Some general questions for the assigned readings. 
For each reading I may put together some special questions, but generally the following are questions that could help us focus on what's useful and important for our discussions: 
    >  What is the topic sentence? 
    >  What is the connection or relevance of the rest of the article to the topic sentence?  How does the rest of it fit in with this point? 
    >  What are the significant assumptions in the presentation?  What words reveal those assumptions?  Are there ambiguities in key terms of the discussion? 
    >  What is the method of argumentation? 
    >  What kinds of empirical material is adduced to ground and inform and justify the discussion? 
    >  As we proceed:  How does this presentation/ viewpoint/ argument compare with others we have looked at?

The following are possible readings for the course 

 Class Day / Reading assignments

    [* = required of most students]
    [# = optional, except for grad students or students who have taken AN3700, in which case it is required instead of the other]
    [& = another optional reading in case you are interested and familiar with the other readings.]. 

 8/27/09 1st day:  Syllabus and plans for the course.  Video [introductions; notes to me]

 9/1/09  2nd day:  Geertz 
 * Clifford Geertz. 1973. “Religion as a Cultural System.” In: The Interpretation of Culture. New York: Basic. 
 # Clifford Geertz. 1973.  "Ethos, Worldview and the Analysis of Sacred Symbols."  In Interpretation of Culture. New York: Basic.
 & Clifford Geertz. 1973. Thick Description. In Interpretation of Culture. New York: Basic. 

 9/3/09 3rd day:  Geertz:  These are both about art as a cultural system and can be compared with his Deep Play, which is also about art as a cultural system.  By comparing them you can get a sense of Geertz's concept of cultural system, a topic on which I might ask you to write about later. 
 * Clifford Geertz. 1973 “Lost in Translation: Social History of the Moral Imagination.” In: Local Knowledge. 
 # Clifford Geertz. 1973. “Art as a Cultural System.” In: Local Knowledge. 

9/8/09  4th day:  Geertz:  This is the most important article to understand and internalize but it is difficult.  Hint:  Look for what he has to say about defining situations.  The definition of the situation is a critical concept in all we will do.
 * Clifford Geertz. 1973. “Ideology as a Cultural System.” In: The Interpretation of Culture. New York: Basic. 

5th and 6th days:  Goffman was an influence on Geertz's thought, but he comes out of a "symbolic interactionism" tradition.  This was early associated with Geo Herbert Mead:  "I" vs "Me", as fundamental concepts of the person.  We will read the first 35 pp. of these chapters for the 5th day and the rest on the 6th day.
9/10/09 * [5th day] Irving Goffman.  1959.  [selections] The Presentation of the Self in Everyday Life.  New York:  Anchor. 
    Goffman: Introduction 1-16. 

9/15/09  * [6th day] Goffman: Performances 17-76.

7th and 8th days:  Sahlins's ideas we will spend a lot of time on.  "Elian" should be read also during this time. 
9/17/09 * [7th day] Marshal Sahlins  1985  Historical Metaphors and Mythical Realities [Selections] 

9/22/09 * [8th day] Marshall Sahlins. 2004. [selections] Apologies to Thucydides: Understanding Culture as History and Vice Versa 
  "Elian Gonzales" [This was read by those of you who took AN204] 
 On the Shot heard round the world" [On the race between the Yankees and the Dodgers]

9/24/09 9th day: PAPER DUE HERE

9/29/09  10th day:  Sewell: Here we begin with Sewell's questions and his solutions. 
 William H. Sewell, Jr. Logics of History . Chicago: University of Chicago.Chapter 1 

10/1/09 11th day: Sewell:
 William Sewell, Jr. [Chapter 3, Eventful Sociology ] Logics of History 

10/6/09 12th day: Sewell:
 William Sewell, Jr. [ch 4, Theory of Structure] Logics of History:  Geertz

10/8/09  13th day: Sewell:
 William Sewell, Jr. [ch 5, Concepts of Culture] Logics of History:  Sahlins

10/13/09  14th day: Sewell:
  Sewell [ch 6, Geertz]

10/15/09  15th day: Sewell:
 Sewell [ch 7, Sahlins, Theory of Culture]

10/20/09 16th day: Sewell:
  Sewell [ch 8, Translations of Structures] 

10/22/09  17th day:  Sewell: 
    Sewell [ch 10 Refiguring the Social] 

10/27/09  18th day PAPER DUE HERE

10/29/09  19th day:  Chakrabarty. Here we are in new territory for me.  I have never made much of this author but I want to look at some of the things he is doing, to broaden my [and our] perspective.  We will read one of these two articles, or else assign the class to divide it up.
 * Dipesh Chakrabarty.  2002.  Ch 1, "A Small History of Subaltern Studies," in Habitations of Modernity:  Essays in the Wake of Subaltern Studies.  Chicago:  University of Chicago. 

