This course provides a survey of the anthropology of contemporary East Asian societies. We examine the effects of modernization and development on the cultures of China, Japan and Korea. Such topics as the individual, household and family; marriage and reproduction; religion and ritual; and political economic systems are introduced through ethnographic accounts of these cultures. This course provides students with sufficient information to understand important social and cultural aspects of modern East Asia.

This course uses anthropological approaches and theories to understand reproduction as a social, cultural and biological process. Drawing on cross-cultural studies of pregnancy and childbirth, new reproductive technologies, infertility and family planning, the course examines how society and culture shape biological experiences of reproduction. We also explore how anthropological studies and theories of reproduction intersect with larger questions about nature and culture, kinship and citizenship among others.

Archaeology and ethnography are combined to survey the history and cultures of indigenous South America, from the earliest settlements to contemporary communities. Topics include early migration, cultural classifications, pre-Hispanic sociopolitical patterns, native cosmologies and ecological adaptations, challenges to cultural survival and indigenous mobilizations.

This course is a general introduction to anthropological analysis of politics and the political. Through a broad survey of anthropological texts and theories, we explore what an ethnographic perspective can offer to our understandings of power and government. Special emphasis is placed on the role of culture, symbols and social networks in the political life of local communities.

This course is open to anyone particularly interested in learning about Asian/Pacific/American (A/P/A) history. The objective of the course is two-fold. The first is to provide the students with a fundamental understanding of A/P/A history that is inextricably linked to the goal of the United States to establish military, economic and cultural hegemony in the world as seen through its colonial and neo-colonial policies both in the U.S. and the Asian/Pacific region.

In this course we interrogate the space now known as “New England” by learning about it as a land with histories, peoples and life ways that predate and exceed the former English colonies and current United States. We devote our semester to studying the cultural distinctiveness of the Native peoples of New England—for example, the Mohawk, Mohegan, Abenaki, Wampanoag and Shaghticoke peoples—and to understanding the historical processes of encounter, adaptation, resistance and renewal that have characterized Native life in the area for centuries.

Topics course.: In this course we investigate and build a critical working vocabulary about 20th-century black migrant communities. Central to our work is exploring the tension between how these communities have been defined (via notions of pathology, disease and death) and how they have defined themselves through their spatial and environmental practices around belonging, collectivity and place. These are queer or non-normative modes of urbanism, and they challenge dominant idioms of territoriality.

Topics course.: The course, which is co-taught by Paula Giddings (Smith) and Bayo Holsey (Duke) via real-time video-conferencing, investigates the relationship between memory weighted by race and gender and the construction of public history in the U.S. and the diaspora. The course includes texts and guest lectures by authors from the Meridians: feminism, race and transnationalism journal. Public history includes memorialization, texts and popular culture. (E)

Students learn to use literary techniques to write factual, engaging narratives that read like fiction. Based on research, interviews and personal experience, creative nonfiction encompasses a wide range of genres, including memoir, travel writing, nature writing, science writing, food writing and biography. Prerequisites: one WI course. Enrollment in each section limited to 16. Course may be repeated once on a different topic.

This experiential course engages students in a critical exploration of innovation and financial viability. Through case studies, interactive discussions and workshops, and guest lectures, students learn and test economic models for innovative ideas. Students are expected to complete weekly assignments and a final project. A course application https://www.smith.edu/wfi/ is due Friday December 2 at 4:00pm. Enrollment limit: 12. Graded S/U. (E)