How do appeals to nature—so called “natural” traits or “essences”—undergird the way race adheres to specific bodies? How does race, in turn, go beyond bodies to mark particular “natural” landscapes and non-human entities as other? In short, how can we understand the historically powerful relationship between race and nature? Drawing on anthropology and critical race studies, this course examines how race and nature work to convey “timeless truths,” inform notions of identity, and justify inequalities.

This course will explore the cultural, political, and historical complexity of everyday life in the Middle East and North Africa. Rather than attempting a survey of the entire region, the course engages a number of important themes in the anthropology of the Middle East and North Africa. Drawing on ethnographic accounts, films, literature, and art, the course will trace how experiences of colonization, imperialism, modernization, nationalism, capitalism, occupation, war and revolt shape the conditions of living for people in the region.

(Offered as ANTH_ 225 and THDA-229) To live is to experience and interact through a body that is perpetually in motion. This course explores the diversity of ways we experience, study, use, treat, and think about the dynamic human body, and why attention to embodied existence and movement matters. We will investigate the complexity of what people are doing when they dance, enter a room, play a sport, take a yoga class, or make a gesture.

How do various kinds of people in various societies worldwide define and pursue happiness? How do they deal with aspects of everyday life that affect their physical and psychological health? How does one’s gender, age, country, sociocultural background, and socioeconomic status shape the ways in which one might pursue health and happiness?

Through the comparative study of culture and society, anthropology explores fundamental questions about what it means to be and become human. Based on deep engagements with specific groups, communities, and settings, anthropology examines the practices, structures, and meanings that shape lived experience. This course introduces students to the basic concepts and methods of sociocultural anthropology.

Fall semester. The Department.

How to handle overenrollment: null

Students who enroll in this course will likely encounter and be expected to engage in the following intellectual skills, modes of learning, and assessment: independent research, critical analysis, close reading, and extended writing.

A one-semester project—either a shorter essay or some other form of independent interdisciplinary research and production. The capstone project serves as the grounds for a comprehensive evaluation of each student's achievement in the major.

Fall and spring semesters. The Department.

How to handle overenrollment: null

Students who enroll in this course will likely encounter and be expected to engage in the following intellectual skills, modes of learning, and assessment: independent research, critical analysis, close reading, and extended writing.

Independent reading course.

Fall and spring semesters. The Department.

How to handle overenrollment: null

Students who enroll in this course will likely encounter and be expected to engage in the following intellectual skills, modes of learning, and assessment: independent research, critical analysis, close reading, and extended writing.

Independent reading course.

Fall and spring semesters. The Department.

How to handle overenrollment: null

Students who enroll in this course will likely encounter and be expected to engage in the following intellectual skills, modes of learning, and assessment: independent research, critical analysis, close reading, and extended writing.

(Offered as AMST-386 and ENGL-413)  In this course, we will consider both historical fiction and creative nonfiction as literary forms that enable us to re-imagine American history. We will read closely, deeply and collaboratively. How do different authors approach historical research and storytelling? What is the role of the imagination in historical recovery? How can writing, reading, and translation enable us to engage critically and creatively with difficult, complex histories and legacies of enslavement and colonization?