11/3/09  20th day:  Chakrabarty
 *Dipesh Chakrabarty.  2002.  Ch 6, "Governmental Roots of Modern Ethnicity," in Habitations of Modernity:  Essays in the Wake of Subaltern Studies.  Chicago:  University of Chicago. 

11/5/09  21th day.  Michael Lindsay.
 * Lindsay. Ch 1, "Presidents and Power" in Faith in the Halls of Power. Oxford University Press.

11/10/09  22nd day.  Wendy James.  James is a product of the E-P style of anthropology 
 * James, Wendy. 2000. Postscript to Part I: On Moral Knowledge. In: The Listening Ebony: Moral Knowledge, Religion, and Power among the Uduk of Sudan. Oxford: Oxford University. pp 143-156.

11/12/09  23rd day.  Foucault.
 * Foucault.  Two Lectures. 

11/17/09  24th day Verdery
 *Katherine Verdery: [selections] The Political Life of Dead Bodies 

11/19/09  25th day. Sivaramakrishnan
    * Sivaramakrishnan, K. 2000. "Crafting the Public Sphere in the Forests of West Bengal: Democracy, Development, and Political Action." American Ethnologist Volume 27, Number 2, (May). PP 431-461. 

11/24/09  26th day:  Navaro-Yashin.
 * Yael Navaro-Yashin.  2009.  "Affective Spaces, Melacholic Objects:  Ruination of the Production of Anthropological Knowledge."  JRAI 15(1):1-18. 

12/1/09  27th day: Starrett. 
 * Starrett: [on Egypt]
 

12/3/09  28th day:  Last class
 
 

Left overs:

Sorabji, Cornelia. 2006. “Manging Memories in Post-war Sarajevo: Individuals, Bad Memories, and New Wars.” JRAI 12:1-18.

Stoczkowski, Wiktor. 2008. UNESCO's doctrine of human diversity: A secular soteriology. Anthropology Today 25(3, June):7-11.

Backer-Cristales, Beth. 2008. “Magical Pursuits: legitimacy and representation in a transitional political field.” American Anthropologist 110[3]: 349-359.

Armstrong, Karen. 2000. Ambiguity and Remembrance: Individual and Collective Memory in Finland. American Ethnologist, 27(3): 591-608.

Eisenlohr, Patrick. 2006: “The Politics of Diaspora and the Morality of Secularism: Muslim identities and Islamic Authority in Mauritius.” JRAI 12: 395-412.

Lester, Rebecca. 2009. Brokering Authenticity. Current Anthropology. June

Richard G. Fox. 1983. [Selections] Gandhian Utopia

Fredrik Barth. 1993. [Selections] Balinese Worlds. Chicago: University of Chicago.

Fredrick G. Bailey: [selections] The Prevalence of Deceit. Ithaca: Cornell University

Dipesh Chakrabarty. 2002. "Subaltern Histories and Post-Enlightenment Rationalism." Ch 2 in Habitations of Modernity: Essays in the Wake of Subaltern Studies. Chicago: University of Chicago.

Verdery, Katherine. 1991. “Introduction: Ideology, Cultural Politics, Intellectuals.” In: National Ideology under Socialism; Identity and cultural politics in Ceausescu's Romania.

Michel-Rolph Trouillot. 1995. "The Power in the Story" Ch 1 in Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History. Boston: Beacon.

Michel-Rolph Trouillot. 1995. "An Unthikable History: The Haitian Revolution as a Non-Event" Ch 3 in Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History. Boston: Beacon. 

Wolf, Eric R. 1999. “National Socialist Germany.” pp 197-273.  In Envisioning Power: Ideologies of Dominance and Crisis. Berkeley: California University. 

Fernandez, James. 1986. “The Dark at the Bottom of the Stairs: The Inchoate in Symbolic Inquiry and Some Strategies for Coping with it.” In: Persuasions and Performances: The Play of Tropes in Culture.