Undergraduate Handbook

Department of Anthropologyhttps://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/anthropology

Email: anthropology.office@mu.iePhone: +353 (1) 708 3984

What is Anthropology?

Anthropology is the compara2ve study of human society and culture. By closely observing and analyzing different ways of life around the world, from tribal villages to Wall Street offices, anthropologists create new knowledge about what it means to be human today. Because of its broad reach, anthropology complements any other subject in the university – from biology to philosophy to media studies, and more – and it can change the way you see human life forever.

What will you learn if you study Anthropology?

You will learn about human social ac2on and cultural diversity. Anthropology will allow you to interpret why people do the things they do. An anthropologist may study different types of families, the raising of young children or the death of the elderly; why some people fit in or why others are cast out. We study war, peace, exchange or theH; we study food prac2ces, markets, industrial agriculture, and their effects on the planet; we study language, cultural performance, and mass media. We study the seemingly mundane, such as everyday habits of adornment (but also the symbolism of high fashion), and the manifestly sacred, such as world religions, their doctrinal precepts, and their ritual prac2ces.

You can also study forensic anthropology, which applies skeletal analysis and archaeological techniques to solve criminal cases, working with real-world specialists and prac22oners.

You will learn how to document and understand cultural difference. But, you will also learn about our evolu2on as a species, and the prac2ces that all humans display in common. Our ancestors and our ape cousins can tell us a lot about ourselves, but we will also discuss the limits and dangers of comparison. Together, we will try to understand how cultures and socie2es interact and change in the contemporary world, which is increasingly interconnected and which moves with ever-growing speed.

What can you do with a degree in Anthropology?

Anthropology compliments many career paths and anthropological skills are op2mal in an interconnected transna2onal economy and global poli2cal situa2on, where understanding cultural difference is necessary for individuals, businesses, and countries to succeed and flourish. Anthropology is also excellent prepara2on for those voca2ons associated with helping people, changing society, or : organizing, advocacy, the law, .

Anthropology prepares students for careers in a wide range of professions including interna2onal development, civil service and government, social work, business and finance, journalism, user experience and design research, heritage, ecology and conserva2on, public health, museum cura2on, marke2ng, and more.

ANTHROPOLOGY MODULES As a part of the general Arts degree, you can choose to study Anthropology as: Single Honours (50/60 ECTS) Double Honours (30 ECTS) Major or minor (40/20 ECTS)

First Year Modules

Second Year Modules

Third Year Modules

FIRST-YEAR MODULES In the first year, there are two general courses, Understanding Culture and Society in Semester 1 and 2 which will introduce you to anthropology. You can also choose two addi2onal modules – in Semester 1, you can explore Ireland’s place in the contemporary world. You will learn how a small country on the margins of Europe has become a fixture of the global imagina2on. You can also choose a module on Language, Ritual and Performance.

Semester 1

AN163 Understanding Culture & Society 1 (Compulsory) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment This course will introduce you to anthropology as the subject that studies human behaviour and cultural diversity. The first half of the module includes close reading of the book Gangsters without Borders, a fascina2ng anthropological study of the street gang MS-13. We use this to discuss, interac2vely, group iden2ty, language and power, and the societal structures that bind some and free others. In the second half of the module, we will focus on understanding how cultures and socie2es interact and change in the contemporary world, which is characterized by increased interconnectedness and movement. We will explore how people in different places respond to globaliza2on and moderniza2on in order to understand how our own cultures and ways of life transform under these new condi2ons. This introductory course in anthropology is compa2ble with every subject in university and it will change the way you see human life forever.

AN164 Ireland in the World (OpQonal) Assessment: 50% Con2nuous Assessment / 50% Exam In this module, Ireland’s unique place within anthropology becomes the occasion for considering Ireland’s place in the contemporary world. Students will gain a broad understanding of anthropological research conducted on the island of Ireland both in the past and today. The anthropology of Ireland speaks to mul2ple topics of cri2cal contemporary significance, including race, sexuality, (post)colonialism, religion, violence, feminism, migra2on, neoliberalism, and transna2onalism. How has a small country on the margins of Europe become a fixture of the global imagina2on? What dynamics have rendered Ireland the beneficiary – and vic2m – of the powerful forces of social transforma2on reshaping social life the world over? Ireland’s dis2nc2ve posi2on within both “Europe” and “Empire” affords a produc2ve vantage point for considering and cri2quing conven2ons of anthropological inquiry.

