthropologists have sought to study cinema as a kind
of social practice (for example: Armbrust, Hahn, Himple, Hughes, Larkin,
Hoek). The example of exhibition has been part of the critical questioning of
the centrality of the film texts for the study of cinema. In particular,
anthropologists have turned to exhibition as providing an alternative approach
to studying the relationship between films and their social and historical
contexts. A study of cinema that takes exhibition into account must consider
film texts as also a kind of performance- a unique interaction of people and
projected media at a specific place and occasion. The reconception of
cinema as performance has important consequences for how one constructs
the object of film studies and how we can relate film texts to historically and
culturally situated practice.
Essay question: How has the study of film exhibition helped anthropologists
to think about the relationship between media and their audiences?
Kelly Askew, “Introduction” in Kelly Askew and Richard Wilk, editors, The
Anthropology of Media: A Reader. Blackwell Publishers, 2002, pp. 1-13.
Brian Larkin, “Indian Films and Nigerian Lovers: Media and the Creation of
Parallel Modernities,” Africa, vol. 67, no. 3, 1997. Also reprinted in Inda and
Rosaldo, eds, The Anthropology of Globalization: A Reader. Blackwell
Publishing, 2005, pp. 350-378.
Brian Larkin, Signal and Noise: Media, Infrastructure and Urban Culture in
Nigeria. Duke University Press, 2008.
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Charles Ambler, “Popular Films and Colonial Audiences in Central Africa” in
Melvyn Stokes and Richard Maltby eds, Hollywood Abroad: Audiences and
Cultural Exchange. British Film Institute, 2004, pp. 133-157.
Stephen Hughes, “House Full: Silent Film Genre, Exhibition and Audiences in
South India” in Indian Economic and Social History Review, forthcoming,
2006, vol. 43, no. 1.
Stephen Hughes, “Pride of Place: rethinking exhibition the study of cinema in
India” in Seminar, May 2003, no. 525, pp. 28-32
Lotte Hoek, “Urdu for Image: Understanding Bangladeshi Cinema through its
Theatres”. In Shakuntala Banaji, editor, South Asian Media Cultures:
Representations, Audiences and Contexts. London & New York: Anthem
Press, 2010, pp. 91-105.
Lotte Hoek, “Unstable Celluloid: Film Projection and the Cinema Audience in
Bangladesh. BioScope: South Asian Screen Studies, 1:1, 2010, pp. 49-66.
S. Dickey, Cinema and the Urban Poor in South India. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1993.
D. Kulick and M. Wilson, “Rambo’s Wife Saves the Day: Subjugating the
Gaze and Subverting the Narrative in a Papua New Guinean Swamp” in K.
Askew and R. Wilk eds., The Anthropology of Media: a reader. Blackwell
Publishers, 270-286.
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Please note that as part of the Department of Anthropology and Sociology’s
Winter term 2010-2011 “Ethnographic Film Series: On Matters of Media”,
there will two public film screenings relevant for this week’s topic. The series
runs every Wednesday at 1pm in the Khalili Lecture Theatre and is open and
free for everyone in the SOAS community.
9 March
Battu's Bioscope, Andrej Fidyk, 1998, 58 min.
This film follows a touring cinema exhibitor, Mr. Battu and his assistant,
from urban Calcutta to isolated rural areas in India.
16 March
Kumar Talkies, Pankaj Rishi Kumar, 1999, 76 min.
The film explores the relationship between Kalpi--a small town in
northern India--and its only surviving cinema hall. The film chronicles
Kalpi’s economic decline and its citizens’s hopes and frustrations while
taking a nostalgic look at the lost, lavish world of cinema. The film also
considers the influence of television, which is gradually reducing the
audience at the hall.
Parvathi Raman
Essay question: Discuss, with examples, the ways that migrant communities
'produce locality'.
Key Readings:
J. Clifford, ‘On Diasporas’, in Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late
twentieth Century, (Harvard, 1997).
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B. Hayes Edwards,The Practice of Diaspora: literature, translation and the
rise of black internationalism, (Cambridge, Harvard, 2003)
A. Gupta and J. Ferguson, ‘Beyond Culture: Space, Identity and the Politics
of Difference’, in A. Gupta and J. Ferguson, Culture, Power, Place:
explorations in critical anthropology, (Baskerville, 2001).
John Campbell
Anthropology has a long tradition of research into law and legal process that
began with work on customary law and tradition in Africa. However in the past
twenty years anthropological approaches to law have changed dramatically
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following a re-conceptualization of law, culture and the role of the state and
transnational organizations. This lecture will focus on contemporary work on
asylum in the UK as a field of law that is deeply affected by national legislation
and international legal conventions such as the European Convention on
Human Rights and the Geneva Convention.
_____. 2005. (2nd Ed). Just Words. Law, language and Power. University of
Chicago (not in SOAS library).
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_____. 2004b. “Undoubtedly an expert? Anthropologists in British Asylum
Courts”, Jo. of the Royal Anthropological Institute (NS) 10, 113-33
No lecture or classes.
