Universität Wien
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240507 VO Anthropology of the global south (P2) (2020W)

Registration/Deregistration

Note: The time of your registration within the registration period has no effect on the allocation of places (no first come, first served).

Details

Language: English

Examination dates

Lecturers

Classes (iCal) - next class is marked with N

Update 14.12.2020: Course on January 7th, instead of December 15th.

Update 11.12.2020: Due to the current Covid-19 Situation the course will change to digital till the end of the semester.

Update 9.12.2020: Course on December 15th, instead of December 7th.

Update 3.11.2020: Due to the current Covid-19 Situation the course will change to digital till the end of the year.

  • Tuesday 06.10. 15:00 - 18:15 Hybride Lehre
    Hörsaal A, NIG 4.Stock
  • Tuesday 13.10. 15:00 - 18:15 Hybride Lehre
    Hörsaal A, NIG 4.Stock
  • Tuesday 27.10. 15:00 - 18:15 Hybride Lehre
    Hörsaal A, NIG 4.Stock
  • Tuesday 10.11. 15:00 - 18:15 Digital
  • Tuesday 24.11. 15:00 - 18:15 Digital
  • Thursday 07.01. 15:00 - 18:15 Digital
  • Monday 11.01. 15:00 - 18:15 Digital

Information

Aims, contents and method of the course

The global south is a conceptual space comprising regions of the world that have shared experiences of exploitation, inequality, imperialism, and colonialism. However, scholars have pointed to the fluidity and instability of the concept, arguing that it is difficult to draw clear lines in a northsouth divide. Nevertheless, this contrasts with the ways in which the global south is generally understood, as a hard-geographic reality that brings up images of the absence of modernity, kleptocracy, corruption, underdevelopment, and marginality. In this course, we will deploy ethnographic perspectives to assess and challenge these perceptions and constructions. What is the global south, and how has anthropology engaged with this geopolitical, socio-economic, and cultural formation? How have anthropologists contributed to its study? What are the theoretical debates which anthropologists have generated around what is commonly understood as global south? The course readings are centered on ethnographic approaches to key sites and dynamics of urban politics, gendered activism, and violence among others. After completing this course, students should be able to:

approach the concept of the global south through a body of theories and ethnographic works;
understand the global south as a broad formation while recognizing its internal diversity;
develop their critical reading, analytical, and written communication skills;
critically engage with the links between theoretical frameworks and the media sphere by placing the readings in a real-life context.

Reading list (first part)

Ahmad, Tania. 2014. "Socialities of indignation: Denouncing party politics in Karachi." Cultural Anthropology 29(2): 411432

Allen, Lori A. 2009. "Martyr bodies in the media: Human rights, aesthetics, and the politics of immediation in the Palestinian intifada." American Ethnologist 36(1): 161180

Auyero, Javier. 2015. "The politics of interpersonal violence in the urban periphery." Current Anthropology 56(S11): S169S179

Caldeira, Teresa P.R. 2015. "Social movements, cultural production, and protests: São Paulo’s shifting political landscape." Current Anthropology 56(11): S126-S136

Chua, Liana, and Mathur Nayanika. 2018. "Introduction: Who are ‘we’?" In Who are ‘we’? Reimagining alterity and affinity in anthropology, edited by Liana Chua and Nayanika Mathur, 134. New York and Oxford: Berghan Books

Ciotti, Manuela. 2012. "Resurrecting seva (social service): Dalit and low-caste women party activists as producers and consumers of political culture and practice in urban north India." The Journal of Asian Studies 71(1): 149170

Comaroff, Jean and John L. Comaroff. 2011. "Theory from the South: Or, how Euro-America is evolving toward Africa." Anthropological Forum 22 (2): 113131

Das, Veena. 2007. "The force of the local." Life and words: Violence and the descent into the ordinary. 135-161. Berkeley: University of California Press.

De Boeck, Filip. 2015. ""Poverty" and the politics of syncopation: Urban examples from Kinshasa (DR Congo)." Current Anthropology 56(11): S146S158

Deeb, Laura. 2009. "Piety politics and the role of a transnational feminist analysis." The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 15: S112S126

Escobar, Arturo. 2008. "Introduction." Territories of difference: Place, movements, life, redes. 126. Durham and London: Duke University Press.

Gupta, Akhil and James Ferguson. 1997. ""Beyond "culture": Space, identity, and the politics of difference." In Culture, power, place: Explorations in critical anthropology, edited by Akhil Gupta and James Ferguson, 3351. Durham: Duke University Press

Assessment and permitted materials

Written exam at the end of the semester

Minimum requirements and assessment criteria

For a positive grade, 51 % is required

90-100 %= 1
77-89 %= 2
64-76 %= 3
51-63 %= 4
0-50 % = 5

Written exams will be evaluated according to the following criteria:
-language and style (spelling and grammar)
-demonstration of a thorough understanding of the readings discussed in class
-selection of the literature (choice of relevant readings, accuracy of the citations and arguments)
-clarity of arguments
-reflexivity
-critical thinking and originality

Examination topics

Written examination on the course readings

Reading list

(second part)

Harrison, Faye. 2017. "Engaging theory in the new millennium." In The Routledge companion to contemporary anthropology, edited by Simon Coleman, Susan B. Hyatt, and Anna Kingsolver, 2756. London and New York: Routledge

Holston, James. 2009. "Insurgent citizenship in an era of global urban peripheries." City & Society 21(2): 245267

Kerry, Chance R. 2015. ""Where there is fire, there is politics": Ungovernability and material life in urban South Africa." Cultural Anthropology 30(3): 394423

Krotz Esteban. 1997. "Anthropologies of the South: Their rise, their silencing, their characteristics." Critique of Anthropology 17(3): 237251

Li Murray, Tania. 2019. "Politics, interrupted." Anthropological Theory 19(1): 2953

Mahmood, Saba. 2005. "Introduction." Politics of piety: The Islamic revival and the feminist subject. 139. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press

Middleton, Townsend. 2017. "The afterlives of a killing: Assassination, thanatos, and the body politic in South Asia." Public Culture 30(1): 85112

Obeid, Michelle 2011. "The "trials and errors" of politics: Municipal elections at the Lebanese border." PoLAR: Political and Legal Anthropology Review 34(2): 251267

Olson, Rae Krisjon. 2013. "After the peace: The contagion of violence at the margins of the Guatemalan state." Anthropological Quarterly 86(4): 10311057

Omolade, Adunbi. 2017. "The Facebook president: Oil, citizenship, and the social mediation of politics in Nigeria." PoLAR: Political and Legal Anthropology Review 40(2): 226244

Phillips, Kristin D. 2010. "Pater rules best: Political kinship and party politics in Tanzania’s presidential elections." PoLAR: Political and Legal Anthropology Review 33(1): 109132

Quan, Adán. 2005. "Through the looking glass: U.S. aid to El Salvador and the politics of national identity." American Ethnologist 32(2): 276293

Scheper-Hughes, Nancy. 1995. "The primacy of the ethical: Propositions for a militant anthropology." Current Anthropology, 36(3): 409440

Schramm, Katharina 2005. "'You have your own history. Keep your hands off ours!' On being rejected in the field." Social Anthropology 13(2): 171183

Selka, Stephen. 2008. "The sisterhood of Boa Morte in Brazil: Harmonious mixture, black resistance, and the politics of religious practice." Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology 13(1): 79114

Thayer, Millie 2001. "Transnational feminism: Reading Joan Scott in the Brazilian sertão." Ethnography 2(2): 243271

Association in the course directory

Last modified: Fr 12.05.2023 00:21