Semester 2

AN165 Understanding Culture & Society 2 (Compulsory) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment Con2nuing the comprehensive first-semester introduc2on to anthropology, this module covers a range of topics in which the problem of cultural difference comes into especially sharp focus. These include: moral and epistemological rela2vism, religion and cosmology, ideas about nature, gender and kinship, afflic2on and healing, and the culturally-adorned body. To deepen student understanding of the challenge of cultural difference, the module focuses on two topics as case studies in cross-cultural interpreta2on: the veil and witchcraH. In the first half the module, we will consider cloth and clothing, fashion and faith through the medium of the hijab. As an object of material and visual culture, the headscarf is frequently co-opted as a vehicle for mul2ple social and cultural agendas. It is both personally in2mate and outwardly expressive. OHen, the hijab - this single piece of cloth - acts as a lightning rod for emo2ve stereotypes regarding race, religion, gender and geopoli2cal forces. As such it carries a transforma2onal quality as much as a representa2ve one. In the second half of the module, we look at diverse contemporary and historical cases of witchcraH phenomena, including a famous Irish case, in order to explore themes of social inequality, scapegoa2ng, human rights, and violence. By engaging puta2vely ‘exo2c’ beliefs, anthropology provokes us to ques2on our own ‘taken for granted’ assump2ons about the world.

AN166 Talk, Ritual and Performance (OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment This module will introduce students to the ethnographic study of communica2on, moving from ordinary talk, through performance, to ritual ac2on. We will explore the ways in which these communica2ve forms are structured, and how they relate to and transform their social sekngs. Along the way, we will introduce ourselves to fundamental theore2cal concepts and case studies in Linguis2c and Semio2c Anthropology, performance studies, and the anthropology of religion.

SECOND-YEAR MODULES In the second year, the two compulsory modules focus 1) on ethnographic wri2ng – here you will be able to learn what anthropologists do through a close reading of anthropological works that will take you to different places of the globe. 2) You will also learn about methods of anthropological research in sekngs ranging from remote villages to urban or digital environments, from organic communi2es of people to complex formal organiza2ons, distributed across many sites and cultures. You will interact with professional ethnographic prac22oners working in government, NGO and business environments. Other modules that you can choose from focus on language, culture and media2on, afflic2on and healing, anthropology of food, self, person and iden2ty, poverty and development, material culture, law and also a topical module on Africa.

Semester 1

AN238 Reading Ethnography (Compulsory) Assessment: 100% ConQnuous Assessment This module looks at contemporary ethnographic wri2ng in anthropology. The aim of the course is to learn about what anthropologists do through a close reading of a range of anthropological works. Through these ethnographies we will learn about the ques2ons anthropologists ask; the types of theore2cal influences they employ; the prac2ces they engage in and data they marshal in forming an argument. Student par2cipa2on and peer discussion will be expected in all sessions.

AN212 Language, Culture and MediaQon: LinguisQc Anthropology (OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment This module inves2gates the ways that human thought, social ac2on, and culture are mediated by language and related semio2c systems. We will inves2gate a few of the ways that social organisa2on, social rela2onships, and iden2ty are mediated through talk, then explore the ways that social rela2onships and talk itself are transformed via mass media and large-scale publics.

AN213 AfflicQon and Healing: Medical Anthropology (OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Exam (held in January 2021) This course offers an introduc2on to medical anthropology. If sickness and suffering are universal aspects of the human condi2on, it is also true that disease and illness are always experienced within historically specific sociocultural frameworks. Pukng sickness into social context, in this course we tarry with the proposi2on that disease is never just about biology. Rather, we view health and illness as produced by and within hybrid and dynamic 'biosocial' milieux, melding the soma2c and the semio2c, culture and corporeality, body and mind. In exploring sickness across socie2es with an eclec2c ae2ology of this sort, medical anthropology takes seriously diverse ways of knowing and trea2ng disorder, some2mes ques2oning (and some2mes suppor2ng) the magisterial social posi2on of Western biomedicine.