Christopher Davis
In this week, we will address several interrelated topics. First, we will consider
the relationship between sorcery or witchcraft and lived experience. That is, we
will think about them not only as social institutions or practices, but also as
devices by which knowledge of the world is constituted or created. Thus, we
will consider their epistemological aspects - i.e. we will see them as sustaining
reflection on how knowledge of particular situations is generated. We will also
see how, within the terms set, people can reflect on and be critical of
judgments. Finally, we will go on to consider the use to which anthropologists
have put this type of knowledge.
Recommended readings
Evans-Pritchard, E.E. 1937. The notion of witchcraft explains unfortunate
events. In Witchcraft, oracles and magic among the Azande. Oxford, Oxford
University Press, pp. 63-84
Further reading
Douglas, M, 1975. ‘Social and religious symbolism of the Lele and animals in
Lele religious symbolism’, in Implicit meanings. London, RKP. pp.9-27, pp.27-
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Jackson, M. 1989. ‘The Witch as category and as a person’, & ‘The Man who
could turn into an elephant’, in Paths toward a clearing. Bloomington, Indiana:
Indiana University Press. pp. 88-108, pp. 102-119
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Luhrmann T. 1989. Persuasions of the Witches’ Craft. Oxford: Blackwell.
Chapter 21 on interpretive drift.
Orwell, G. 1989. The Road to Wigan Pier. London: Penguin. chaps 2, 3 & 4.
Ngubane, H. 1977. Body and mind in Zulu medicine. New York, Academic
Press
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WEEK 9: The politics of memorializing in the dead in the
aftermath of natural disasters in South Asia
Edward Simpson
In this lecture I explore some of the memorial practices that emerged after the
2001 earthquake in Gujarat and along the eastern and southern coasts of Sri
Lanka following the tsunami of 2004. In both locations, acts of memorialization
have been inseparable from reconstruction initiatives, and politics of all kinds
and at all levels have influenced the design, location and inauguration
ceremonies of memorials. In Gujarat, memorials are tied to the politics of
religious communalism, regionalism and mainstream Hindu nationalism. In Sri
Lanka, memorials are local manifestations of ethno-nationalisms and state
hegemony. The comparison of the two locations shows different patterns of
memorialisation, but why? Looking for an answer to this question forces us to
think about 'culture', the relation between 'culture' and public action, and the
nature of comparison in anthropology.
Readings
Casey, Edward, S. 2000. Remembering: A phenomenological study (second
edition). Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.
Grider, S. 2007. 'Public grief and the politics of memorial: Contesting the
memory of 'the shooters' at Columbine High School', Anthropology Today, 34
(3): 3-7.
* Simpson, Edward and Stuart Corbridge. 2006. 'The geography of things that
may become memories: The 2001 earthquake in Kachchh-Gujarat and the
politics of rehabilitation in the pre-memorial era,' Annals of the Association of
American Geographers. 96 (2): 566-585.
Winter, Jay (1995), Sites of Memory, Sites of Mourning: The Great War in
European Cultural History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Caroline Osella
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This week we will think about some issues in and approaches to the study of
consumption, using (mostly) South Asian ethnography. We will evaluate
different analytical perspectives on consumption, and explore the role of
consumption in producing identities and social categories.
Essay question
What - if any - fresh insights can be gained through making consumption a
central focus of research?
Further Readings
Appadurai, A. 1986. ‘Introduction: commodities and the politics of value’. In
Appadurai A (ed) The Social life of things: commodities in cultural perspective.
CUP.
Bourdieu, P. 1984. Distinction (Chp 5) (or see also Bourdieu’s The logic of
Practice, part 1, section 3,5,7 & 8).
Marx, K. 1909 (1887) ‘The Fetishism of Commodities and the Secret Thereof’.
In Marx K Capital, Vol 1, Part 1. (Chapter 1, Section 4)
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Tarlo, E 1991 “The problem of what to wear - the politics of Khadi in late
colonial India”. In South Asia Research Vol.11, No.2, pp.134-157
Extra Reading (for essay or exam answer; select from the list below)
Adorno, T & M. Horkheimer. 1972 ‘The Culture Industry: enlightenment as
mass deception’. In Adorno T & M Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment
(extract in S. During (ed) The Cultural Studies Reader, Routledge, 1993)
Comaroff, J. 1996. ‘The empire’s old clothes: fashioning the colonial subject’. I
D. Howes (ed.) Cross-cultural consumption: global markets, local realities.
Routledge.
Osella F & Osella C. 2000 ‘Migration, Money and Masculinity in Kerala’. The
Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, vol. 6, no. 1: 115-131.
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Ritzer, G. 1998 The McDonaldization Thesis: Explorations and Extensions.
London: SAGE Publications (chps 1-10).
Tarlo, E 1991 “The problem of what to wear - the politics of Khadi in late
colonial India”. In South Asia Research Vol.11, No.2, pp.134-157
Tarlo, E 1996 Clothing matters: dress and identity in India. Hurst Pub.
White, L.1997. ‘Cars out of place: vampires, technology and labor in East and
Central Africa’. In Cooper, F & AL Stoler (eds) Tensions of Empire: Colonial
Cultures in a Bourgeois World. University of California Press. (pp 436-460)
Essays
The word length of term essays for Voice and Place is 1,500 – 2,500 words.
Essays for term 2 are to be submitted, in duplicate, no later than 4pm on
Monday 26th April.
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