AN214 From Seed to Plate: Anthropology and Food (OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment Whereas Dublin Bay prawns would be considered a tasteful addi2on to any menu in Ireland, communi2es in Oaxaca, Mexico, have tradi2onally regarded shrimp as too repulsive to eat. In contrast, Oaxacans delight in preparing toasted grasshoppers with garlic and lime as an appealing treat – but insects are an2the2cal to Irish ideas about what is appropriate for people to eat. What explains this difference? Although conven2onal wisdom claims that ‘there is no accoun2ng for taste,’ anthropology as a discipline holds that just the opposite is true. Food preferences (‘tastes’) reveal the deep and profound way in which culture shapes people and the social worlds we inhabit. Thus, although food is a universal human necessity, it is also always a cultural phenomenon. This module explores the anthropology of food, a remarkably rich and complex area of inquiry, and one that is evermore urgent as we come to understand the linkages between ea2ng habits, the poli2cal economy of food produc2on, and climate crisis.

AN231A Area Studies: Africa (OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment This module aims to familiarise the student with defini2ve works that have led to the current representa2on of Africa in anthropology and social science circles. The module debates a wide array of classic and contemporary ar2cles and books on the con2nent. In order to enable students to form their own perspec2ves, the module will be cri2cal but not conclusive. The module will also be useful for those who are interested in early theore2cal developments of anthropology.

Semester 2

AN210 Ethnographic Research (Compulsory) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment This course of lectures and tutorials explores how anthropological field research is designed and carried out in sekngs ranging from remote villages to urban or digital environments, from organic communi2es of people to complex formal organiza2ons or processes, distributed across many sites and cultures. The course addresses how such research gets wripen up as ethnographies and the class will have the opportunity to interact with professional ethnographic prac22oners working in government, NGO and business environments. Students will learn prac2cal ethnographic field techniques by carrying out a field exercise in par2cipant-observa2on, and will explore how to design an anthropological research project, including planning, literature and ethics review, fieldwork, analysis and write-up phases. Moreover, students will learn the epistemological founda2ons of anthropological research, how to prepare an annotated bibliography, and develop an ethnographic research proposal.

AN240 Self, Person, IdenQty; Psychological Anthropology (OpQonal) Assessment: 50% Con2nuous Assessment / 50% Exam (held in May 2021) This course is designed to introduce the student to how the rela2onships between personal minds and socio-cultural phenomena have been approached by anthropologists over the past one hundred years or so. The lectures focus on how specific thinkers have understood the problem of the individual mind within various social-cultural contexts in pursuit of models of social analysis and understandings of individuals that might have some actual rela2onship to how humans variably fashion their lives in different 2mes and places.

AN234 Anthropological Approaches to Poverty and Development (OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment This module tries to familiarise students with cri2cal anthropological perspec2ves on global poverty and inequality, and the efforts to address it, using a core ethnography and shorter theore2cal texts. It begins by considering the long historical process of the making of the contemporary Global South, and goes on to probe the exacerba2on of global inequality in the era of globalisa2on. Excerpts from key texts by Worsley, Appadurai and Scheper-Hughes are among the readings assigned for the first segment of this module. The second segment is based on a close textual reading of the classic ethnography on the subject of development, James Ferguson's 'The An2-Poli2cs Machine'. This module is a standalone module offered in the Anthropology Department; it is also the second half of the elec2ve stream 'Perspec2ves on Poverty and Development', which is a teaching collabora2on between the Interna2onal Development and the Anthropology departments.

AN211 Objects and AcQons: Material Culture (OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment This module looks at anthropological approaches to material culture, from spectacular monuments of the built environment to the commodi2es that furnish domes2c life. Through diverse ethnographies, we will focus on the ac2ve role of the material world to mediate, cons2tute and intervene in human rela2onships. Student par2cipa2on and peer discussion will be expected in all sessions.

AN237A Changing Legal Landscapes: Anthropology and the Law (OpQonal)

Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment This module will explore the field of legal anthropology from its historical origins to contemporary debates on legal pluralism and human rights. A core objec2ve of the course is to foreground law as a social process influenced by developments outside of the law. The course will examine the contested arenas of law and custom, crime and punishment and the dispu2ng process.

THIRD-YEAR MODULES

In the third year, the two compulsory modules focus on 1) contemporary anthropological theory and 2) globaliza2on and cultural change. You can also choose fascina2ng modules in user experience and innova2on, ethnographic film making, psychological and environmental anthropology or a module that explores contemporary iden22es through the prism of gender, sexuality and race. In the third year, you can also choose from a range of full-semester and short-term courses in forensic anthropology and archaeology.

Semester 1

AN344 Knowledge, Power, InsQtuQons (Compulsory) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment Few ideas have so firmly entrenched themselves in social scien2fic discourse over the last forty years or so more than the no2on that knowledge and power are inextricably bound up with one another, and, further, that a cri2cal aspect of rela2ons of domina2on are connected to groups of people gekng to know one another “scien2fically”. Crucial to this way of thinking is an implicit or explicit no2on of “ins2tu2on” defined as rela2vely structured parts of social life, generally with some connec2on to the state, generally commiped to visualising and solving a social “problem”. Weaving these levels together, are specific types of subjects and subjec2vi2es -- the sick, the bad, the mad, the dangerous to know – and, on the reforming side – doctors, nurses, wardens, ac2vists, and missionaries (among others) – interested in somehow making certain classes of humanity “discernable” and “beper”. The purpose of this module is three-fold. The first is to introduce the student to some of the ideas in the wri2ngs of Michel Foucault, who is prac2cally impossible to ignore in any discussion of power and knowledge. The second is to introduce several ideas concerning ins2tu2ons that echo one another to an extent, but that also diverge in crucial ways. The third is to look at some work in Anthropology clearly influenced by these sources.

AN307 Thesis Draa (OpQonal) (Compulsory for Single Honours Anthropology) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment This course involves the prepara2on and wri2ng up of data collected for a B.A. thesis.

AN342 User Experience and Service InnovaQon (OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment This module explores service innova2on through the context of human experience. It will equip undergraduate students with the transferable skillset required to bridge academic learning with the applied contexts of UX research prac22oners. Students will explore user experience in terms of both qualita2ve and quan2ta2ve research methods. Using methods such as design ethnography, experience-centred design and co-design, students will develop a toolkit for capturing experience across a range of societal and organisa2onal issues. This module will illustrate how students can create innova2ve ways of responding to these issues, bringing about posi2ve change through evidence-based prac2ces. Major interna2onal organisa2ons are seeking individuals who can bring crea2ve but also cri2cal responses to problem-solving. This module will expose students to the poten2al of innova2on to ini2ate or manage change in the design of private and public sector products and services, while also reflec2ng on public good and societal responsibility.

AN340 Visual Ethnography (OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment Visual Ethnography is a prac2ce-led module that teaches students to cri2cally evaluate visual media and provides instruc2on on how to create short ethnographic films and images. The course will be composed of a mix of lectures in Maynooth and fieldwork in local community organisa2ons and loca2ons. Students will receive a prac2cal introduc2on to storyboarding, filmmaking, photography, ligh2ng, sound and edi2ng. Small group film projects comprise a substan2al element of this module.

AN345 Ecology and Power: Anthropology and the Environment (OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment The anthropologist Eric Wolf coined the term 'poli2cal ecology' in 1972. Since then, anthropologists have made significant contribu2ons to the interdisciplinary field of poli2cal ecology, exploring the networks of power underlying human-environment rela2onships. This module will familiarise students with these contribu2ons, theore2cal as well as ethnographic.

AN351 ExcavaQon (takes place in June 2021 off-campus with IAFS - OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment The summer school programme will be delivered through onsite experien2al learning at the Ferrycarrig Ringwork, in the Irish Na2onal Heritage Park, Ferrycarrig, County Wexford. The program will give students a hands-on orienta2on in archaeology field techniques and field anthropology in a research driven environment. Students will par2cipate in different research, excava2on and post-excava2on tasks, and be expected to cri2cally evaluate the wider role of the excava2on, par2cularly in terms of public outreach. Student instruc2on will be led by an interna2onal team of archaeologists and specialists from the Irish Archaeology Field School in the disciplines of archaeology, physical anthropology and history, through both onsite tui2on and a series of onsite workshops and lectures. The module aims to maximise the teaching benefits of conduc2ng a mul2-faceped research programme in a 'live' research environment - excava2ng the first Anglo-Norman castle in the country.

AN353 Forensic Anthropology (takes place in June 2021 off-campus with IAFS - OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment The summer school programme will be delivered through onsite experien2al learning at the Ferrycarrig Ringwork, in the Irish Na2onal Heritage Park, Ferrycarrig, County Wexford. This course will cover human and compara2ve osteology, determining sex, approximate age at death, living stature, iden2fying palaeopathological condi2ons and understanding how these techniques are used in archaeological and forensic contexts

Semester 2

AN348 Shiaing Worlds: Theories and Ethnographies of Global Change (Compulsory) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment In this final-semester compulsory module, we will explore how anthropology and anthropologists explore contemporary processes of accelerated change and uneven global interconnectedness. Unlike most disciplines that focus on the macrolevel of globaliza2on, anthropology centres on globaliza2on’s situated nature and the lived experiences of diverse peoples who find themselves at the intersec2ons of global developments. Focusing on these ar2cula2ons of the global and the local, the module opens with three class sessions dedicated to sketching out conceptual and theore2cal approaches to contemporary global change within anthropology. These will help us explore concrete thema2c areas of anthropological research, including: iden2ty and ci2zenship in transna2onal fields; mobili2es, borders and militarism; culture and media; global economics and trade; environment and global health; cultural and poli2cal transforma2ons. The final class session will consider ethical challenges of globaliza2ons.

AN318 Thesis (OpQonal) (Compulsory for Single Honours Anthropology) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment This course involves the wri2ng up and comple2on of a B.A. thesis.

AN355 Troubling IdenQQes: Gender, Race and Sexuality (OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment This seminar focuses a reflexive and cri2cal anthropological lens on contemporary iden2ty poli2cs. The module samples historical genealogies of iden22es today, as well as philosophical, social scien2fic, and historical analyses of how ‘the self’ has come to be a key problem in contemporary society. We will review several of the dominant frameworks that shape contemporary iden2ty poli2cs, including mul2culturalism and the poli2cs of recogni2on, representa2on and cultural appropria2on, inequality and intersec2onality, and so on. Moving from the emergent norms and forms that make iden2ty intelligible as a poli2cal problem, the seminar also focuses on ac2vist strategies and tac2cs in this area. Substan2al apen2on will be given to an2-racist ac2vism in Ireland, the US, and elsewhere, as well as to the muta2ng global poli2cs of gender and sexuality, including especially queer and trans* perspec2ves.

AN346 Crime, Death and Forensic Anthropology (OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment The module is an overall introduc2on to forensic disciplines (aimed toward students of Anthropology and Criminology), divided into three broad strands (each containing four lectures): - Introduc2on to Forensics: describing the history of the discipline interna2onally and in Ireland. - Forensic Human Iden2fica2on: an introduc2on to Forensic Human Iden2fica2on within the Irish legal system. The disciplines directly involved in domes2c and interna2onal casework will be explained. The strand will overview the importance of the ‘three primary iden2fiers’ and the role of the iden2fica2on commission, as well as the use of various other disciplines in mass fatality incidents. - Forensics and Physical Anthropology: a more in-depth look at a single sub-discipline in Forensics, namely the prac2cal applica2on of skeletal excava2on and analysis in both archaeological and forensic contexts. It will detail the development of this specialism and will focus in par2cular on the methods used in analyses, and the informa2on which may be ascertained. The module will examine the importance of skeletal analysis in both archaeological and forensic sekngs.

AN347 Anxiety: Culture, History and Differing ConcepQons of Fear and Worry (OpQonal) Assessment: 100% Con2nuous Assessment Anxiety, worries and fears, are part of the normal human experience. Some2mes anxie2es get so strong that they cross from normal emo2ons to signs of mental illness. Anthropology has long analyzed how the boundaries between normality and abnormality have changed through 2me and across cultures. In this course, we will examine studies of anxiety that focus on how culture shapes the experience of anxiety. We will par2cularly examine these issues through the lens of the La2no cultural syndrome of ataques de nervios, translated as apacks of nerves. The course will also be informed by cri2cal work on the anxiety disorders in the development of cultural issues in the DSM-IV and DSM-5, the two most recent diagnos2c manuals developed by the American Psychiatric Associa2on.

Department of Anthropologyhttps://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/anthropology

Email: anthropology.office@mu.iePhone: +353 (1) 708 3984